And this is the reply as given by the Longitudes Office.
“Important Notice.
“The experiment to be attempted by Barbicane & Co. is as follows:—
“To produce a recoil on the 22nd of September at midnight, local time, by means of a monster cannon throwing a projectile of one hundred and eighty thousand tons.
“If this discharge is effected just below the Equator, near the thirty-eighth meridian, at the base of the Kilimanjaro chain, and if it is directed towards the south, the mechanical effect on the terrestrial spheroid will be as follows:—
“At once, owing to the shock being combined with the diurnal movement, a new axis will be formed, the old axis being 23° 28′, and the new one being perpendicular to the plane of the ecliptic.
“In the north the extremity of the new axis will be situated between Greenland and Grinnell Land, on that part of Baffin Sea cut by the Arctic Circle. In the south it will be on the Antarctic Circle to the east of Adelaide Land.
“As an example of the new meridians, we may mention that passing through Dublin in Ireland, Paris in France, Palermo in Sicily, Obeid in Darfur, Kilimanjaro, Kerguelen Island, the new Antarctic Pole, the Society Islands in the Pacific, Vancouver Island, and Melville Peninsula.
“The new Equator will pass through the Kilimanjaro country, the Indian Ocean, Goa, a little below Calcutta, Mangala in Siam, Hong Kong, the Marshall and Walker Islands in the Pacific, Rio Janeiro, Saint Helena, and by St. Paul de Loanda across Africa to Kilimanjaro.
“The new Equator having been formed by the new axis, it is possible to calculate the results on the ocean levels.