The Columbia herald. [volume] (Columbia, Tenn.) 1850-1873, 1869-10-15
Is the Moon an Iceberg or a Furnaces

Still grasping in his hand of ice
That banner with the strange device,
-ztr-- Excelsior!
Is the Moon an Iceberg or Furnace?
THIS is the question that selenographers
are now earnestly discussing. 1t is strange
that so little should be known of the near
est heavenly body, as to leave such ques-
ton open and championed on both sides
by men of genius and great experience in
lunar observations. That two theories so
precisely opposite should exist with regard
to the state of the moon, may well throw
doubt on some of the most confident
guesses into the condition of the more dis
tant sun and planets and stars. Sir John
Herschel stood forth as the chief defender
of what We may call for brevity, the
furnace theory" of the moon. He be-
lieved that, owing to the long lunar days
lasting some three hundred of our
hours-the moon warns up under the
fierce heat of the sun, until its temperature
is more than 200 degrees F. above that OF
boiling water-or about 492 degrees. For
nearly seventy hours any given point on
the moons surface turned toward the sun
is exposed to the almost vertical rays OF
that body. The moon having no atmos-
phere, or one SO tenuous as to be invisible
to US, there would be no mitigation of
shelter from the blazing downpour of the
solar rays. No animal life, no vegetation
such as we are familiar with, could live for
an hour under such torrid inf1uences-to
say nothing of the want of atmosphere,
which in the terrestrial order OF things, IS
indispensable to the vitality OF animals and
L. l,aI p11f
Captain John Ericsson, the distinguished
American inventor, man OF profound
originality, and slow and cautious OBJ
server and theorist, recently propounded
an opinion, that the moons surface is one
mass of ice He has arrived at this con-
clusion from novel and ingenious expert
ments to ascertain the actual intensity of
the solar rays in absolute space, that is
before they enter the earth's atmosphere.
We have not room to detail his processes
of investigation which were given in full
to the American Association for the Adj
yancement of Science at its late meeting,
and will only say that they are regarded
bv him as proving the actual heat of the
solar rays in absolute space to be more
than 300 degrees below the freezing
point of water-a degree of cold which
has no parallel in human experience, and
which would be as deadly to animal life
and vegetation as the high heat imagined
by Herschel. The reason why the earth
is not as cold as the moon is that the for
mer has an atmosphere, which prevents
the earth from parting with the solar heat
as fast as received, by radiating it back
into space. In other words, the atmos-
phere permits the solar rays to reach the
earth, and then keeps the resulting heat
imprisoned, until it is augmented up to
the existing average temperature, when
other causes step in to prevent it going
higher. Captain Ericsson, in attaching
such importance to the atmosphere as a
preventive of the escape of heat once i'm
parted to the earth, has the familiar
experience of aeronauts and mount
ain climbers on his side. At the
height of few miles from the earth a
| freezing atmosphere is encountered, which
| is satisfaco rily explained by the thinness
of the air, the radiation of the earth's sur
face expanding its principal heating effects
on the denser strata of atmosphere below
Assuming, as may be properly done, from
all the evidence, that there is no atmos
phere about the moon, it would follow thai
the Herschel theory must be erroneous
and it will remain one of the curiosities o
| science that Herschel should have regard
cd the absence of lunar atmosphere a!
causing an intense heat on the moons sur
face, while Captain Ericsson takes tina
| fact to be positive proof of the superla
| lively cold condition of that body.
The Herschel party claim that recen
experiments with the great Rose tele
scope sustain their theory. That gigantic
instrument has the largest metallic reflecto
| in the world, and, by connecting the tele
scope with clock. work during the presen
year, Lord Rose has been able to concen
trate the rays of the moon upon delicate
heat measurer, for the purpose of deter
mining whether the moon gives out hea
or not. No tests previously made wer
satisfactory on that point; but this on
settled the question beyond doubt. TIL
lunar rays do transmit sensible degree
heat This fact is quoted to substantial
the Herschel theory, but it does not neces
sarily do so. For it is wei
established truth that heat may b.
reflected from surfaces of ice, or iron
or glass, or other substances, themselve
cold. Reflected heat from cold bodies, o
heat radiated from hot bodies, would pro
duce exactly the same effects upon object
receiving the rays. No means are nov
known by which reflected and radiated hea
can be told apart, except by an examination
of the surface from which they proceed
The Rose experiments, therefore, Will
they are very interesting as deciding
mooted point, and demonstrating that tn
"chaste beams of the watery moon" ar
not altogether devoid of heat, settles moth
ing conclusively as between Ericsson an
Herschel; for there is no doubt tina
Ericsscn's Hypothetical lunar ice would re
feet as much heat as Herschel's suppose
burning temperature would radiate.
Under the impulse of the discussion
which the bold and original Ericsson ha
started, the moon will now become NOR
than ever an object of inquisitorial ex
animation. Perhaps some telescope ma
yet be made powerful enough to determin
by direct inspection, once and forever, tn
question whether the lunar mountains arc
as Ericsson says, enormous cones of ict
fed by water from the interior, whic
freezes the moment it comes to the surface
or the peaks of extinct volcanoes, rs astron
omcrs generally suppose them to be.-Me'
York Journal Of Commerce.