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Nebula

The Unique Experiences of a Visit to a Hitherto Undiscovered

Terrestrial Satellite

By EUGENE S. BISBEE
Historian of the Exploring Expedition

"L

AST fall, I participated in an experience that for its wonderful phases has never been duplicated."

John Bennett reached for his pipe, filled and lighted it, and then glanced toward me as if to ask if I wished to hear what he had to divulge. He is a very remarkable man, of that rare type fast disappearing. Like the "poet of the Sierras," he wears a flowing, patriarchal beard, and hair to match, and is a student and a poet by nature. For more than half a century he has made his home in the heart of California's majestic mountains, where he is surrounded by all the comforts and none of the harshness of civilization. His wife and six stalwart sons, four of whom are married and have offspring, and a daughterMay, named for her natal month, and as charming as her namesake-form the little colony in the hills; and there is never a moment when ennui comes to them. There is a splendid library, a veritable arsenal, and everything calculated to induce visitors to dally; but I may as well admit, parenthetically, that May was the primal object of my visit, although the companionship of her father often took me away from her side when strict duty as an engaged lover may have demanded my attention elsewhere. But that is not the story. I glanced at John Bennett in such a way that he saw he had in me the same good listener I had always shown myself to be, so he entered upon his tale. "I am the oldest graduate of Yale in California," he said; "and I think it was

this that brought to the ranch here a party of scientists from my old university. I am not at liberty to name them, for they are coming again to try another experiment, and until that has been made, the whole thing is a secret of theirs. It will not do any harm to tell as much as I intend to, however.

"They brought with them a dirigible. balloon, and confided that they were going to make an ascent and study the topography of the Sierras, so as to be able to make an accurate map of the entire range. It didn't turn out that way, however, as you will see.

"In a sort of superficial way I have always been interested in aërostatics and kindred sciences; and when they asked me to accompany them as guide and companion, I accepted the invitation with alacrity. We went farther up into the range, and made camp. They took their machine out, and began the work of assembling the parts; and I want to say right here that it was as complete a thing as ever man made. There was everything calculated to make the trip a success, and every appliance to prevent accident. It's pretty cold up on top of the range above timber line, and arrangements had been made to prevent this condition from retarding the experiments. The car of the balloon was made of isinglass over a frame of aluminum. It was entirely enclosed, and was heated from an electric motor, which also propelled the machine. the machine. Hydrogen gas was used as the lifting power, supplemented by another motor; and oxygen was manufact

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ured and supplied to the occupants of the car when the atmosphere became too rarefied for comfortable breathing. Provisions were stored for the partyenough to last six men a week-and when the ascension was made, it seemed that not a thing had been overlooked. All sorts of anemometers, barometers, and thermometers were taken along, and everything necessary for the proper study of the conditions that might confront the party after leaving the earth.

"It was a sparkling morning when the signal was given; and we arose with a bound and were soon soaring over the tops of the snowy peaks. Never shall I forget that sight as I gazed through the sides and bottom of the transparent car. So bright was the sunshine that we were forced to draw the green silk curtains at some of the windows. Within five minutes we were looking down on toy mountains that were dropping away from us as a stone drops from the top of a tall building; and the atmosphere had become so rarefied that the oxygen tank was opened into the car, and the heating motor was started. Far off to the west, we could see the tiny valleys, and, still farther, an endless blue expanse that marked the Pacific Ocean. Many men have exulted in the view from a balloon; but few have ever had the experience of making an ascension from a height above the sea of more than two miles. Straight upward we soared; and within an hour, during which we felt not the least discomfort, we had risen so high that the earth was now a broad expanse beneath us, blue in color and showing no convolutions whatever. It seemed perfectly flat at such a distance, and the ocean had become the same color as the land.

One of the gentlemen of the party lowered a thermometer through the floor, and drew it back within ten seconds, its bulb showing that the outside air was too cold for it to record the temperature. A special instrument was then sent down, and came back with the information that the rarefied atmosphere we were in was eighty degrees below zero. Within the car, the thermometers registered sixtytwo degrees, which was quite warm enough for comfort. In another hour we

again tested the outer atmosphere, and found that it had dropped to more than one hundred below zero. By this time the earth had become a dim haze, and calculations showed that we were more than sixty miles above its surface. The thought staggered me; but on we kept, the scientists exulting at such wonderful progress. Constant observations were being made of every condition, and all were jotted down for future reference; and still onward and upward we soared for another hour.

"At the end of the third hour, I noticed a remarkable thing, and called the attention of one of my companions to it. Ilitherto the earth had, as I have said, been a blue-gray blot beneath us. It now appeared part blue and part pale gray, the latter color being toward the west; and, as I interested my other fellow travelers in the sight, the western portion of the colored map was seen to grow larger as the eastern portion diminished in size. None of my companions could account for the phenomenon. The entire field of our vision was changing, until now it seemed that only a portion of the old familiar blue remained, the pale gray having absorbed it. Then, as suddenly as had come the other change, there crept in from the east a dark blue shadow that rapidly swept across the plain beneath, changing the color again to its own, while the former colors moved away. There were no definite objects in sight, only the monotonous dark blue that soon covered the entire field below us.

"Not understanding the cause of the change, and becoming somewhat exercised by it, the professor in charge of the expedition concluded to descend, and accordingly operated the machinery for that purpose. Rapidly the motor did its work, and the plain below began to assume a definite form. It changed its color from blue to blue and green, with here and there a dazzling spot that indicated water; yet even then the territory was wholly unfamiliar to any of us, even to me who know these mountains as you do your own home. The balloon, under the guidance of the practiced hand of the operator, descended rapidly toward a plain; but of course you are familiar enough with aërostatics to know that the

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"We arose with a bound and were soon soaring over the tops of the snowy peaks."

Immediately beneath us now was a perfectly circular disc of variegated colors, surrounded by an ocean of bright blue, with here and there a feathery cloud. The disc seemed very small in comparison with the surrounding blue ocean, and we could none of us understand it. The balloon now fell less rapidly than previously, and I happened to glance upward through the sides of the car. I almost fell over with astonishment, and could scarcely get my voice to call to the others to see what I saw. When

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Some of these bodies are as small as pinheads, while others may be larger. That this last was correct, was evident; yet how it had never been discovered by the earth's astronomers was a puzzle to me.

"That is a simple matter of explanation,' said our leader; 'this asteroid has never been discovered, for the same reason that many small but important things have been for years overlooked by scientists in search of greater fields to conquer. It is within less than one hundred miles of the earth, while the very nearest object that has ever attracted the telescopes of our astronomers is the moon, distant a quarter of a million miles. Can you not understand that no astronomer would ever train his instrument so as to focus an object less than a hundred miles distant?'

"That sounded reasonable, yet I asked him how it was that it had never been seen with the naked eye.

"Simpler still,' he answered, 'because this little planet is less than ten miles in diameter. So small an object, with a color nearly identical with that of the earth's atmosphere, would never be noticed, and, having no light of its own, could not be seen at any time. It is a mere speck in the sky, and no man can tell how long it has floated around our earth. There may be many more of them; but for the present we will confine ourselves to this one, and soon shall land and see what there is to see.'

"An aneroid barometer was then let through the trap in the floor, in order to ascertain the pressure of the atmosphere before we dared to open the car and step onto the little world we had discovered. The planet was growing larger every moment, and we were now within less than a mile of its surface. The instrument showed that the pressure was eight pounds to the square inch, which about equaled that on high mountains on the earth; so we were safe to land. The anemometer attached to the car at this time showed an entire lack of breeze, and we gently dropped to the surface of the 'Nebula,' as I had volunteered to call the discovery. As we looked upon the landscape, it seemed as if we had suddenly dropped into Southern California, and I could not possibly justify this condition

of verdure with the small size of the tiny world, for such a little thing could not be expected to obstruct enough of the heat of the sun to produce such a condition. Puzzled, I myself dropped a thermometer through the trapdoor and noted its register. It was eighty degrees a fact that further surprised me-and I said so.

"I dare say we shall find that there are other sources of heat besides the sun,' said one of my companions; and no sooner had we opened the car door and begun to climb down the anchor rope, which had been cast out, than we discovered the correctness of his prophecy. There were boiling springs everywhere, and the verdure was magnificent.

"Tying the anchor rope about a bowlder, we began a survey of our world. But first of all, I took a good look at the earth we had left a few hours before. It was a more magnificent sight than words can ever tell. It filled almost the entire dome of the sky, and the continent of North America looked exactly as it does on a raised globe such as we have in school-rooms. I could locate San Francisco as well as if I had had a map and pointer; and from that Western metropolis could trace the outline of the United States to the city of Chicago, and so on to the gateway of Europe-New York. It was wonderful! The air was not so rare as to be hard on lungs used to mountain conditions; but some of the party complained, and one suffered nosebleed. There was a rippling brook near at hand, its banks lined with plant life, and I went toward it to get a drink. I felt wonderfully elated in mind and body, and ran lightly toward it, falling on my chest, and quenching my thirst with the most refreshing water I had ever drunk. The stream was not more than ten feet wide, and, as far as we could see from where we stood, there was no narrower place. We wanted to cross it, and I fancied I could make the leap, old man though I am. I took a few steps backward, and then ran toward the bank and sprang into the air.

"I soared through that air like a bird, and landed at least twenty yards beyond the farther bank! My companions, as I alighted with the ease of a feather, first looked bewildered, and then broke into

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