on a carriage or railway car and
only through it to the passengers, Ayrault and his companions had no
unusual sensation except loss of weight, for, when they were so far
from the earth, its attraction was very slight, and no other planet was
near enough to take its place. After breakfast, wishing to reach the
dome, and realizing that it would be unnecessary to climb, each in turn
gave a slight spring and was obliged to put up his hands to avoid
striking the roof. In the cool quiet of the dark dome it was difficult
to believe that only twenty feet away the sun was shining with such
intensity upon the metal base as to make it too hot on the inside to
touch without gloves.

The first thing that attracted their attention was the size and
brilliance of Mars. Although this red planet was over forty million
miles from the earth when they started, they calculated that it was
less than thirty million miles from them now, or five millions nearer
than it had ever been to them before. This reduction in distance, and
the clearness of the void through which they saw it, made it a splendid
sight, its disk showing clearly. From hour to hour its size and
brightness increased, till towards evening it looked like a small, full
moon, the sun shining squarely upon it. They calculated that on the
course they were moving they should pass about nine hundred thousand
miles to the right or behind it, since it was moving towards their
left. They were interested to see what effect the mass of Mars would
have on the Callisto, and saw here a chance of still further increasing
their speed. Notwithstanding its tremendous rate, they expected to see
the Callisto swerve from its straight line and move towards Mars, whose
orbital speed of nine hundred miles a minute they thought would take it
out of the Callisto's way, so that no actual collision would occur even
if their air-ship were left to her own devices.

Towards evening they noticed through their glasses that several
apparently island peaks in the southern hemisphere, which was turned
towards them, became white, from which they concluded that a snow-storm
was in progress. The south polar region was also markedly glaciated,
though the icecap was not as extensive as either of those at the poles
of the earth.

"As the Martian winters must be fully as severe as ours," said
Cortlandt, "on account of their length, the planet's distance from the
sun, and the twenty-seven and a half degrees inc