“Your observation is right,” returned Uncle Paul, “but only in a certain degree. Yes, it is true that twelve hours from now we shall be in an inverse position; our heads will be toward that point in space to which our feet are now turned. But despite this inversion there will be no danger of our falling, nor even the slightest inconvenience of any kind; for our heads will always be up, that is to say toward the sky, since the sky surrounds the terrestrial globe everywhere; our feet will always be down, that is to say resting on the ground. Understand thoroughly, once for all, that to fall is to rush toward the ground, and not into surrounding space. So that notwithstanding all the evolutions of our globe, as we are always on the earth, feet on the ground, head toward the sky, we are always in an upright position, without any unpleasant feeling, without any danger of falling.” “Does the terrestrial globe turn very fast?” Emile inquired. “It turns on its axis once in twenty-four hours. Therefore any point in its middle region, the region that makes the longest journey, travels in the same time forty millions of meters, that is to say a journey equal to the circuit of the earth, or 462 meters a second. That is about the speed of a cannon-ball as it leaves the cannon’s mouth, or about thirty times the speed of the fastest locomotive. Mountains, plains, seas, apparently fixed in their places for time and for eternity, are perpetually chasing one another in a circle, with the formidable speed of more than one-tenth of a league a second.” “And yet everything seems to us to be stationary.” “Without the jolting of the car should we not think we were standing still when the train carries us with such frightful speed? Well, the rapid movement of the earth is at the same time so gentle that it is impossible to be aware of it except by the apparent motion of the stars.” “By rising to a certain height in a balloon,” said Jules, “we ought to see the earth turning under us. Seas and their islands, continents with their empires, forests, and mountains, ought in succession to come under the eyes of the observer, who in twenty-four hours sees the turning of the whole earth. What a magnificent spectacle that must be! What a journey, so wonderful and with so little fatigue! When the rotation brings back one’s own country, one descends and it is accomplished. In twenty-four hours, without changing place, one has seen the whole world.”