“—J. T. Maston had exclaimed, “Let us invent machines, let us find a fulcrum, and we will shift the axis of the Earth!” Many of you heard him, and will remember it. Well, the machines are invented, the fulcrum is found, and it is to the righting of the Earth’s axis that our efforts will be directed.” “What!” exclaimed Donellan. “You will put the Earth’s axis upright?” “Yes, sir,” said Barbicane; “or rather we can make a new axis on which the diurnal rotation formerly—” “Modify the diurnal rotation!” exclaimed Karkof. “Absolutely! and without touching its duration. The operation will bring the Pole to about the sixty-seventh parallel, and under such circumstances the Earth will behave like Jupiter, whose axis is nearly perpendicular to the plane of his orbit. This displacement of 23° 28′ will suffice to obtain for our Polar property sufficient warmth to melt the ice accumulated for thousands of years.” The audience looked at him in a state of breathlessness. No one dared to interrupt or even to applaud him. All were overwhelmed with the idea, which was so ingenious and so simple; to change the axis on which the globe turns! The representatives of the rival syndicates were astounded, annihilated, and remained without a word to say for themselves. But the applause broke out when Barbicane concluded with sublime simplicity,— “Thus it is the Sun himself who will melt the icebergs and ice-floes, and render it easy to obtain access to the Pole!” “And so,” said Donellan, “if man cannot get to the Pole, the Pole must come to man?” “Just so!” said Barbicane. CHAPTER VIII. LIKE JUPITER. Yes! Like Jupiter. At the time of that memorable meeting in honour of Michel Ardan—so appropriately mentioned by the orator—if J. T. Maston had excitedly exclaimed, “Let us right the Earth’s axis,” it was because the daring and fantastical Frenchman, one of the heroes of the Moon Voyage, had chanted his dithyrambic hymn in honour of the most important planets of our solar system. In his superb panegyric he had celebrated the special advantages of the giant planet, as we briefly reported at the time. The problem solved by the calculator of the Gun Club was the substitution of a new axis of rotation for the old one on which the Earth had turned ever since in popular phrase, “the world was a world.” This new axis of rotation would be perpendicular to the plane of its orbit; and under such conditions the climatal situation of the old Pole would be much the same as that of Trondhjem, in Norway, in spring-time. The palæocrystic armour would thus naturally melt under the rays of the Sun; and at the same time climate would be distributed over the Earth as the climates are distributed in Jupiter.