The Captain was frisky enough to remind you of a middle-aged Frenchman from the provinces, on a hasty visit to the capital for a few days' fun.

Ardan was in raptures.
"Oh! if Raphael could only see us!" he exclaimed in a kind of ecstasy.
"He would paint such a picture as would throw all his other masterpieces in the shade!" "Knock spots out of the best of them by fifty per cent!" cried the Captain, gesticulating well enough _a l'etudiant_, but rather mixing his metaphors.
[Illustration: A GROUP _A LA JARDIN MABILLE_.] "He should be pretty quick in getting through the job," observed Barbican, the first as usual to recover tranquillity.

"As soon as the Projectile will have passed the neutral point--in half an hour at longest--lunar attraction will draw us to the Moon." "We shall have to crawl on the ceiling then like flies," said Ardan.
"Not at all," said the Captain; "the Projectile, having its centre of gravity very low, will turn upside down by degrees." "Upside down!" cried Ardan.

"That will be a nice mess! everything higgledy-piggledy!" "No danger, friend Michael," said M'Nicholl; "there shall be no disorder whatever; nothing will quit its place; the movement of the Projectile will be effected by such slow degrees as to be imperceptible." "Yes," added Barbican, "as soon as we shall have passed the neutral point, the base of the Projectile, its heaviest part, will swing around gradually until it faces the Moon.

Before this phenomenon, however, can take place, we must of course cross the line." "Cross the line!" cried the Frenchman; "then let us imitate the sailors when they do the same thing in the Atlantic Ocean! Splice the main brace!" A slight effort carried him sailing over to the side of the Projectile.
Opening a cupboard and taking out a bottle and a few glasses, he placed them on a tray.