They both looked over the side of the Flying Machine and saw the Earth bathed in a sheen of gold, with here and there glimpses of brilliant purple showing.
“Oh! I know what it is now!” Janey cried, presently. “A thunder storm has just passed between us and the Earth and the sun is shining on the Clouds. Look! See the lightning?”
A faint rumble came up to them as of someone rolling potatoes down a wooden trough, and a vivid streak of blue zigzagged through the yellow of the clouds.
“The purple we see is the Earth in shadow beneath the clouds,” Johnny concluded, after a while.
The children watched the strange sight for a long time before they decided to go on. Then they looked away for a moment, and when they looked back toward the Earth they could not find it at once. They had traveled so far that the Earth now seemed no larger than a bright Star, and but for the fact that it was almost beneath them they would never have recognized it at all.
Lots of other Stars could be plainly seen now. The Moon had grown to an enormous size; in fact, it almost filled the sky behind them. The children were greatly surprised to see it. They had been watching the Stars in front of them and they had not once turned their heads the other way.
“What is that?” Janey cried suddenly, as she grasped her brother’s arm and pulled one of the rudder strings so that the Flying Machine swung around to face the Moon.
Johnny was so startled at the wonderful sight that he gave the “Stop” spool a twist and brought the Flying Machine to a stop with a jerk.
“It must be the Moon!” said Johnny, in an awed voice, after he had looked at the enormous object in speechless amazement for fully five minutes.