That night he asked the Captain if he would not sail down as far as Cape San Lucas. Bloomsbury saw that further search was all labor lost, but he respected such heroic grief too highly to give a positive refusal. He consented to devote the following day, New Year"s, to an exploring expedition as far as Magdalena Bay, making the most diligent inquiries in all directions.
But New Year"s was just as barren of results as any of its predecessors, and, a little before sunset, Captain Bloomsbury, regardless of further entreaties and unwilling to risk further delay, gave orders to "bout ship and return to San Francisco.
The _Susquehanna_ was slowly turning around in obedience to her wheel, as if reluctant to abandon forever a search in which humanity at large was interested, when the look-out man, stationed in the forecastle, suddenly sang out:
"A buoy to the nor"east, not far from sh.o.r.e!"
All telescopes were instantly turned in the direction indicated. The buoy, or whatever object it was, could be readily distinguished. It certainly did look like one of those buoys used to mark out the channel that ships follow when entering a harbor. But as the vessel slowly approached it, a small flag, flapping in the dying wind--a strange feature in a buoy--was seen to surmount its cone, which a nearer approach showed to be emerging four or five feet from the water. And for a buoy too it was exceedingly bright and shiny, reflecting the red rays of the setting sun as strongly as if its surface was crystal or polished metal!
"Call Mr. Marston on deck at once!" cried the Captain, his voice betraying unwonted excitement as he put the gla.s.s again to his eye.
Marston, thoroughly worn out by his incessant anxiety during the day, had been just carried below by his friends, and they were now trying to make him take a little refreshment and repose. But the Captain"s order brought them all on deck like a flash.
They found the whole crew gazing in one direction, and, though speaking in little more than whispers, evidently in a state of extraordinary excitement.
What could all this mean? Was there any ground for hope? The thought sent a pang of delight through Marston"s wildly beating heart that almost choked him.
The Captain beckoned to the Club men to take a place on the bridge beside himself. They instantly obeyed, all quietly yielding them a pa.s.sage.
The vessel was now only about a quarter of a mile distant from the object and therefore near enough to allow it to be distinguished without the aid of a gla.s.s.
What! The flag bore the well known Stars and Stripes!
An electric shudder of glad surprise shot through the a.s.sembled crowd.
They still spoke, however, in whispers, hardly daring to utter their thoughts aloud.
The silence was suddenly startled by a howl of mingled ecstasy and rage from Marston.
He would have fallen off the bridge, had not the others held him firmly.
Then he burst into a laugh loud and long, and quite as formidable as his howl.
Then he tore away from his friends, and began beating himself over the head.
"Oh!" he cried in accents between a yell and a groan, "what chuckleheads we are! What numskulls! What jacka.s.ses! What double-treble-barrelled gibbering idiots!" Then he fell to beating himself over the head again.
"What"s the matter, Marston, for heaven"s sake!" cried his friends, vainly trying to hold him.
"Speak for yourself!" cried others, Belfast among the number.
"No exception, Belfast! You"re as bad as the rest of us! We"re all a set of unmitigated, demoralized, dog-goned old lunatics! Ha! Ha! Ha!"
"Speak plainly, Marston! Tell us what you mean!"
"I mean," roared the terrible Secretary, "that we are no better than a lot of cabbage heads, dead beats, and frauds, calling ourselves scientists! O Barbican, how you must blush for us! If we were schoolboys, we should all be skinned alive for our ignorance! Do you forget, you herd of ignoramuses, that the Projectile weighs only ten tons?"
"We don"t forget it! We know it well! What of it?"
"This of it: it can"t sink in water without displacing its own volume in water; its own volume in water weighs thirty tons! Consequently, it can"t sink; more consequently, it hasn"t sunk; and, most consequently, there it is before us, bobbing up and down all the time under our very noses! O Barbican, how can we ever venture to look at you straight in the face again!"
Marston"s extravagant manner of showing it did not prevent him from being perfectly right. With all their knowledge of physics, not a single one of those scientific gentlemen had remembered the great fundamental law that governs sinking or floating bodies. Thanks to its slight specific gravity, the Projectile, after reaching unknown depths of ocean through the terrific momentum of its fall, had been at last arrested in its course and even obliged to return to the surface.
By this time, all the pa.s.sengers of the _Susquehanna_ could easily recognize the object of such weary longings and desperate searches, floating quietly a short distance before them in the last rays of the declining day!
The boats were out in an instant. Marston and his friends took the Captain"s gig. The rowers pulled with a will towards the rapidly nearing Projectile. What did it contain? The living or the dead? The living certainly! as Marston whispered to those around him; otherwise how could they have ever run up that flag?
The boats approached in perfect silence, all hearts throbbing with the intensity of newly awakened hope, all eyes eagerly watching for some sign to confirm it. No part of the windows appeared over the water, but the trap hole had been thrown open, and through it came the pole that bore the American flag. Marston made for the trap hole and, as it was only a few feet above the surface, he had no difficulty in looking in.
At that moment, a joyful shout of triumph rose from the interior, and the whole boat"s crew heard a dry drawling voice with a nasal tw.a.n.g exclaiming:
"Queen! How is that for high?"
It was instantly answered by another voice, shriller, louder, quicker, more joyous and triumphant in tone, but slightly tinged with a foreign accent:
"King! My brave Mac! How is that for high?"
The deep, clear, calm voice that spoke next thrilled the listeners outside with an emotion that we shall not attempt to portray. Except that their ears could detect in it the faintest possible emotion of triumph, it was in all respects as cool, resolute, and self-possessed as ever:
"Ace! Dear friends, how is that for high?"
They were quietly enjoying a little game of High-Low-Jack!
[Ill.u.s.tration: HOW IS THAT FOR HIGH?]
How they must have been startled by the wild cheers that suddenly rang around their ocean-prison! How madly were these cheers re-echoed from the decks of the _Susquehanna_! Who can describe the welcome that greeted these long lost, long beloved, long despaired of Sons of Earth, now so suddenly and unexpectedly rescued from destruction, and restored once more to the wonderstricken eyes of admiring humanity? Who can describe the scenes of joy and exuberant happiness, and deep felt grat.i.tude, and roaring rollicking merriment, that were witnessed on board the steamer that night and during the next three days!
As for Marston, it need hardly be said that he was simply ecstatic, but it may interest both the psychologist and the philologist to learn that the expression _How is that for high?_ struck him at once as with a kind of frenzy. It became immediately such a favorite tongue morsel of his that ever since he has been employing it on all occasions, appropriate or otherwise. Thanks to his exertions in its behalf all over the country, the phrase is now the most popular of the day, well known and relished in every part of the Union. If we can judge from its present hold on the popular ear it will continue to live and flourish for many a long day to come; it may even be accepted as the popular expression of triumph in those dim, distant, future years when the memory not only of the wonderful occasion of its formation but also of the ill.u.s.trious men themselves who originated it, has been consigned forever to the dark tomb of oblivion!
CHAPTER XXIV.
FAREWELL TO THE BALTIMORE GUN CLUB.
The intense interest of our extraordinary but most veracious history having reached its culmination at the end of the last chapter, our absorbing chronicle might with every propriety have been then and there concluded; but we can"t part from our gracious and most indulgent reader before giving him a few more details which may be instructive perhaps, if not amusing.
No doubt he kindly remembers the world-wide sympathy with which our three famous travellers had started on their memorable trip to the Moon.
If so, he may be able to form some idea of the enthusiasm universally excited by the news of their safe return. Would not the millions of spectators that had thronged Florida to witness their departure, now rush to the other extremity of the Union to welcome them back? Could those innumerable Europeans, Africans and Asiatics, who had visited the United States simply to have a look at M"Nicholl, Ardan and Barbican, ever think of quitting the country without having seen those wonderful men again? Certainly not! Nay, more--the reception and the welcome that those heroes would everywhere be greeted with, should be on a scale fully commensurate with the grandeur of their own gigantic enterprise.
The Sons of Earth who had fearlessly quitted this terrestrial globe and who had succeeded in returning after accomplishing a journey inconceivably wonderful, well deserved to be received with every extremity of pride, pomp and glorious circ.u.mstance that the world is capable of displaying.
To catch a glimpse of these demi-G.o.ds, to hear the sound of their voices, perhaps even to touch their hands--these were the only emotions with which the great heart of the country at large was now throbbing.
To gratify this natural yearning of humanity, to afford not only to every foreigner but to every native in the land an opportunity of beholding the three heroes who had reflected such indelible glory on the American name, and to do it all in a manner eminently worthy of the great American Nation, instantly became the desire of the American People.
To desire a thing, and to have it, are synonymous terms with the great people of the American Republic.
A little thinking simplified the matter considerably: as all the people could not go to the heroes, the heroes should go to all the people.