The Bolivar bulletin. [volume] (Bolivar, Hardeman County, Tenn.) 1865-1888, 1879-02-06
THE SUN.
P.Of. LOckyer's New solar Discoveries.
New York Herald.


Pot Lockyer's New Solar Discoveries.
New York Herald.
Dne of our cable dispatches is Of pecu
liar interest to the scientific world, but
also of great interest to that large part
of the general public which watches with
sdmiratiOn and wonder the vast additions
made in our time to the exact knOwl-
edge of the physical universe. Mr.. J.
Lockyer, whose remarkable discoveries
in the spechoscopic examination of the
sun have made him justly famous,
claims to have made one more step in
advance in the solution of the mysteries
OF solar phenomena. An outline of his
statement-Just enough to whet the ap-
petite OF the scientific world for the fuller
statement itself when it shall be put
for6A-bas been given to our London
correspondent, and the new views it
contains appear to be presented as con-
victions reached from study Of the
observations made in the eclipse of the
sun last year. 1t deals with the consti-
tuition of the solar chromosphere, sug-
gests a theory OF the corona, an srgu-
ment in support of Secchi's views of the
sun spots and theory of the solar
phenomena in their totality." Appar-
emily these are all the result of further
details in spectroscopic study. Mr..
Lockyer and the French astronomer,
Jansen made nearly st the same time,
in the year 1858, the discovery that the
luminous protuberances beyond the
corona, seen when the sun is in eclipse,
could be examined in the spectros0Ope,
and that so examined they showed the
lines OF the spectrum of hydrogen. Al
once the study of the chemical constitu-
ton o the sun and other planets was
seen to be possible, and has been since
pursued with great zeal by means of the
same instrument. Many lines seen il
this examination were not susceptible 0
satisfactory classification, were in lac
chemical mysteries.
Prof. Lockyer's first statement refer
to some of these, which he Is now in
clined to accept as indications of tn
imperfection of our present chemica
2 nowledge-evidences that some fourteen
e substances now classified as elements ar
/ not elementary, but are compounds. 1
: should be remem bered that the spectre
;, scope has pointed the way for chemics
s discovery, and has indicated the exist
!, ence of metals not previously known t
us. That this process may be now IT
s peated on a grander scale is reasonabl,
q An old proverb, thai we must 90 ava
y from home to get news of our neighbor
o is strikingly exemplifed in our gettin
o from the sun hints for prosecution
l, our study of earthly substances. BE-
e Mr.. Lockyer's suggestion of sort {
r gaseous circulation on the surface of tt
u sun bids fair to be the most remarkab
- result of his studies. This is practical
e. a theory that the sun is an enOrmOI
D, permanent reservoir of gases in chemic
&, combustion, but whose combustion Is
er ordered that exhaustion is impos-ibl
IN Our atmospheric circulation may illu
y trate the process as it seems to be state
Id If an inbabitant of the sun was to
ne that the seas on earth were continual
vaporized by the sun he might say, {"
yh cannot be, for they are not exhausted
as But if learned of the return. in t
"a form OF rain, Of all that vaIoriz
ad water, one fact would explain the 9th
nd Somewhat analogous are the two poiI
as IN the history of the sun stated in t
he dispatch-discharge by combustion
ty its elements at the level of the Pho
.ry sphere, their projection to higher lev
-th and their return in new associations,
BILE in the old ones repeated, from this higl
to level--that, in short, all the unexplair
nst appearances on the surface of the s
his are due to a constant projection of gs
on, Gus elements in one state. and c5nst
yes fiery rain made by their return
des another state.
the