"Yes; everything is lovely and the goose hangs high!" cried the Captain,
who on grand occasions was not above a little slang.

"Talking of goose reminds me of breakfast," cried Ardan; "I assure you,
my fright has not taken away my appetite!"

"Yes," continued Barbican. "Captain, you're quite right. Our initial
velocity very fortunately was much greater than what our Cambridge
friends had calculated for us!"

"Hang our Cambridge friends and their calculations!" cried Ardan, with
some asperity; "as usual with your scientific men they've more brass
than brains! If we're not now bed-fellows with the oysters in the Gulf
of Mexico, no thanks to our kind Cambridge friends. But talking of
oysters, let me remind you again that breakfast is ready."

The meal was a most joyous one. They ate much, they talked more, but
they laughed most. The little incident of Algebra had certainly very
much enlivened the situation.

"Now, my boys," Ardan went on, "all things thus turning out quite
comfortable, I would just ask you why we should not succeed? We are
fairly started. No breakers ahead that I can see. No rock on our road.
It is freer than the ships on the raging ocean, aye, freer than the
balloons in the blustering air. But the ship arrives at her destination;
the balloon, borne on the wings of the wind, rises to as high an
altitude as can be endured; why then should not our Projectile reach the
Moon?"