"You mean the Moon!"
"Yes, the Moon. Her mass being 1/89 of the Earth's, her attractive power should be in the same proportion; that is, a boy 10 years old, whose weight on Earth is about 90 lbs., would weigh on the Moon only about 1 pound, if nothing else were to be taken into consideration. But when standing on the surface of the Moon, he is relatively 4 times nearer to the centre than when he is standing on the surface of the Earth. His weight, therefore, having to be increased by the square of the distance, must be sixteen times greater. Now 16 times 1/89 being less than 1/5, it is clear that my weight of 150 pounds will be cut down to nearly 30 as soon as we reach the Moon's surface."
"And mine?" asked Ardan.
"Yours will hardly reach 25 pounds, I should think," was the reply.
"Shall my muscular strength diminish in the same proportion?" was the next question.
"On the contrary, it will be relatively so much the more increased that you can take a stride 15 feet in width as easily as you can now take one of ordinary length."
"We shall be all Samsons, then, in the Moon!" cried Ardan.
"Especially," replied M'Nicholl, "if the stature of the Selenites is in proportion to the mass of their globe."
"If so, what should be their height?"
"A tall man would hardly be twelve inches in his boots!"