Preliminary

RESUMING THE FIRST PART OF THE WORK AND SERVING AS AN INTRODUCTION TO
THE SECOND.

A few years ago the world was suddenly astounded by hearing of an
experiment of a most novel and daring nature, altogether unprecedented
in the annals of science. The BALTIMORE GUN CLUB, a society of
artillerymen started in America during the great Civil War, had
conceived the idea of nothing less than establishing direct
communication with the Moon by means of a projectile! President
Barbican, the originator of the enterprise, was strongly encouraged in
its feasibility by the astronomers of Cambridge Observatory, and took
upon himself to provide all the means necessary to secure its success.
Having realized by means of a public subscription the sum of nearly five
and a half millions of dollars, he immediately set himself to work at
the necessary gigantic labors.

In accordance with the Cambridge men's note, the cannon intended to
discharge the projectile was to be planted in some country not further
than 28° north or south from the equator, so that it might be aimed
vertically at the Moon in the zenith. The bullet was to be animated with
an initial velocity of 12,000 yards to the second. It was to be fired
off on the night of December 1st, at thirteen minutes and twenty seconds
before eleven o'clock, precisely. Four days afterwards it was to hit the
Moon, at the very moment that she reached her _perigee_, that is to say,
her nearest point to the Earth, about 228,000 miles distant.

The leading members of the Club, namely President Barbican, Secretary
Marston, Major Elphinstone and General Morgan, forming the executive
committee, held several meetings to discuss the shape and material of
the bullet, the nature and position of the cannon, and the quantity and
quality of the powder. The decision soon arrived at was as follows:
1st--The bullet was to be a hollow aluminium shell, its diameter nine
feet, its walls a foot in thickness, and its weight 19,250 pounds;
2nd--The cannon was to be a columbiad 900 feet in length, a well of that
depth forming the vertical mould in which it was to be cast, and
3rd--The powder was to be 400 thousand pounds of gun cotton, which, by
developing more than 200 thousand millions of cubic feet of gas under
the projectile, would easily send it as far as our satellite.

These questions settled, Barbican, aided by Murphy, the Chief Engineer
of the Cold Spring Iron Works, selected a spot in Florida, near the 27th
degree north latitude, called Stony Hill, where after the performance of
many wonderful feats in mining engineering, the Columbiad was
successfully cast.

Things had reached this state when an incident occurred which excited
the general interest a hundred fold.