Indeed, I
      had so well secured them in their places, that such an accident
      was entirely out of the question. Looking at my watch, I found it
      six o’clock. I was still rapidly ascending, and my barometer gave
      a present altitude of three and three-quarter miles. Immediately
      beneath me in the ocean, lay a small black object, slightly
      oblong in shape, seemingly about the size, and in every way
      bearing a great resemblance to one of those childish toys called
      a domino. Bringing my telescope to bear upon it, I plainly
      discerned it to be a British ninety four-gun ship, close-hauled,
      and pitching heavily in the sea with her head to the W.S.W. Besides this ship, I saw nothing but the ocean and the sky, and
      the sun, which had long arisen. “It is now high time that I should explain to your Excellencies
      the object of my perilous voyage. Your Excellencies will bear in
      mind that distressed circumstances in Rotterdam had at length
      driven me to the resolution of committing suicide. It was not,
      however, that to life itself I had any positive disgust, but that
      I was harassed beyond endurance by the adventitious miseries
      attending my situation. In this state of mind, wishing to live,
      yet wearied with life, the treatise at the stall of the
      bookseller opened a resource to my imagination. I then finally
      made up my mind. I determined to depart, yet live—to leave the
      world, yet continue to exist—in short, to drop enigmas, I
      resolved, let what would ensue, to force a passage, if I could,
      to the moon. Now, lest I should be supposed more of a madman than
      I actually am, I will detail, as well as I am able, the
      considerations which led me to believe that an achievement of
      this nature, although without doubt difficult, and incontestably
      full of danger, was not absolutely, to a bold spirit, beyond the
      confines of the possible. “The moon’s actual distance from the earth was the first thing to
      be attended to. Now, the mean or average interval between the
      centres of the two planets is 59.9643 of the earth’s equatorial
      radii, or only about 237,000 miles. I say the mean or average
      interval, but it must be borne in mind that the form of the
      moon’s orbit being an ellipse of eccentricity amounting to no
      less than 0.05484 of the major semi-axis of the ellipse itself,
      and the earth’s centre being situated in its focus, if I could,
      in any manner, contrive to meet the moon, as it were, in its
      perigee, the above mentioned distance would be materially
      diminished. But, to say nothing at present of this possibility,
      it was very certain that, at all events, from the 237,000 miles I
      would have to deduct the radius of the earth, say 4,000, and the
      radius of the moon, say 1,080, in all 5,080, leaving an actual
      interval to be traversed, under average circumstances, of 231,920
      miles. Now this, I reflected, was no very extraordinary distance. Travelling on land has been repeatedly accomplished at the rate
      of thirty miles per hour, and indeed a much greater speed may be
      anticipated. But even at this velocity, it would take me no more
      than 322 days to reach the surface of the moon. There were,
      however, many particulars inducing me to believe that my average
      rate of travelling might possibly very much exceed that of thirty
      miles per hour, and, as these considerations did not fail to make
      a deep impression upon my mind, I will mention them more fully
      hereafter. “The next point to be regarded was a matter of far greater
      importance. From indications afforded by the barometer, we find
      that, in ascensions from the surface of the earth we have, at the
      height of 1,000 feet, left below us about one-thirtieth of the
      entire mass of atmospheric air, that at 10,600 we have ascended
      through nearly one-third; and that at 18,000, which is not far
      from the elevation of Cotopaxi, we have surmounted one-half the
      material, or, at all events, one-half the ponderable, body of air
      incumbent upon our globe. It is also calculated that at an
      altitude not exceeding the hundredth part of the earth’s
      diameter—that is, not exceeding eighty miles—the rarefaction
      would be so excessive that animal life could in no manner be
      sustained, and, moreover, that the most delicate means we possess
      of ascertaining the presence of the atmosphere would be
      inadequate to assure us of its existence. But I did not fail to
      perceive that these latter calculations are founded altogether on
      our experimental knowledge of the properties of air, and the
      mechanical laws regulating its dilation and compression, in what
      may be called, comparatively speaking, the immediate vicinity of
      the earth itself; and, at the same time, it is taken for granted
      that animal life is and must be essentially incapable of
      modification at any given unattainable distance from the surface. Now, all such reasoning and from such data must, of course, be
      simply analogical. The greatest height ever reached by man was
      that of 25,000 feet, attained in the aeronautic expedition of
      Messieurs Gay-Lussac and Biot. This is a moderate altitude, even
      when compared with the eighty miles in question; and I could not
      help thinking that the subject admitted room for doubt and great
      latitude for speculation. “But, in point of fact, an ascension being made to any given
      altitude, the ponderable quantity of air surmounted in any
      farther ascension is by no means in proportion to the additional
      height ascended (as may be plainly seen from what has been stated
      before), but in a ratio constantly decreasing. It is therefore
      evident that, ascend as high as we may, we cannot, literally
      speaking, arrive at a limit beyond which no atmosphere is to be
      found. It must exist, I argued; although it may exist in a state
      of infinite rarefaction. “On the other hand, I was aware that arguments have not been
      wanting to prove the existence of a real and definite limit to
      the atmosphere, beyond which there is absolutely no air
      whatsoever. But a circumstance which has been left out of view by
      those who contend for such a limit seemed to me, although no
      positive refutation of their creed, still a point worthy very
      serious investigation.