bottom of the Atlantic or the Pacific than anywhere else on the surface
of our globe. Besides, it may have sunk into some weak point of the
surface, at the early epoch when the crust of the Earth had not acquired
sufficient solidity."

"Captain," said Ardan, turning with a smile to M'Nicholl; "no use in
trying to catch Barby; slippery as an eel, he has an answer for
everything. Still I have a theory on the subject myself, which I think
it no harm to ventilate. It is this: The Selenites have never sent us
any projectile at all, simply because they had no gunpowder: being older
and wiser than we, they were never such fools as to invent any.--But,
what's that? Diana howling for her breakfast! Good! Like genuine
scientific men, while squabbling over nonsense, we let the poor animals
die of hunger. Excuse us, Diana; it is not the first time the little
suffer from the senseless disputes of the great."

So saying he laid before the animal a very toothsome pie, and
contemplated with evident pleasure her very successful efforts towards
its hasty and complete disappearance.

"Looking at Diana," he went on, "makes me almost wish we had made a
Noah's Ark of our Projectile by introducing into it a pair of all the
domestic animals!"

"Not room enough," observed Barbican.

"No doubt," remarked the Captain, "the ox, the cow, the horse, the goat,
all the ruminating animals would be very useful in the Lunar continent.
But we couldn't turn our Projectile into a stable, you know."