"God help us!" said the religious president.
Michel Ardan and Nicholl lay down on their beds in the centre of the floor.
"Thirteen minutes to eleven," murmured the captain.
Twenty seconds more! Barbicane rapidly put out the gas, and lay down beside his companions.
The profound silence was only broken by the chronometer beating the seconds.
Suddenly a frightful shock was felt, and the projectile, under the impulsion of 6,000,000,000 litres of gas developed by the deflagration of the pyroxyle, rose into space.
CHAPTER II.
THE FIRST HALF-HOUR.
What had happened? What was the effect of the frightful shock? Had the ingenuity of the constructors of the projectile been attended by a happy result? Was the effect of the shock deadened, thanks to the springs, the four buffers, the water-cushions, and the movable partitions? Had they triumphed over the frightful impulsion of the initial velocity of 11,000 metres a second? This was evidently the question the thousands of witnesses of the exciting scene asked themselves. They forgot the object of the journey, and only thought of the travellers! Suppose one of them—J.T. Maston, for instance—had been able to get a glimpse of the interior of the projectile, what would he have seen?
Nothing then. The obscurity was profound in the bullet. Its cylindro-conical sides had resisted perfectly. There was not a break, a crack, or a dint in them. The admirable projectile was not hurt by the intense deflagration of the powders, instead of being liquefied, as it was feared, into a shower of aluminium.