Belonging rather to the Moon's dark
side than to her Earth side, they are visible to terrestrial astronomers
only when she is in her highest northern latitudes. Those faint peaks
beyond them that you can catch with such difficulty must be those of
_Newton_ and _Curtius_."
"How in the world can you tell?" asked Ardan.
"They are the highest mountains in the circumpolar regions," replied
Barbican. "They have been measured with the greatest care; _Newton_ is
23,000 feet high."
"More or less!" laughed Ardan. "What Delphic oracle says so?"
"Dear friend," replied Barbican quietly, "the visible mountains of the
Moon have been measured so carefully and so accurately that I should
hardly hesitate in affirming their altitude to be as well known as that
of Mont Blanc, or, at least, as those of the chief peaks in the
Himalayahs or the Rocky Mountain Range."
"I should like to know how people set about it," observed Ardan
incredulously.
"There are several well known methods of approaching this problem,"
replied Barbican; "and as these methods, though founded on different
principles, bring us constantly to the same result, we may pretty
safely conclude that our calculations are right.
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