ay."

"I must take care of my head, then, and hold it on," replied the
irrepressible orderly.

Unable to get the last word, the professor was about to retire, when
Servadac detained him.

"Permit me to ask you one more question," he said. "Can you tell me what
is the nature of the soil of Gallia?"

"Yes, I can answer that. And in this matter I do not think your
impertinent orderly will venture to put Montmartre into the comparison.
This soil is of a substance not unknown upon the earth." And speaking
very slowly, the professor said: "It contains 70 per cent. of tellurium,
and 30 per cent. of gold."

Servadac uttered an exclamation of surprise.

"And the sum of the specific gravities of these two substances is 10,
precisely the number that represents Gallia's density."

"A comet of gold!" ejaculated the captain.

"Yes; a realization of what the illustrious Maupertuis has already
deemed probable," replied the astronomer.

"If Gallia, then, should ever become attached to the earth, might it not
bring about an important revolution in all monetary affairs?" inquired
the count.

"No doubt about it!" said Rosette, with manifest satisfaction. "It would
supply the world with about 246,000 trillions of francs."

"It would make gold about as cheap as dirt, I suppose," said Servadac.

The last observation, however, was entirely lost upon the professor, who
had left the hall with an air almost majestic, and was already on his
way to the observatory.

"And what, I wonder, is the use of all these big figures?" said Ben Zoof
to his master, when next day they were alone together.

"That's just the charm of them, my good fellow," was the captain's cool
reply, "that they are of no use whatever."

CHAPTER VIII. JUPITER SOMEWHAT CLOSE

Except as to the time the comet would take to revolve round the sun,
it must be confessed that all the professor's calculations had
comparatively little interest for anyone but himself, and he was
consequently left very much to pursue his studies in solitude.

The following day was the 1st of August, or, according to Rosette,
the 63rd of April. In the course of this month Gallia would travel
16,500,000 leagues, attaining at the end a distance of 197,000,000
leagues from the sun. This would leave 81,000,000 leagues more to be
traversed before reaching the aphelion of the 15th of January, after
which it would begin once more to approach the sun.

But meanwhile, a marvelous world, ne