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Astor, John Jacob, 1864-1912

"A romance of the future"

They are
like the fire-flies in Cuba, which the Cubans are said to put
into a glass box and get light enough from to read by. Here they
would need only one, if it could be induced to give its light
continuously."

Having found an open space on high ground, they sat down, and
Bearwarden struck his repeater, which, for convenience, had been
arranged for Jupiter time, dividing the day into ten hours,
beginning at noon, midnight being therefore five o'clock.

"Twenty minutes past four," said he, "which would correspond to
about a quarter to eleven on earth. As the sun rises at
half-past seven, it will be dark about three hours, for the time
between dawn and daylight will, of course, be as short as that we
have just experienced between sunset and night."

"If we stay here long," said the doctor, "I suppose we shall
become accustomed, like sailors, to taking our four, or in this
case five, hours on duty, and five hours off."

"Or," added Ayrault, "we can sleep ten consecutive hours and take
the next ten for exploring and hunting, having the sun for one
half the time and the moons for the other."

Bearwarden and Cortlandt now rolled themselves in their blankets
and were soon asleep, while Ayrault, whose turn it was to watch
till the moons rose--for they had not yet enough confidence in
their new domain to sleep in darkness simultaneously--leaned his
back against a rock and lighted his pipe.


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