arried?"

"You are asking too much," remonstrated the count.

"I confess," said the lieutenant, "that just at present I am not able to
clear away the uncertainty of the future; but I feel confident that by
careful observation at various points we shall arrive at conclusions
which not only will determine our path, but perhaps may clear up the
mystery about our geological structure."

"Allow me to ask," said Count Timascheff, "whether such a new asteroid
would not be subject to ordinary mechanical laws, and whether, once
started, it would not have an orbit that must be immutable?"

"Decidedly it would, so long as it was undisturbed by the attraction
of some considerable body; but we must recollect that, compared to the
great planets, Gallia must be almost infinitesimally small, and so might
be attracted by a force that is irresistible."

"Altogether, then," said Servadac, "we seem to have settled it to our
entire satisfaction that we must be the population of a young little
world called Gallia. Perhaps some day we may have the honor of being
registered among the minor planets."

"No chance of that," quickly rejoined Lieutenant Procope. "Those minor
planets all are known to rotate in a narrow zone between the orbits of
Mars and Jupiter; in their perihelia they cannot approximate the sun as
we have done; we shall not be classed with them."

"Our lack of instruments," said the count, "is much to be deplored; it
baffles our investigations in every way."

"Ah, never mind! Keep up your courage, count!" said Servadac, cheerily.

And Lieutenant Procope renewed his assurances that he entertained good
hopes that every perplexity would soon be solved.

"I suppose," remarked the count, "that we cannot attribute much
importance to the last line: _'Va bene! All right!!_ Parfait!!!'"

The captain answered, "At least, it shows that whoever wrote it had no
murmuring or complaint to make, but was quite content with the new order
of things."

CHAPTER XVI. THE RESIDUUM OF A CONTINENT

Almost unconsciously, the voyagers in the _Dobryna_ fell into the habit
of using Gallia as the name of the new world in which they became aware
they must be making an extraordinary excursion through the realms
of space. Nothing, however, was allowed to divert them from their
ostensible object of making a survey of the coast of the Mediterranean,
and accordingly they persevered in following that singular boundary
which had revealed itself to