This decision was taken down by Barbicane in his notebook, where he had already written the proces-verbal of the sitting of December 6th.

“Now,” said Nicholl, “let us attack the second question, depending on the first.  I therefore ask the honourable Commission if the moon is not habitable, has it been inhabited?”

“Answer, Citizen Barbicane,” said Michel Ardan.

“My friends,” answered Barbicane, “I did not undertake this journey to form an opinion upon the ancient habitability of our satellite.  I may add that my personal observations only confirm me in this opinion.  I believe, I even affirm, that the moon has been inhabited by a human race organised like ours, that it has produced animals anatomically formed like terrestrial animals; but I add that these races, human or animal, have had their day, and are for ever extinct.”

“Then,” asked Michel, “the moon is an older world than the earth?”

“No,” answered Barbicane with conviction, “but a world that has grown old more quickly, whose formation and deformation have been more rapid.  Relatively the organising forces of matter have been much more violent in the interior of the moon than in the interior of the celestial globe.  The actual state of this disc, broken up, tormented, and swollen, proves this abundantly.  In their origin the moon and the earth were only gases.  These gases became liquids under different influences, and the solid mass was formed afterwards.  But it is certain that our globe was gas or liquid still when the moon, already solidified by cooling, became habitable.”

“I believe that,” said Nicholl.

“Then,” resumed Barbicane, “it was surrounded by atmosphere.  The water held in by the gassy element could not evaporate.  Under the influence of air, water, light, and heat, solar and central, vegetation took possession of these continents prepared for its reception, and certainly life manifested itself about that epoch, for Nature does not spend itself in inutilities, and a world so marvellously habitable must have been inhabited.”

“Still,” answered Nicholl, “many phenomena inherent to the movements of our satellite must have prevented the expansion of the vegetable and animal kingdoms.  The days and nights 354 hours long, for example.”

“At the terrestrial poles,” said Michel, “they last six months.”

“That is not a valuable argument, as the poles are not inhabited.”

“In the actual state of the moon,” resumed Barbicane, “the long nights and days create differences of temperature insupportable to the constitution, but it was not so at that epoch of historical times.  The atmosphere enveloped the disc with a fluid mantle.  Vapour deposited itself in the form of clouds.  This natural screen tempered the ardour of the solar lays, and retained the nocturnal radiation.  Both light and heat could diffuse themselves in the air.  Hence there was equilibrium between the influences which no longer exists now that the atmosphere has almost entirely disappeared.  Besides, I shall astonish you—­”