not badly at it
in the past (he wrote some sketches for old Salmon once, under a different
name, and old S. thought the world of them). . . .
So
we made it—that’s as good a line as any for me to end on. We made it. And it
was barely two days after we did make it that we found the Albatross and were right in the thick of things,
heaven help us all.
Oh
yes—we found them. Dr. Livingstone, I presume! But oh my suffering Sam, the
things, the things we saw!
Up
in a balloon, boys—
Up
in a balloon!!!
Cue
for Curtain. Bye, darlings. Love and kisses. Bye.
2. A Technical Note by Dr. Marius B. Kalkenbrenner
In
this, my only contribution to the present sketchy volume, I will be brief to
the very point, perhaps, of baldness.
I
am not, myself, concerned in any way with the narrative part of this anthology;
indeed, if anything, my own tendency (it must be said in all frankness) would
be to avoid putting upon the market any such romanticized account of the Third
Martian Expedition as this is in some danger of becoming; for although each
contributor is undoubtedly speaking the truth as he or she sees it, the over-all
effect is, surely, to give the impression of little more than an adventure
tale, and this ill accords, in all conscience, with the basic scientific nature
of the entire project.
It
seems, however, that my companions are intent upon the compilation of this
abstract, and while I will not connive at the solecism by contributing any
lengthy personal “piece,” I will go along with them so far as to inscribe these few purely factual notes at this juncture, so as to add some authority to their (if
I may say so) somewhat sentimental lucubrations.
The
facts, then, and only the facts, are:
The
duration of the Third Martian Expedition was precisely eleven weeks, four days,
twenty-three hours, thirty-one minutes, calculating from the specially prepared
chronometers with which I had equipped my ship.
Throughout
the journey there were no unexpected developments; I was more than pleased with
the performance of my craft.
The
“turning around” of the rocket (if I may indulge in lay language to suit the
occasion) took place some thirty hours before the moment of landfall; and, like
all else on the journey, went exactly according to plan.
Thus,
we approached the Martian surface without a jar—came quietly to rest almost
precisely on the spot I had already chosen for the event.
As
to the choice of that spot itself, I will say only this, in elucidation of a
matter which perhaps has exercised the more discriminating readers of this compilation:
When
my colleague Roderick Mackellar, in Scotland, succeeded in making contact with
the lost explorers on Mars, he had the foresight (being a scientific man) to
endeavor to discover from MacFarlane the exact whereabouts of his transmitting
station. Unfortunately, as is known, the more scientifically minded of the two
space travelers (Dr. McGillivray) was incapacitated, and MacFarlane himself was
not fully equipped to give Mr. Mackellar the information in as accurate a form
as might have been desirable. However, working from the data he was
intermittently able to supply, and from the observed facts compiled by
Mackellar himself (the times of transmission and reception, the known
opposition of the two planets during these periods, etc.), it had been possible
to form a fairly shrewd idea of the situation of the Albatross.
It
was from this information I worked when plotting our own course; and I was
fairly confident that the spot I had chosen for landing was, if not the very
spot on which my predecessor’s ship rested, one sufficiently in the vicinity to
make discovery almost certain.
I
may add that as we landed we naturally “kept a lookout” for any signs on the
terrain below—particularly for something in the nature of a “dark-green ridge”
with, perhaps, the gleaming hull of the spaceship in close proximity to it (for
we landed, I should perhaps explain, in
in the past (he wrote some sketches for old Salmon once, under a different
name, and old S. thought the world of them). . . .
So
we made it—that’s as good a line as any for me to end on. We made it. And it
was barely two days after we did make it that we found the Albatross and were right in the thick of things,
heaven help us all.
Oh
yes—we found them. Dr. Livingstone, I presume! But oh my suffering Sam, the
things, the things we saw!
Up
in a balloon, boys—
Up
in a balloon!!!
Cue
for Curtain. Bye, darlings. Love and kisses. Bye.
2. A Technical Note by Dr. Marius B. Kalkenbrenner
In
this, my only contribution to the present sketchy volume, I will be brief to
the very point, perhaps, of baldness.
I
am not, myself, concerned in any way with the narrative part of this anthology;
indeed, if anything, my own tendency (it must be said in all frankness) would
be to avoid putting upon the market any such romanticized account of the Third
Martian Expedition as this is in some danger of becoming; for although each
contributor is undoubtedly speaking the truth as he or she sees it, the over-all
effect is, surely, to give the impression of little more than an adventure
tale, and this ill accords, in all conscience, with the basic scientific nature
of the entire project.
It
seems, however, that my companions are intent upon the compilation of this
abstract, and while I will not connive at the solecism by contributing any
lengthy personal “piece,” I will go along with them so far as to inscribe these few purely factual notes at this juncture, so as to add some authority to their (if
I may say so) somewhat sentimental lucubrations.
The
facts, then, and only the facts, are:
The
duration of the Third Martian Expedition was precisely eleven weeks, four days,
twenty-three hours, thirty-one minutes, calculating from the specially prepared
chronometers with which I had equipped my ship.
Throughout
the journey there were no unexpected developments; I was more than pleased with
the performance of my craft.
The
“turning around” of the rocket (if I may indulge in lay language to suit the
occasion) took place some thirty hours before the moment of landfall; and, like
all else on the journey, went exactly according to plan.
Thus,
we approached the Martian surface without a jar—came quietly to rest almost
precisely on the spot I had already chosen for the event.
As
to the choice of that spot itself, I will say only this, in elucidation of a
matter which perhaps has exercised the more discriminating readers of this compilation:
When
my colleague Roderick Mackellar, in Scotland, succeeded in making contact with
the lost explorers on Mars, he had the foresight (being a scientific man) to
endeavor to discover from MacFarlane the exact whereabouts of his transmitting
station. Unfortunately, as is known, the more scientifically minded of the two
space travelers (Dr. McGillivray) was incapacitated, and MacFarlane himself was
not fully equipped to give Mr. Mackellar the information in as accurate a form
as might have been desirable. However, working from the data he was
intermittently able to supply, and from the observed facts compiled by
Mackellar himself (the times of transmission and reception, the known
opposition of the two planets during these periods, etc.), it had been possible
to form a fairly shrewd idea of the situation of the Albatross.
It
was from this information I worked when plotting our own course; and I was
fairly confident that the spot I had chosen for landing was, if not the very
spot on which my predecessor’s ship rested, one sufficiently in the vicinity to
make discovery almost certain.
I
may add that as we landed we naturally “kept a lookout” for any signs on the
terrain below—particularly for something in the nature of a “dark-green ridge”
with, perhaps, the gleaming hull of the spaceship in close proximity to it (for
we landed, I should perhaps explain, in
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