By becoming a satellite, she had lost the native
perfect regularity of her outline; her centre of gravity had shifted
from her real centre; and as a result of this arrangement, some
scientists have drawn the conclusion that the Moon's air and water have
been attracted to that portion of her surface which is always invisible
to the inhabitants of the Earth.
The convexity of her outline, this bulging prominence of her surface,
however, did not last long. The travellers were getting too near to
notice it. They were beginning to survey the Moon as balloonists survey
the Earth. The Projectile was now moving with great rapidity--with
nothing like its initial velocity, but still eight or nine times faster
than an express train. Its line of movement, however, being oblique
instead of direct, was so deceptive as to induce Ardan to flatter
himself that they might still reach the lunar surface. He could never
persuade himself to believe that they should get so near their aim and
still miss it. No; nothing might, could, would or should induce him to
believe it, he repeated again and again. But Barbican's pitiless logic
left him no reply.
"No, dear friend, no. We can reach the Moon only by a fall, and we don't
fall.
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