Spirit of the age. [volume] (Woodstock, Vt.) 1845-1913, 1872-03-21
The Coming Comet.

1t will be prudent to get ones affairs
in order during the next few months
for on the 18th of August comet is to
come in collision with the earth, and
great will be the damage and the panic.
At least a Swiss paper utters this pro-
phecy, and one of the English papers
tells us what may happen
Let us for a brief period "dally with
false surmise," and return to the simple
faith of a child. Let us imagine that
the astronomer has really prophesied our
approaching fate, and that the prophecy
is correct. Within few weeks we shall
be able without the help of telescope
to see the little cloud, no bigger than a
mans hand, and fruught with omens
more dreadful than have ever before af-
frighted the human race. 1t will grow,
slowly at first, but afterwards with a rate
of increase almost perceptible to our
naked vision, till at last the whole sky
will be lit up with the fiery portent
Night by night we shall watch its terri
bic growth, and before long it will be
brilliant enough to outshine the sun it.
self. The temperature will rise to be
at first tropical and then hotter than
anything that is endured in the hottest
/ DOM of Turkish bath. But the time
during which we shall be conscious of
excessive heat will be brief indeed. The
two large bodies, plunging towards each
other at pace compared with which the
speed of cannon ball is absolute rest,
will crash into each other with a hideous
collision. If we happen to be placed
between two such antagonists, we shall
not have time even for an ejaculation
The petty race of insects that crawls
among the little excressences on the
earth's skin will be instantaneously dis
missed from existence.
On the other side of the world We
shall perhaps have Just one flash of SEN
sation. We shall see the mountains
without any metaphor, skipping like
rams, and be ourselves sent spinning of
into space Just as the dust-to indulge
in an humble simile--is knocked off the
under side Of the carpet by the blows
upon its upper surface. For an instant
we shall have glimpse of the broken
fragments of the earth starting off, each
on its new career, to whirl through the
universe, each bearing with it-so WI
shall remember on the faith of Presi
dent of the British Association-som,
minute germs to be planted, if they
have good luck, on some distant planet
and there to begin over again tina
endless process of evolution which vii
have come to so summary a conclusion
here. Or, if we please, we contemplat
another alternative, and suppose we jus
miss the nucleus of the comet, but ar
wrapped in his fiery tail, which will turf
oceans into steam, dissipate the eterna
ice at the poles, and SINCE the world int
the likeness Of an American prairie al
ter a fire. Nothing will be left but
vast surface of gray ashes, gradually t
be converted into mud as the water
) again condense and again descend upo
the depopulatod planet. Alas we can
not claim the eloquence which would b
necessary to do justice to such tremer
dous catastrophes. Milton, writing I'm
{ der the superintendent of DR.. Cum
ming, might possibly be equal to such
task as the description of the complet
and instantaneous ruin of a world BIT
nature is not prodigal she only give
one such mind at time