Chapter 5 - Page 2

and a triumphant light glittering in his eye.

"No, my brave boys!" he exclaimed at last throwing down his pencil,
"we're not falling! Far from it, we are at present more than 150
thousand miles from the Earth!"

"Hurrah!" }
"Bravo!" } cried M'Nicholl and Ardan, in a breath.

"We have passed the point where we should have stopped if we had had no
more initial velocity than the Cambridge men allowed us!"

"Hurrah! hurrah!"

"Bravo, Bravissimo!"

"And we're still going up!"

"Glory, glory, hallelujah!" sang M'Nicholl, in the highest excitement.

"_Vive ce cher Barbican!_" cried Ardan, bursting into French as usual
whenever his feelings had the better of him.

"Of course we're marching on!" continued M'Nicholl, "and I know the
reason why, too. Those 400,000 pounds of gun-cotton gave us greater
initial velocity than we had expected!"

"You're right, Captain!" added Barbican; "besides, you must not forget
that, by getting rid of the water, the Projectile was relieved of
considerable weight!"

"Correct again!" cried the Captain. "I had not thought of that!"

"Therefore, my brave boys," continued Barbican, with some excitement;
"away with melancholy! We're all right!"

"Yes; everything is lovely and the goose hangs high!" cried the Captain,
who on grand occasions was not above a little slang.

"Talking of goose reminds me of breakfast," cried Ardan; "I assure you,
my fright has not taken away my appetite!"

"Yes," continued Barbican. "Captain, you're quite right. Our initial
velocity very fortunately was much greater than what our Cambridge
friends had calculated for us!"

"Hang our Cambridge friends and their calculations!" cried Ardan, with
some asperity; "as usual with your scientific men they've more brass
than brains! If we're not now bed-fellows with the oysters in the Gulf
of Mexico, no thanks to our kind Cambridge friends. But talking of
oysters, let me remind you again that breakfast is ready."

The meal was a most joyous one. They ate much, they talked more, but
they laughed most. The little incident of Algebra had certainly very
much enlivened the situation.

"Now, my boys," Ardan went on, "all things thus turning out quite
comfortable, I would just ask you why we should not succeed? We are
fairly started. No breakers ahead that I can see. No rock on our road.
It is freer than the ships on the raging ocean, aye, freer than the
balloons in the blustering air.