The beams, no longer strained through the misty atmosphere of the Earth, streamed copiously in through the glass and coated the interior walls of the Projectile with a brilliant silvery plating.

The intense blackness of the sky enhanced the dazzling radiance of the Moon.

Even the stars blazed with a new and unequalled splendor, and, in the absence of a refracting atmosphere, they flamed as bright in the close proximity of the Moon as in any other part of the sky.
You can easily conceive the interest with which these bold travellers gazed on the Starry Queen, the final object of their daring journey.

She was now insensibly approaching the zenith, the mathematical point which she was to reach four days later.

They presented their telescopes, but her mountains, plains, craters and general characteristics hardly came out a particle more sharply than if they had been viewed from the Earth.
Still, her light, unobstructed by air or vapor, shimmered with a lustre actually transplendent.