The Jeffersonian. [volume] (Stroudsburg, Pa.) 1853-1911, 1855-07-12
Wonders of the Atmosphere.


The atmosphere forms spherical shell
surrounding the earth to depth which
is unknown to US by reason of its grow
ing tenuity as it is released from the pres
sure of its own superintendent mass. It's
upper surface cannot be nearer to US than
afty and can scarcely be more than five
hundred miles. 1t surrounds us on all
sides, yet we see it not; it presses on US
with a load of fifteen pounds on every
square inch or surface of our bodies, or
from seventy to one hundred tons on US
all, yet we do not so much as feel its
weight. Softer than the finest down,
more impalpable than the finest gossa-
mer, it leaves the cobweb undisturbcd,
and scarcely stirs the slightest flower that
feeds on the dew it supplies; yet it bears
the fleets of nations on its wings around
the world and crushes the most refractory
substances with its weight. When in mo-
ton its force is sufficient to level the
most stately forests and stable buildings
with the earth; to raise the waters of the
ocean into ridges like mountains and dash
the strongest ships to pieces like toys
1t warns and cools by turns the earth
and the living creatures that inhabit it,
1t draws up vapers from the sea and land,
retains them dissolved in itself or suspend
ed in cisterns Of clouds, and throws them
down again as rain or dew when they are
required. 1t bends the rays of the sun
from their path to give us the twilight of
evening and of dawn; it disperscs and re-
tracts their various tints to beautify the
approach and the retreat of the orb of
day. But for the atmosphere, sunshine
would burst upon US and fail US at once,
and at once remove US from midnight
darkness to the blaze of noon. We should
have no twilight to soften and beautify
the landscape, no clouds to shade US from
the scorching heat; but the bald earth, as
it revolved on its axis, would turn its
tanned and weathered front to the full
and unmitigated rays of the lord Of day
1t affords the gas which WHITES and warns
our frames, and receives into itself that
which had been polluted by use and is
thrown off as noxious. 1t feeds the flame
of life exactly as it does that of the fire;
it is in both cases consumed and affords
the food of consumption; in both cases it
becomes combined with charcoal, which
requires is for combustion, and it re moved
By it when this is over.
at is only the girdling encircling air, :"
ho ,,h D.
view, "that flows above and around US,
that makes the whole world kin. The
carbonic acid with which to-day our
breathing fills the air tomorrow seeks its
way round the world. The date trees
that grow round the falls of the Nile will
drink it in by their leaves; the cedars of
Lebanon will take of it to add to their
stature; the cocoa nuts Of Tahita will grow
rapidly upon it; and the palms and ban
anas of Japan will change it into flowers.
The oxygen we are breathing was distill-
ed for US some short time ago by the mag
,nolias of Susquehanna and the great trees
that skirt the Orinoco and the Amazon;
the giant rhododendrons Of the Himalays
contributed to it, and the roses and myr-
ties of Cashmere, the cinnamon tree of
Ceylon, and the forests older than the
food, buried deep in the heart of Africa,
far behind the Mountains of the Noon
The rain we see descending was thawed
for as out of the icebergs which have
watched the Polar star for ages; and the
lotus lilies have soaked up from the Nile
and eXhaled as vapor SHOWS that rested
on the SUBMITS of the Alps"
"The atmosphere" says Maun, (which
forms the outer surface of the habitaable
world is vast reservoir, into which the
supply of food designed for living crea-
lures is thrown; or, in one word, it is it.
self the food in its simple form of all liv-
ing creatures. The animal grinds down
the fibre and the tissue of the plant, or
the nutritious store that has been laid up
within its cells, and converts these into the
substance of which its own organs are
composed. The plant acquires the Or
gans and nutritious store thus yielded up
as food to the animal from the invulnera-
bic air surrounding it; but animals are
furnished with the means of locomotion
and seizure-they can approach their food
and lay hold of and swallow it ; plants
must await till their food comes to them
No solid particles find access to their
frames; the restless ambient air, which
rushes past them loaded with the carbon,
the hydrogen, the oxygen, the water, ev-
cry thing they need in the shape of sup
plies, is constantly at hand to minister to
their wants, not only to afford them food
in due seasan, but in the shape or fash.
on in which it alone can avail them.