"Where's the Moon?" cried Ardan in amazement.
"It appears as if she had been wiped out of creation!" cried M'Nicholl.
Barbican said nothing, but observed carefully. Not a particle, however,
could he see of the disc that had glittered so resplendently before his
eyes a few moments ago. Not a shadow, not a gleam, not the slightest
vestige could he trace of its existence. The darkness being profound,
the dazzling splendor of the stars only gave a deeper blackness to the
pitchy sky. No wonder. The travellers found themselves now in a night
that had plenty of time not only to become black itself, but to steep
everything connected with it in palpable blackness. This was the night
354-1/4 hours long, during which the invisible face of the Moon is
turned away from the Sun. In this black darkness the Projectile now
fully participated. Having plunged into the Moon's shadow, it was as
effectually cut off from the action of the solar rays as was every point
on the invisible lunar surface itself.
The travellers being no longer able to see each other, it was proposed
to light the gas, though such an unexpected demand on a commodity at
once so scarce and so valuable was certainly disquieting.
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