The Sun.
London, England, 1863-09-19 00:00:00

TEE SUN AS A DWELLING-PLACE.

(Teem the Spectator,)
Sir Wm. Armstrong suggested, in his inaugural address
last week to the British Association, that that curiously
mottled appearance of the sun's bright atmosphere when
seen through a telescope, which has given rise to Mr. Na-
smyth's expression about the solar " willow-leaves," might
be due to "organised" forms of matter ; and that the con-
stant supply of heat which warms the whole solar system
may, as previous astronomers have suggested, be due to the
constant concussion of falling bodies rushing into the centre
of our system, and heating it just as his own cannon balls
or ,hells heat the great targets at Shoebure ness. Both
these suggestions are, of course, mere guesses, though the
latter, at least, is as probable as any other mere conjecture
concerning the source of the solar heat; but both of them
suggest so many marvels and inconveniences which would
attend its possible inhabitants, if it could be the habitation
of beings in any way resembling the inhabitants of this
earth, that if astronomers were to acquiese in them, or, at
least, in the latter of them, the sun would probably be
given up as rapidly as the moon to that desolating theory
of Dr. evnewell's, which refuses to give rational animals a
foothold anywhere in the universe except upon our little
planet. Certainly, one would not choose for a dwelling-
place a sphere, however majestic, eternally bombarded from
all parts of the celestial spaces—a world into which minute
planets, that had been travelling from infinite distances
with a constantly accelerating speed, shoal' be constantly
crashing home, where the annexation of a comet would be
an every-day event. Sebastopol or Vicksburg under siege
would be a sort of heaven to such a life as that, besides that,
they at least had the satisfaction of returning the fire,which
would be impossible for the sun, seeing that the force which
would keep up the bombardment would be of no alien origin,
but inseparable from its own existence. The big sala-
manders, 100,000 miles in area, which Sir W. Armstrong
pictured as floating in the solar atmosphere, and this heavy
celestial artillery, are alike matters of conjecture; but of
the sun as a dwelling-place for =bulled creatures we can
form a few notions based on more trustworthy facts, In-
deed, the elder Herschel, who was one of the earliest theo-
rists about the sun's spots, always held that the sun might
be inhabited—and its solid nucleus, that is, need not be so
hot as to prevent the existence of beings organised more or
less as we are. It is, at least, worth while to consider what
sorts and degrees of difference such a life, if it be possible,
would imply, even without an atmosphere of gigantic sala-
manders, and a converging fire of innumerable meteors and
planetoids, or a lashing by cometary tails a few millions of
miles in length.
In the first place, there is no doubt room enough for a very
considerable immigration there, as the surface of the sue
would accommodate in mere extent the population of 12,000
earths. In other words, if the earth had been fully peopled
during 12,000 generations, and all its population transferred
to the sun, the sun would only then become fully peopled,
supposing its surface to be in the same proportion suscep-
tible to cultivation. Unfortunately, however the muscular
power, needed for walking on the sun would have to be 23
times as great, for a man of the same size, as the muscular
power needed for walking on the earth. The sun is very
much less dense than the earth—not much, indeed above
the density of water—but its enormous size increases the
gravitation there to twenty-eight times its power on
earth. Every man, therefore, suddenly transferred to the
surface of the sun—if he could live there at ell—would
appear to himself to have an accumulation of twenty-
seven other men upon his back—a weight under which it
is needless to observe that no human muscles could
stagger. However,
swimming upon such a surface, in any
fluid as light as water (and the bulk of the sun appears to
be made up of fluid at least as light as this) would be far
easier than it is hero; for all weights being multiplied by
about 28, the difference between the weight of the water
displaced and of the human body—which measures the sup-
porting force—would also be raultipled by 23 ; and just in
proportion therefore as the difficulty of walking is increased
there, that of swimming (in such a fluid as our water) would
be diminished.

But these differences aro trifling compared with the diffe-
rences arising from the central position of the sun. To in-
habitants of that globe there would be no such phenomena
as day and night, but a perpetual and uniform blaze, like
the light with which the roofs of the Houses of Parliament
are nightly lighted up, though infinitely intense, would be
always blazing above that semi-transparent cloudy screen
which Sir W. Herschel thought might temper the light and
heat of the solar world. It is natural to suppose that the
light and heat of the sun are derived from the same source,
and that since we have at times glimpses into the recesses
of a darker sphere, that darker sphere would also be a cooler
sphere than we usually connect with our visible sun. In-
deed, if inhabitable at all, it would need to be. The tem-
perature of the sun's heated surface is calculated to be seven
times as hot as the hottest known blast furnace. "It
would require the combustion of more than 130,0001b5,, or
nearly sixty tons of coal per hour, on each square foot of
the sun's surface, to produce a heat equal to that radiated
from the solar orb." The probability of some deep cloudy
stratum of atmosphere, there, enveloping a cooler world,
seems considerable.

But even if this be so, the vast difference between the phy-
sical situation of the Sunites and that of our race would
scarcely be much diminished. With a sufficiently thick sea
of cloud between them and the intolerable light and heat
they might manage to exist, like the fabled mermen, who,
living on the ocean floor, saw sunlight only through the un-
fathomable depths of the sea. But then, though living in the
centre of our system, they could never know that there was
a system at all beyond this centre. Thry could not even
know that their own sun revolves in about 251 of our days
on its own axis. For no celestial phenomena at all could be
accessible to them. The constant and uniform light would
shut them in far more effectually than any darkness; and
the cloud which would be essential to soften that con-
stant and uniform light would be a second screen. We
could never know that our own earth revolved on its axis
if a blon stronger than the strongest nocn always shut
out the night. The solar inhabitants certainly would be far
more effectually cut off from astronomy, both by
their light
and by the internal screen which would interrupt the light,
than by any darkness. The planet Neptune would have a
better chance of good astronomers than the sun. The ab-
sence of anything like night and dew, and of all the conse-
quent periodic changes in the vegetable and animal world,
would certainly revolutionise the whole character of the
agriculture, and natural history. Sleep might perhaps exist
without night, but both plants and animals must have a
different structure in order to secure it, Then too there could