“O they supposed the Lunarians were going to see to that part of it. They had got the idea the Lunarians could do anything.”
“But could they have accomplished such an undertaking as that?”
“That question was never settled; but they would not have done it if they could. The Lunarians always felt very much mortified that the moon is only a satellite and not a full planet. They have got some little satisfaction, however, in the great amount of attention, the moon has always received from the people of the earth. In old times in fact the earthlings used to pay divine honors to our globe, as well they might. But if Mars were to become a satellite of the earth it is easy to see he would monopolize all the attention that has heretofore been lavished on us. We wouldn’t like that. No it looks as if you may depend upon it, the Lunarians would never lend themselves to a scheme like that. But a hoax like that has wonderful vitality.
“A little over a thousand years ago the Lunarians began to think of foreclosing their mortgage. They had the polar regions of Mars quietly explored, and were agreeably surprised to find large deposits of coal, iron, gold, silver, tin, copper and many other metals and valuable minerals. They were already posted as to the nature of the little moons Jack-Deimos and Lucy-Phobos. It was a difficult and perilous task to effect a landing on them, but after much effort it was accomplished. It was found that Jack Deimos, which by the way is about seven miles in diameter and twenty-two in circumference—you could ride clear around it on a bicycle in four hours—is about one-half iron, the rest rock containing gold, silver, lead and tin. Deimos always has the same side turned toward Mars, and on the opposite side is a lake about a mile in diameter and frozen solid to the bottom, which melts down a few inches every day and freezes up again at night. There is a little thin air, that does not extend more than one or two hundred yards high. The mass of this little moon is so small that its attraction for anything on it is very slight. An ordinary man weighs less than an ounce. He is considerably lighter on the side toward Mars than he is on the opposite side. One might stand on that side and shoot an arrow toward Mars, and it would not return to him, but continue its flight till it reached the planet.
“There is in several places quite a growth of a hardy plant something like an alga, although the temperature on the shady side is 40° below 0. It is hot on the sunny side. The difficulty of getting on this little moon is due to its small attractive power. When we approach a large body, such as the Moon or Mars its attraction draws us after it and gradually brings us to its surface. But Deimos attracts with so little force that we have to get up speed and force from some other body and so run alongside and catch him. He flies around his orbit at the astonishing speed of 3,610½ miles an hour or more than 50 miles a minute. In order to get up such a speed as that our folks had to go off a million miles from Mars in a direction opposite to the sun and then allow themselves to fall toward Mars until they were near the orbit of Deimos; then they turned on repulsion which sheered them off and caused them to describe an orbit around Mars in the same direction as that of Deimos. Deimos passed them several times before they could get into his attraction close enough to be pulled in by him.
“They afterwards boarded Lucy-Phobos in the same way. Her attraction is a little stronger than Jack’s as she is over eight miles in diameter. But her speed is still more terrific than his as she goes at the rate of 4,777 miles an hour or more than 79.2 miles a minute. She, too, always presents the same face to Mars.
“Having made up their minds how they would improve the property when they got it, they informed the King that they desired to foreclose the mortgage. He made no defense and instructed the authorities to throw no obstacles in the way. The foreclosure was advertised in the usual way and when the day of sale arrived there was the usual crowd of loafers, but no bidders except the Lunarians. They bid three million kiks for the whole outfit—one million each for the two frigid zones and one million for the two satellites, and the property was of course knocked down to them, considering the importance of the sale it was a quiet, tame affair.—The King was not a little displeased when he found they had bid in the property for less than the billion, billion, billionth part of their claim, thus leaving the debt practically unreduced. He supposed they would bid the face of their claim and thus wipe out the debt. Still, however, he made no attempt at redemption; in fact nobody would have given any more for the property than was bid. The title was confirmed to them by the court and they entered into possession.”
CHAPTER XV.
The Great Debt.
“The King began to be much concerned in regard to the great debt. He called his bankers together and had them compute it down to date. Then after brooding over the matter for some days he called his council and the Lunarian claimants together and made them a speech. He declared he was sick and tired of “paying interest.” True, he had never paid any, but it constantly added to the already most appalling debt to be found in the solar system. “In fact it is so great (said he) that we have no single words to express it. It is written by setting down 20 and then annexing to that a string of 153 ciphers. The original debt left by my illustrious ancestor the father of the canals was 1,000,000 kiks, at least that is all his successor assumed, and it is that insignificant sum that has grown to such overwhelming proportions.