Other editions of book Off on a Comet! a Journey through Planetary Space

Nothing, sir, can induce me to surrender my claim.""I am sorry, count, but in such a matter your views cannot modify mine.""But allow me to point out that my seniority unquestionably gives me a prior right.""Mere seniority, I assert, in an affair of this kind, cannot possibly entitle you to any prior claim whatever.""Then, captain, no alternative is left but for me to compel you to yield at the sword's point.""As you please, count; but neither sword nor pistol can force me to forego my pretensions. Here is my card.""And mine."This rapid altercation was thus brought to an end by the formal interchange of the names of the disputants. On one of the cards was inscribed: Captain Hector Servadac, Staff Officer, Mostaganem.On the other was the title: Count Wassili Timascheff, On board the Schooner "Dobryna."It did not take long to arrange that seconds should be appointed, who would meet in Mostaganem at two o'clock that day; and the captain and the count were on the point of parting from each other, with a salute of punctilious courtesy, when Timascheff, as if struck by a sudden thought, said abruptly: "Perhaps it would be better, captain, not to allow the real cause of this to transpire?"

One of Jules Verne’s strangest and most controversial novels, Off on a Comet tells the story of a small band of people on a tiny world torn from earth by a grazing comet and their struggles to survive in the wilderness of interplantary space. A strange mixture of dream-like fantasy and hard science."Nothing, sir, can induce me to surrender my claim.""I am sorry, count, but in such a matter your views cannot modify mine.""But allow me to point out that my seniority unquestionably gives me a prior right.""Mere seniority, I assert, in an affair of this kind, cannot possibly entitle you to any prior claim whatever.""Then, captain, no alternative is left but for me to compel you to yield at the sword's point.""As you please, count; but neither sword nor pistol can force me to forego my pretensions. Here is my card.""And mine."This rapid altercation was thus brought to an end by the formal interchange of the names of the disputants.

“Nothing, sir, can induce me to surrender my claim.”“I am sorry, count, but in such a matter your views cannot modify mine.”“But allow me to point out that my seniority unquestionably gives me a prior right.”“Mere seniority, I assert, in an affair of this kind, cannot possibly entitle you to any priorclaim whatever.”“Then, captain, no alternative is left but for me to compel you to yield at the sword’spoint.”“As you please, count; but neither sword nor pistol can force me to forego mypretensions. Here is my card.”“And mine.”This rapid altercation was thus brought to an end by the formal interchange of the namesof the disputants. On one of the cards was inscribed:Captain Hector Servadac,Staff Officer, Mostaganem.On the other was the title:Count Wassili Timascheff,On board the Schooner “Dobryna.”It did not take long to arrange that seconds should be appointed, who would meet inMostaganem at two o’clock that day; and the captain and the count were on the point ofparting from each other, with a salute of punctilious courtesy, when Timascheff, as if struckby a sudden thought, said abruptly: “Perhaps it would be better, captain, not to allow thereal cause of this to transpire?”