For many weeks after the events recorded in this chapter, the _Sirius_ sped on without a single notable occurrence to relieve the monotony of the journey. Our first Christmas Day was observed with all customary honours, Sandy providing us with a royal feast; and the evening was given up to conviviality and amusement. The Doctor and Temple played chess; Sandy, with his short pipe and unlimited whiskey, now and then sang us a North-country ballad; Rover lay quietly at his master's feet; Graham smoked huge Cabanas, told stories, fired off jokes, and sang many a Yorkshire ditty. All of us felt the magic spell of Christmas-tide, and the observance of the festal day filled our hearts with renewed hope, and served to increase and strengthen the bond of brotherly unity in our little party.
We were now 8,820,000 miles from Earth, or, reducing this vast number to more comprehensive language, we had accomplished slightly more than a quarter of our journey. We still continued to find ether sufficiently dense to be converted into a breathable atmosphere, and into water--everything promised well for the ultimate success of our daring enterprise. Alas! for all human hopes and human anticipations; we little dreamed of what the future was about to bring!
Day after day, week after week, and month after month sped the _Sirius_ on its journey, like a meteor across the gulf of space. We had now been eighteen months away from Earth, and our distance from that planet we computed to be quite nineteen millions of miles. The Earth was remarkably small in appearance, and the moon could only be detected through a glass. On the other hand, Mars had risen in elevation, and sensibly increased in brilliancy and apparent size. Other heavenly bodies had also changed considerably in their aspect. Some had got much larger, others smaller, many had disappeared entirely from our vision, whilst several new orbs had been discovered. The Doctor was able to make many observations of the little-known asteroids which travel round the sun between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter. Scores of new ones were seen.
For a long time Doctor Hermann had been worried by the course which the _Sirius_ was taking. In spite of the fact that we were apparently steadily travelling onwards across the vast belt of space between Earth and Mars, certain of his calculations appeared to demonstrate that we were being drawn rapidly towards the sun! The quantity of water we condensed from the atmosphere now became very small, and eventually failed altogether, so that we had to depend upon our scanty store and the lozenges.
