he invisible nimbus of the moon. During that rapid peep,
continents, seas, and forests had appeared to them. Then the atmosphere
did give there its life-giving particles? Questions still not solved,
eternally asked by American curiosity.

It was then 3.30 p.m. The bullet was still describing its curve round
the moon. Had its route again been modified by the meteor? It was to be
feared. The projectile ought, however to describe a curve imperturbably
determined by the laws of mechanics. Barbicane inclined to the opinion
that this curve would be a parabola and not an hyperbola. However, if
the parabola was admitted, the bullet ought soon to come out of the cone
of shadow thrown into the space on the opposite side to the sun. This
cone, in fact, is very narrow, the angular diameter of the moon is so
small compared to the diameter of the orb of day. Until now the
projectile had moved in profound darkness. Whatever its speed had
been--and it could not have been slight--its period of occultation
continued. That fact was evident, but perhaps that would not have been
the case in a rigidly parabolical course. This was a fresh problem which
tormented Barbicane's brain, veritably imprisoned as it was in a web of
the unknown which he could not disentangle.

Neither of the travellers thought of taking a minute's rest. Each
watched for some unexpected incident which should throw a new light on
their uranographic studies. About five o'clock Michel distributed to
them, by way of dinner, some morsels of bread and cold meat, which were
rapidly absorbed, whilst no one thought of leaving the port-light, the
panes of which were becoming incrusted under the condensation of vapour.

About 5.45 p.m., Nicholl, armed with his telescope, signalised upon the
southern border of the moon, and in the direction followed by the
projectile, a few brilliant points outlined against the dark screen of
the sky. They looked like a succession of sharp peaks with profiles in a
tremulous line. They were rather brilliant. The terminal line of the
moon looks the same when she is in one of her octants.

They could not be mistaken. There was no longer any question of a simple
meteor, of which that luminous line had neither the colour nor the
mobility, nor of a volcano in eruption. Barbicane did not hesitate to
declare what it was.

"The sun!" he exclaimed.

"What! the sun!" answered Nicholl and Michel Ardan.

"Yes, my friends, it is the radiant orb itself, li