Page:Clement Fezandié - Through the Earth.djvu/211

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THE MODERN SAMSON
191

near the truth. The things that you feel sure are going to occur are those that don't take place, while the ones you don't think about are precisely those that do happen. And as soon as something does happen, and you think everything else is going to occur in the same way, then it changes and takes place in a different manner. All the laws of nature seem turned topsy-turvy in this car!"

Whatever the explanation, there was no doubt about the fact that bodies in the car now possessed a slight weight. William would not believe it until he had made several experiments. He began by placing his penknife beside him, and slowly, very slowly, it fell to the bottom of the car and stayed there. The furniture, too, did likewise. He lifted each article a slight distance from the floor, and yet it slowly but surely fell to the bottom again. To "make assurance double sure," he now did what he should have done at first, namely, he looked at the spring balance suspended in the car. The needle showed that the pound weight now weighed about half an ounce. As a final test, our hero suspended himself to the balance, and found he weighed about six pounds.

"There's no longer the slightest doubt about