Round the Moon by Jules Verne

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On the 4th of December, at 5 a.m. by terrestrial reckoning, the travellers awoke, having been fifty-four hours on their journey. They had only been five hours and forty minutes more than half the time assigned for the accomplishment of their journey, but they had come more than seven-tenths of the distance. This peculiarity was due to their regularly-decreasing speed.

When they looked at the earth through the port-light at the bottom, it only looked like a black spot drowned in the sun's rays. No crescent or pale light was now to be seen. The next day at midnight the earth would be new at the precise moment when the moon would be full. Above, the Queen of Night was nearing the line followed by the projectile, so as to meet it at the hour indicated. All around the dark vault was studded with brilliant specks which seemed to move slowly; but through the great distance they were at their relative size did not seem to alter much. The sun and the stars appeared exactly as they do from the earth. The moon was considerably enlarged; but the travellers' not very powerful telescopes did not as yet allow them to make very useful observations on her surface, or to reconnoitre the topographical or geological details.

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