From the Earth to the Moon, Direct in Ninety-Seven Hours and Twenty Minutes: and a Trip Round It. Verne Jules
and address of President Barbicane averted the danger. These personal demonstrations found a division in the newspapers of the different states. The New York Herald and the Tribune supported Texas, while the Times and the American Review espoused the cause of the Floridan Deputies. The members of the Gun Club could not decide to which to give the preference.
Texas produced its array of twenty-six counties; Florida replied that twelve counties were better than twenty-six in a country only one-sixth part of the size.
Texas plumed itself upon its 330,000 natives; Florida with a far smaller territory, boasted of being much more densely populated with 56,000.
The Texians, through the columns of the Herald, claimed that some regard should be had to a state which grew the best cotton in all America, produced the best green oak for the service of the navy, and contained the finest oil, besides iron mines, in which the yield was fifty per cent. of pure metal.
To this the American Review replied that the soil of Florida, although not equally rich, afforded the best conditions for the moulding and casting of the Columbiad, consisting as it did of sand and argillaceous earth.
"That may be all very well," replied the Texians; "but you must first get to this country. Now the communications with Florida are difficult, while the coast of Texas offers the bay of Galveston, which possesses a circumference of fourteen leagues, and is capable of containing the navies of the entire world!"
"A pretty notion truly," replied the papers in the interest of Florida, "that of Galveston Bay below the 29th parallel! Have we not got the bay of Espiritu Santo, opening precisely upon the 28th degree, and by which ships can reach Tampa Town by direct route?"
"A fine bay! half choked with sand!" "Choked yourselves!" returned the others.
Thus the war went on for several days, when Florida endeavoured to draw her adversary away on to fresh ground; and one morning the Times hinted that, the enterprise being essentially American, it ought not to be attempted upon other than purely American territory.
To these words Texas retorted, "American! are we not as much so as you? Were not Texas and Florida both incorporated into the Union in 1845?"
"Undoubtedly," replied the Times; "but we have belonged to the Americans ever since 1820."
"Yes!" returned the Tribune; "after having been Spaniards or English for 200 years, you were sold to the United States for five million dollars!"
"Well! and why need we blush for that? Was not Louisiana bought from Napoleon in 1803 at the price of sixteen million dollars?"
"Scandalous!" roared the Texan deputies. "A wretched little strip of country like Florida to dare to compare itself to Texas, who, in place of selling herself, asserted her own independence, drove out the Mexicans in March 2, 1836, and declared herself a federal republic after the victory gained by Samuel Houston, on the banks of the San Jacinto, over the troops of Santa Anna! – a country, in fine, which voluntarily annexed itself to the United States of America!"
"Yes; because it was afraid of the Mexicans!" replied Florida.
"Afraid!" From this moment the state of things became intolerable. A sanguinary encounter seemed daily imminent between the two parties in the streets of Baltimore. It became necessary to keep an eye upon the deputies.
President Barbicane knew not which way to look. Notes, documents, letters full of menaces showered down upon his house. Which side ought he to take? As regarded the appropriation of the soil, the facility of communication, the rapidity of transport, the claims of both states were evenly balanced. As for political prepossessions, they had nothing to do with the question.
This dead block had existed for some little time, when Barbicane resolved to get rid of it at once. He called a meeting of his colleagues, and laid before them a proposition which, it will be seen, was profoundly sagacious.
"On carefully considering," he said, "what is going on now between Florida and Texas, it is clear that the same difficulties will recur with all the towns of the favoured state. The rivalry will descend from state to city, and so on downwards. Now Texas possesses eleven towns within the prescribed conditions, which will further dispute the honour and create us new enemies, while Florida has only one. I go in, therefore, for Florida and Tampa Town."
This decision, on being made known, utterly crushed the Texan deputies. Seized with an indescribable fury, they addressed threatening letters to the different members of the Gun Club by name. The magistrates had but one course to take, and they took it. They chartered a special train, forced the Texians into it whether they would or no; and they quitted the city with a speed of thirty miles an hour.
Quickly, however, as they were despatched, they found time to hurl one last and bitter sarcasm at their adversaries.
Alluding to the extent of Florida, a mere peninsula confined between two seas, they pretended that it could never sustain the shock of the discharge, and that it would "bust up" at the very first shot.
"Very well, let it bust up!" replied the Floridans, with a brevity worthy of the days of ancient Sparta.
CHAPTER XII.
URBI ET ORBI
The astronomical, mechanical, and topographical difficulties resolved, finally came the question of finance. The sum required was far too great for any individual, or even any single state, to provide the requisite millions.
President Barbicane undertook, despite of the matter being a purely American affair, to render it one of universal interest, and to request the financial co-operation of all peoples. It was, he maintained, the right and the duty of the whole earth to interfere in the affairs of its satellite. The subscription opened at Baltimore extended properly to the whole world —Urbi et orbi.
This subscription was successful beyond all expectation; notwithstanding that it was a question not of lending but of giving the money. It was a purely disinterested operation in the strictest sense of the term, and offered not the slightest chance of profit.
The effect, however, of Barbicane's communication was not confined to the frontiers of the United States; it crossed the Atlantic and Pacific, invading simultaneously Asia and Europe, Africa and Oceania. The observatories of the Union placed themselves in immediate communication with those of foreign countries. Some, such as those of Paris, Petersburg, Berlin, Stockholm, Hamburg, Malta, Lisbon, Benares, Madras, and others, transmitted their good wishes; the rest maintained a prudent silence, quietly awaiting the result. As for the observatory at Greenwich, seconded as it was by the twenty-two astronomical establishments of Great Britain, it spoke plainly enough. It boldly denied the possibility of success, and pronounced in favour of the theories of Captain Nicholl. But this was nothing more than mere English jealousy.
On the 8th of October President Barbicane published a manifesto full of enthusiasm, in which he made an appeal to "all persons of good will upon the face of the earth." This document, translated into all languages, met with immense success.
Subscription lists were opened in all the principal cities of the Union, with a central office at the Baltimore Bank, 9, Baltimore Street.
In addition, subscriptions were received at the following banks in the different states of the two continents: —
At Vienna, with S. M. de Rothschild.
„ Petersburg, Stieglitz and Co.
„ Paris, The Crédit Mobilier.
„ Stockholm, Tottie and Arfuredson.
„ London, N. M. Rothschild and Son.
„ Turin, Ardouin and Co.
„ Berlin, Mendelssohn.
„ Geneva, Lombard, Odier, and Co.
„ Constantinople, The Ottoman Bank.
„ Brussels, J. Lambert.
„ Madrid, Daniel Weisweller.
„ Amsterdam, Netherlands Credit Co.
„ Rome, Torlonia and Co.
„