From the Earth to the Moon and Round the MoonDuring the War of the Rebellion, a new and influential club was established in the city of Baltimore in the State of Maryland. It is well known with what energy the taste for military matters became developed among that nation of ship-owners, shopkeepers, and mechanics. Simple tradesmen jumped their counters to become extemporized captains, colonels, and generals, without having ever passed the School of Instruction at West Point; nevertheless; they quickly rivaled their compeers of the old continent, and, like them, carried off victories by dint of lavish expenditure in ammunition, money, and men. But the point in which the Americans singularly distanced the Europeans was in the science of gunnery. Not, indeed, that their weapons retained a higher degree of perfection than theirs, but that they exhibited unheard-of dimensions, and consequently attained hitherto unheard-of ranges. In point of grazing, plunging, oblique, or enfilading, or point-blank firing, the English, French, and Prussians have nothing to learn; but their cannon, howitzers, and mortars are mere pocket-pistols compared with the formidable engines of the American artillery. |
Contents
The Gun Club | 11 |
President Barbicanes Communication | 19 |
Effect of the Presidents Communication | 28 |
Reply From the Observatory of Cambridge | 32 |
The Romance of the Moon | 39 |
The Permissive Limits of Ignorance and Belief in the United States | 45 |
The Hymn of the CannonBall | 51 |
History of the Cannon | 60 |
The New Citizen of the United States | 159 |
The ProjectileVehicle | 165 |
Final | 173 |
XXVI | 180 |
Foul | 186 |
Preliminary Chapter | 192 |
From Twenty Minutes Past Ten to FortySeven Minutes Past Ten P M | 198 |
The First Half Hour | 206 |
The Question of the Powders | 66 |
One Enemy V TwentyFive Millions of Friends | 73 |
Florida and Texas | 79 |
Urbi et Orbi | 85 |
Stones Hill | 92 |
Pickaxe and Trowel | 99 |
The Fete of | 105 |
XVI | 111 |
The Passenger of the Atlanta | 118 |
A Monster | 126 |
Attack | 134 |
How A Frenchman Manages An Affair | 147 |
Their Place of Shelter | 222 |
A Little Algebra | 233 |
The Cold of Space | 242 |
Question and Answer | 254 |
A Moment of Intoxication | 265 |
At SeventyEight Thousand Five Hundred and Fourteen Leagues | 278 |
The Consequences of A Deviation | 290 |
The Observers of the Moon | 298 |
Fancy and Reality | 302 |
Orographic Details | 306 |
Lunar Landscapes | 315 |
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Common terms and phrases
American asked Barbicane asked Michel asked Nicholl astronomers atmosphere Barbicane and Nicholl Barbicane's Belfast Bilsby Bronsfield calculations Cambridge Observatory cannon Captain Nicholl carbonic acid cast CHAPTER Columbiad companions continued Barbicane craters cried Michel darkness diameter distance earth enormous equal Espiritu Santo exclaimed Michel Ardan eyes fall feet fire Florida force of impulsion friends glasses Gun Club gun-cotton heat hemisphere hundred hurrahs hyperbola immense inhabitants J. T. Maston journey light Long's Peak lunar attraction lunar disc metal meteor miles minutes moon motion mountains never o'clock observations oxygen parabola passed perfect perigee planets pounds powerful President Barbicane profound darkness projectile projectile's pyroxyle question reach replied Barbicane replied Michel Ardan round satellite scuttle Selenites shock shot space stars Stones Hill Susquehanna Tampa Town telescope temperature terrestrial globe thick thousand travelers Tycho velocity weight worthy yards zenith