necessary to life; one of these days, when the sun has grown dark and
cold, it may be neither lighted, nor warmed, nor fertilized; on the
other hand, it may be suddenly scorched by an outburst of heat,
analogous to what has been observed in temporary stars; not to speak of
many other sources of accidents and mortal peril, whose easy enumeration
we leave to the geologists, paleontologists, meteorologists, physicists,
chemists, biologists, physicians, botanists, and even to the veterinary
surgeons, inasmuch as the arrival of an army of invisible microbes, if
they be but deadly enough, or a well-established epidemic, would suffice
to destroy the human race and the principal animal and vegetable
species, without working the least harm to the planet itself, from a
strictly astronomical point of view.”
Just as the speaker was uttering these last words, a voice, which seemed
to come from a distance, fell, as it were, from the ceiling overhead.
But a few words of explanation may here perhaps be desirable.
As we have said, the observatories established on the higher mountains
of the globe were connected by telephone, with the observatory of Paris,
and the sender of the message could be heard at a distance from the
receiver, without being obliged to apply any apparatus directly to the
ear. The reader doubtless recollects that, at the close of the preceding
session, a phonogram from Mt. Gaurisankar stated that a photophonic
message, which would be at once deciphered, had been received from the
inhabitants of Mars. As the translation of this cipher had not arrived
at the opening of the evening session, the bureau of communications had
connected the Institute with the observatory by suspending a
telephonoscope from the dome of the amphitheater.
The voice from above said:
“The astronomers of the equatorial city of Mars warn the inhabitants of
the earth that the comet is moving directly toward the earth with a
velocity nearly double that of the orbital velocity of Mars. Mechanical
motion to be transformed into heat, and heat into electrical energy.
Terrible magnetic storms. Move away from Italy.”
The voice ceased amid general silence and consternation. There were,
however, a few sceptics left, one of whom, editor of La Libre Critique,
raising his monocle to his right eye, had risen from the reporters desk
and had exclaimed in a penetrating voice:
“I am afraid that the venerable doctors of the Institute are the victims
of a huge joke. No one can ever persuade me that the inhabitants of
Mars—admitting that there are any and they have really sent us a
warning—know Italy by name. I doubt very much if one of them ever heard
of the Commentaries of Cæsar or the History of the Popes, especially
as”—