Robur the Conqueror | Page 4

A Visitor is
Announced IV In Which a New Character Appears V Another
Disappearance VI The President and Secretary Suspend Hostilities VII
On board the Albatross VIII The Balloonists Refuse to be Convinced
IX Across the Prairie X Westward--but Whither? XI The Wide Pacific
XII Through the Himalayas XIII Over the Caspian XIV The Aeronef at
Full Speed XV A Skirmish in Dahomey XVI Over the Atlantic XVII
The Shipwrecked Crew XVIII Over the Volcano XIX Anchored at Last
XX The Wreck of the Albatross XXI The Institute Again XXII The
GoAhead is Launched XXIII The Grand Collapse

Chapter I
MYSTERIOUS SOUNDS

BANG! Bang!
The pistol shots were almost simultaneous. A cow peacefully grazing
fifty yards away received one of the bullets in her back. She had
nothing to do with the quarrel all the same.
Neither of the adversaries was hit.
Who were these two gentlemen? We do not know, although this would
be an excellent opportunity to hand down their names to posterity. All
we can say is that the elder was an Englishman and the younger an
American, and both of them were old enough to know better.
So far as recording in what locality the inoffensive ruminant had just
tasted her last tuft of herbage, nothing can be easier. It was on the left
bank of Niagara, not far from the suspension bridge which joins the
American to the Canadian bank three miles from the falls.
The Englishman stepped up to the American.
"I contend, nevertheless, that it was 'Rule Britannia!'"
"And I say it was 'Yankee Doodle!'" replied the young American.
The dispute was about to begin again when one of the seconds--
doubtless in the interests of the milk trade--interposed.
"Suppose we say it was 'Rule Doodle' and 'Yankee Britannia' and
adjourn to breakfast?"

This compromise between the national airs of Great Britain and the
United States was adopted to the general satisfaction. The Americans
and Englishmen walked up the left bank of the Niagara on their way to
Goat Island, the neutral ground. between the falls. Let us leave them in
the presence of the boiled eggs and traditional ham, and floods enough
of tea to make the cataract jealous, and trouble ourselves no more about
them. It is extremely unlikely that we shall again meet with them in this
story.
Which was right; the Englishman or the American? It is not easy to say.
Anyhow the duel shows how great was the excitement, not only in the
new but also in the old world, with regard to an inexplicable
phenomenon which for a month or more had driven everybody to
distraction.
Never had the sky been so much looked at since the appearance of man
on the terrestrial globe. The night before an aerial trumpet had blared
its brazen notes through space immediately over that part of Canada
between Lake Ontario and Lake Erie. Some people had heard those
notes as "Yankee Doodle," others had heard them as "Rule Britannia,"
and hence the quarrel between the Anglo-Saxons, which ended with the
breakfast on Goat Island. Perhaps it was neither one nor the other of
these patriotic tunes, but what was undoubted by all was that these
extraordinary sounds had seemed to descend from the sky to the earth.
What could it be? Was it some exuberant aeronaut rejoicing on that
sonorous instrument of which the Renommée makes such obstreperous
use?
No! There was no balloon and there were no aeronauts. Some strange
phenomenon had occurred in the higher zones of the atmosphere, a
phenomenon of which neither the nature nor the cause could be
explained. Today it appeared over America; forty-eight hours
afterwards it was over Europe; a week later it was in Asia over the
Celestial Empire.
Hence in every country of the world--empire, kingdom, or republic--
there was anxiety which it was important to allay. If you hear in your

house strange and inexplicable noises, do you not at once endeavor to
discover the cause? And if your search is in vain, do you not leave your
house and take up your quarters in another? But in this case the house
was the terrestrial globe! There are no means of leaving that house for
the moon or Mars, or Venus, or Jupiter, or any other planet of the solar
system. And so of necessity we have to find out what it is that takes
place, not in the infinite void, but within the atmospherical zones. In
fact, if there is no air there is no noise, and as there was a noise--that
famous trumpet, to wit-- the phenomenon must occur in the air, the
density of which invariably diminishes, and which does not extend for
more than six miles round our spheroid.
Naturally the newspapers took up the question in their thousands,