"There is nothing whatever in it," replied Barbican decidedly: "a simple
proof is the fact that the Moon does not retain the slightest trace of
the vaporous envelope by which comets are always surrounded."
"Lost her tail you mean," said Ardan. "Pooh! Easy to account for that!
It might have got cut off by coming too close to the Sun!"
"It might, friend Michael, but an amputation by such means is not very
likely."
"No? Why not?"
"Because--because--By Jove, I can't say, because I don't know," cried
Barbican with a quiet smile on his countenance.
"Oh what a lot of volumes," cried Ardan, "could be made out of what we
don't know!"
"At present, for instance," observed M'Nicholl, "I don't know what
o'clock it is."
"Three o'clock!" said Barbican, glancing at his chronometer.
"No!" cried Ardan in surprise. "Bless us! How rapidly the time passes
when we are engaged in scientific conversation! Ouf! I'm getting
decidedly too learned! I feel as if I had swallowed a library!"
"I feel," observed M'Nicholl, "as if I had been listening to a lecture
on Astronomy in the _Star_ course."
"Better stir around a little more," said the Frenchman; "fatigue of body
is the best antidote to such severe mental labor as ours.
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