The Sun.
London, England, 1867-06-06 00:00:00

THE LIGHT OF ASTEROIDS.

'AI. W. de Fonvielle, whose very clever scientific
researches in the Cosmos we have often had occasion
to mention, devotes an article to a curious investi-
gation concerning the quantity of light emitted by
asteroids. The question is merely incidental, the
author's object being the study of those bodies ac-
cording to the latest observations ; but such as it
is, it is calculated to interest our readers.
Mr. Glaisher has shown by direct experiment
that a gas-burner will cast on a plane,
situated at a distance of five metres (about 15
feet) from. it,
400,000,000 of
the full moon on a clear night. Such being the
would require a quantity of light equal to that of
case, M. de Fonvielle correctly remarks that it
pro-
duce the same effect, if they were lighted at a dis-
tance 20,000 times greater, viz., 100 kilometres, the
in the ratio intensity diminishing gas-burners to
tio of the squares of
the distances. Now it appears from observation that
asteroids are about this distance from our earth when
they meet the upper strata of our atmosphere. The
conclusion to be drawn from these data is, that
we know the quantity of gas we should have to
burn at the altitude of 100 kilometres in order
to produce on the surface of the earth an optical
effect equal to that of the full-moon. As Paris is
lighted by about 30,000 burners, one Irindred and
fifty thousand times that quantity of light would
have to be condensed at that altitude. Now every
burner of Paris consumes on an average two centili-

......... _
tree of gas per second ; so that, admitting the aste-
roids to yield a quantity of light equal in intensity to
that of the moon, the quantity of gas to be con-
sumed in order to produce an equal effect under the
same circumstances would be about eight millions
of litres per second! These are certainly singular
speculations, and we regret we cannot follow
the author quite so closely as we could wish, as
he gradually becomes too scientific, and would
require too many definitions in order to be un-
derstood. We may say, however, that he ultimately
converts the consumption of gas into horse-power,
and thereby arrives at the conclusion that the equi-
valent of the power extended in the collision of
asteroids with our atmosphere at the altitude of 100
kilometres is 3,000 millions horse-power ! Nature
seems to delight in such a display of exuberant
force, which,
with all our mechanical skill, out-
strips our wildest conceptionfi,—Galignami.

STA'

.DE.

MANCHESTER, June 5. —The market for cotton
yarn and cloth has been steady to-day, at the
prices of yesterday, which were id to -}d. generally
higher than last week, and 3d. per piece on India
shirtings. Mulls, jacconets, and light goods gener-
ally for the same market are rather dearer. Buy-
ers seem hardly willing to follow the recent ad-
vances in price, and the market is consequently
quiet, but spinners and manufacturers are generally
so well supplied with contracts as to be exceedingly
firm in adhering to quotations. The deliveries to
agents and merchants on behalf of the contracts re-
ferred to are now becoming large, and there can be
no doubt that at present the out-turn from the
mills throughout the district is again becoming very
great. It is expected that the shipments of cotton
from India to the Ist of June, when the season
ended, have been very considerable, and telegrams
stating the total will be looked for with some
anxiety during the next few days.
BELFAST, 4th.—Flax : During the past week the
markets of this province were fairly suppled, with
the exception of Monaghan and Aughnacloy, the
cause of which is farmers holding over their flax
for the approaching fairs to be held during the pre-
sent week. Yarns : The improvement last an-
nounced has continuod unabated. Tows have been
in active request ; prices of these show indications
of upward tendency. Stocks are slightly decreased.
Linens, brown, powerloom : No improvement in
this department to announce, except for drills.
Cloth suitable for the foreign clothing trade and
light linens for bleaching. Handloom : Light
linens for bleaching and linen handkerchiefs con-
tinue in fair request ; prices of the latter are steady ,
manufacturers demand higher rates for the former.
Bleached and finished Linens : Home trade as last
reported. Improvement in the trade with the Con-

tinent has been announced. Stocks are large, espe-
cially of coarse goods.
NorriNGHAH, sth.—The lace trade has under-
gone very little change since our last report. All
branches continue unusually dull, especially for the
time of the year, and at present not much prospect
is held out of a favourable alteration taking place. ,
A. few houses are moderately active, but the gene-
rality have a great absence of orders on their books.
The weather, which is just now extremely change-
able, no doubt tends to restrict business ; but it is
really difficult to understand why the summer trade
should be so uncommonly inactive. There seems a
fair demand for curtains, but trimmings, on the
other hand, are very heavy, and the same remark
may be applied to the shawl departments. A decent
number of orders are being received for hair nets,
but it is a question whether manufacturers obtain
anything like a proportionate profit from the goods.
Yarns continue about the same, and their firmness

in some degree tends to keep the trade dull. In the
hosiery branches very little alteration has occurred
during the week ; orders for the home and foreign
markets are coming in rather actively, and there is
a fair demand for all light description of goods.

PROFESSOR GOLD WIN SMITH ON "THE

DERBY."

Mr. Godwin Smith has addressed the following
.otter to the Manchester Examiner :—" Sir,—The

correspondent of one of the journals, describing the
Derby, says that among the cheering which hailed
the victor was to be heard here and there a sound,

half scream, half sob, telling a tale of heavy loss, if
not of absolute ruin.' Subsequent report seems to
confirm the tale. This is the spectacle which Lord
Palmerston compared to the Isthmian games. It is
about as like the Isthmian games as the character of
Lord Palmerston was like the character, cast in a
narrow but genuine and noble mould, of the Greek
hero. 'I he reward of the victor at the Isthmian
games was a crown of leaves ; this, with an inscrip-
tion on enduring marble in his city, and the more
enduring monument of Pindar's verse. Of betting

I believe we have no record. If any sobs and
screams mingled with the exultation of victory, they
told only of the honourable agony of defeat. If a
parallel is to be sought in antiquity for these sports
of oars, it should be sought rather in the delirious
and degraded passions of the Roman circus in
the last age of degenerate R)me. It is need-
less to say that this is horse-racing no longer.
It is a gigantic system, or rather frenzy, of
national gambling. The horses are no more
than the two straws pulled from a haystack, or
the two drops of rain running together, down
the window-pane, on which, for want of anything
better, gamblers have been known to stake their
money. The whole kingdom at the approach of the
Derby becomes a gambling table, at which men who
never saw a horserace, who could not tell the points
of a horse, who would not know Ilermit from a
hack, and even women and boys, hasten to taste the
vile delight of gambling, often to their demoralisa-
tion, sometimes to their ruin. As to the pretence
of keeping up the breed of horses, it is needless to
say that it is about as valid and about as sincere as
the defence of fox-hunting on the ground that it
clears the country of vermin. Gambling—gambling,
every year more extensive, every year for higher
stakes, as the need of excitement increases—this is
now the grand national amusement, and its crisis is
the great national event. The men of the Common-
wealth put a stop to bear-baiting and the other
sports' of that time. This is set down as a proof
of their moroseness, and Macaulay says, in his epi-
grammatic way, that the bear-baiting was put down
not because it gave pain to the bear, but because it
gave pleasure to the spectators. Vane or Cromwell
would probably have answered that it was not be-
cause it gave pleasure, but because the pleasure
which it gave was an ignoble, unmanly, and degrad-
ing pleasure, unworthy alike of a Christian and of
an English citizen. Those days, however, are gone
by. Nobody would now propose to interfere legally
with any amusement not contrary to public order
or decency. We have learnt that a censorship of
manners in attempting to cure throws in the disease.
If, indeed, as the Times tells us, the aristocracy, our
hereditary legislators, are gambling away their
estates and impoverishing their titles, it may become
necessary that the State should step in for the pro-
tection of hereditary wisdom. But otherwise, as
offences against 'leaven must be left to the jurisdic-

tion of Heaven, so moral diseases must be left to
moral cures. It is hard to meet in any moral
philosopher with a good diagnosis of the
moral malady of gambling, or a good pre-
scription for its cure. Moral philosophers oc-
cupy themselves too much with general senti-
ments and theories, too little with the practical exa-
mination and treatment of the infirmities to which
humanity is heir ; they are too much of the preacher
and essayist, too little of the physician. There
seems to be no principle or propensity in human
nature in itself evil ; our vices are the depravations
or over-excitements of natural tendencies and de-
sires. The feeling of hope, or whatever it is that
leads us to venture and aspire, is capable, I pre-
sume, like other feelings, of being over-excited by
artificial stimulants, such as the gambling table or
the betting ring affords. Or perhaps a lower but
more natural explanation may be found in the
love of gain, combined with the dislike of
labour. But one thing seems certain, that
the passion for gambling prevails only in the
absence of any worthy object of interest or
desire. A man whose mind was full of manly
aspirations, or whosi heart was occupied by strong
and pure affections, would not be seen waiting at
the telegraph office, with agony in his face, for the
news of a horse race, or heard screaming and sob-
bing at Epsom because one animal had got its head
before another. The clergymen and moralists who
are lamenting %lad denouncing this base mania will
find that in the case of the individual they will do
little by attacking it directly. The only way of ex-
pelling the unhealthy and immoral interest is by im-
planting an interest which is healthy and moral.
And as with the individual, so it is with the nation.
Give us a Parliament capable of being the organ of
national aspiration and effort, let great questions be
once more handled in earnest by great men, let our
political chiefs once more display the qualities which
touch a nation's heart, and the soul of England
will soon cease to be absorbed by a horse race. That
it should he so absorbed at present is not wonder-
ful. I see in the shop windows a caricature the form
• of which is itself taken from the race-course, A