From the Earth to the Moon direct in ninety-seven hours and twenty minutes, and a trip round it . is notes willbear witness to this great fact in his selenographic observations. J These mountains of Doerfel and Leibnitz rose in the midst of Iplains of a medium extent, which were bounded by an indefinitesuccession of circles and annular ramparts. These two chainsarc the only ones met with in this region of circles. Compara-tively but slightly marked, they throw up here and there somesharp points, the highest summit of which attains an altitude of24,G00 feet. But the projectile was high above al
From the Earth to the Moon direct in ninety-seven hours and twenty minutes, and a trip round it . is notes willbear witness to this great fact in his selenographic observations. J These mountains of Doerfel and Leibnitz rose in the midst of Iplains of a medium extent, which were bounded by an indefinitesuccession of circles and annular ramparts. These two chainsarc the only ones met with in this region of circles. Compara-tively but slightly marked, they throw up here and there somesharp points, the highest summit of which attains an altitude of24,G00 feet. But the projectile was high above all this landscape, and theprojections disappeared in the intense brilliancy of the disc. Andto the eyes of the travellers there reappeared that original aspectof the lunar landscapes, raw in tone, without gradation of colours,and without degrees of shadow, roughly black and white, fromthe want of diffusion of light. But the sight of this desolate world did not fail to captivatethem by its very strangeness. They were nio^ing over thisregion as if they had been borne on the breath of some stonn,. HE DISTINGUISHED ALL THIS [p. 275.] TVCHO. 275 watching heights defile under their feet, piercing the cavities withtheir eyes, going down into the rifts, climbing the ramparts,sounding these mysterious holes, and levelling all cracks. Butno trace of vegetation, no appeaiance of cities ; nothing butstratification, beds of lava, overflowings polished like immensemirrors, reflecting the suns rays with overpowering belonging to a living world—everything to a deadworld, where avalanches, rolling from the summits of the moun-tains, would disperse noiselessly at the bottom of the abyss,retaining the motion, but wanting the sound. In any case itwas the image of death, without its being possible even to saythat life had ever existed there. Michel Ardan, however, thought he recognized a heap ofruins, to which he drew Barbicanes attention. It was about the80th parallel, in 30°
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade1870, bookpublishernewyo, bookyear1874
