The Indiana State sentinel., 1874-02-10
THE MOON.

l3th inst. SALEM.
THE MOON.
A wATERLEss, AIELEss, LIFEIEss PLANET
LONG BURNED OUT.
Professor Proctor lectured recently in New
York on the moon. The New York World
gives report of the lecture There had
once been moon worshippers as well as sun
wershippers, and it was not strange. The
moon travelled over the heavens with what
well might have seemed an independents
power. She was goddess, cir
cling the earth and watching
it from all points. Her diameter
was 2100 miles, her distance 23S,S2S miles;
her surface was to the earth's surface as one
to thirteen and a half, or about IA, sec, 900
square miies-Jhe joint area of North and
South America. Its volume was one-forty-
mini b that of the earth, its mass one-eight-
| ieth. The first thing noticeable in its sp-
pearance under the telescope were the
mountains, many of which were circular.
The seas, so called, had no signs of water.
| 1t had always been hoped that the moon
might be found fit abiding place for hui
man beings, but the largest telescopes
had failed to detect a. sign of life.
I" His audience would remember the
moon hoax of their countryman, Richard
A. Locke. Herschel went to the Cape of
| Good Hope and the hoaxer took advantage
of his absence to describe his dircoveries,
how he illuminated the focus of his teles-
cope with the oxy hydrogen light, how he
| first saw flowers and animals, their build
ings covered with frame-shaped appear
ances so arranged as to indicate belief
in the doctrine of the Trinity; and at last
the "bat-men," who were described as
"not handsome. but at least as handsome
as the London militia" So effective had
been the hoax that somebody wrote to Sir
John asking if the opportunity could not
| be availed of to convey religious instruction
to the benighted moon men," Bat the con-
ditions of sustaining life were wanting on
| the moon. The first of series of photo
graphs was introduced on the screen. The
blackness of the shadows forbade the idea
| that there were any illuminated sky: any
atmosphere. A star at the edge disappeared
! instantly and reappeared instantly when it
had crossed the disk. If one were looking
ably not disappear at all, the refraC-
tive power of the atmosphere
holding back its light. The earth when
''new'' would have a twilight circle ever
| around the darker part. There was none
/ such in the new moon. There was no at
atmosphere, therefore no water, for water
would be raised as vapor and we should see
signs of it. The physical roughness of the
moon could therefore show no signs of
"weathering," as there were no storms and
nc glaciers. The earth could never totally
eclipse the sun, for its atmosphere would
refrsct real sunlight all the time. So that
moon astronomers, if there were any, could
never see the corona or the prominences.
| Here followed a display of lunar photo
graphs, the lecturer say ing that Mr. Ruther-
ford, of New York, had taken some which
surpassed any taken in England. Mr.. Proc
| tor corrected the popular notion that by per-
fected processes of photography the image
formed by telescope could be so enlarged as
! to give indefinite perfection in details of
! the moons surface. The difficulty
lay in the imperfection of the image itself,
! and the hope of astronomers in mounting
powerful telescope up in the rare atmosphere
! of some mountain. So far as observation
went there was no evidence whatever of
change on the moons surface, except the
gradual disruption probably caused by the
great alternations of heat and cold in the
hong lunar days and nights. The day was
twenty nine and half of our days. Du-
ring the fifteen days of sunshine, and
no sheltering atmosphere or clouds, the
surface atmosphere rose to heat of boiling
water, and during the long night with no at
mosphere to prevent rapid radiation an in
an American winter, Of which he heard so
much and experienced so little. II the
| moons craters had been produced by vol
| canic action, what had become of the water
and the gaseous products? One theory was
that the comet had come and whisked the
air and the oceans away. Another was that
| in the intense cold water and air
had frozen up together and fallen as a
white snow. This was apparently favored
| by the Wilderness of the moon. But OBJ
servations of the amount of light reflected
| by the moon and of the amount perfectly
white body of the same size would reflect,
had shown that the moon reflected about as
much as would be given by an equal globe
of weathered sandstone; while some parts
were white as snow, others were absolutely
black. Another theory had been that the
contractions of the cooling moon had formed
cavities in it's interior into which the oceans
has been withdrawn. But the atmosphere
could not so have been Withdrawn with
force of gravity only one-sixth
the force at the earth's surface. Another
theory was that
THE MOONS CENTER OF GRAVITY
was farther away than its center of figure,
and that consequently all the oceans and the
air had been drawn to the further side,
which was never turned towards the earth.
But it was almost inconceivable that the
fitting of the moon in its hbrations
should never show US sign of atmosphere,
| III there were on the further side at snch
times partly revealed. Besides, it was
found that the moon bulged little towards
the earth, which would bring it's center of
gravity this way and certainly show us the
atmosphere. Mr.. Proctor confessed a strong
impression that the best explanation of the
multitudinous craters was furnished by the
theory of the downfall of immense meteoric
systems long ago, when meteors were
plentier and when the processes Of growth
by accretion, new slowly going on, were
more rapid. The moon always turned
the same face towards the earth that
was, it turned on its axis and passed
round the earth in the same period.
If she had been made so she
would be compelled 10 so continue by the
earth's attraction, aud in that there was evil
dence as to the conditions under which she
first came into being. In the process of evo-
luton of the solar system she came into
being within the extension of the earth
that is, within the reach of the vaprous mat
ter which was to form the earth, but which
stretched out then beyond the moons orbit.
Naturally. then, she carried with her tho
motion of that rotating mass. In the sun
we had a body full of YigOf QiYing forth