Bristol news. [volume] (Bristol, Va. & Tenn.) 1867-189?, 1880-07-06

the effect is about the same as II the OBJ.
server were in balloon 500 miles above
the surface of the moon. Below him liz
mountains greater than Mount Blanc
and Chimberazo, looking no larger than
pebbles. Ancient sea bottoms are spread
beneath him like smooth floors, dotted
here and there with elevations that may
once have been islands, and surrounded
by table lands, plains 'and mountain
chains that show where the old sea coast
was fiat and marshy, where it was full
Of harbors, and where it was iron bound
and perious. Great naked plains
stretch out in various directions as
smooth as our prairies, and in other
places there are reaches Of hill country,
and then tremendous mountain masses.
The great typographical features remain,
as in the days when the moon was young
and full of lie like the earth; but the
coasts nre silent as the mountain peaks,
the seas are empty, the fruitful soil is
gone, all that ancient tecming life has
vanished, and the whole land is void of
air. 1t is only the rocky skeleton Of Il
dead world, and picture of what our
earth will be hundl eds of millions of
years hence.
1t is this last cOnsideration-that the
moon furnishes us sort of prophetic
page wherein the earth's future can be
read-which makes the study Of lunar
scenery only less interesting than it
would be if our telescopes revealed to us
cities and cultivated fields and all the
evidences Of mans presence in the
moon.
The scenery of the moon il not only
wonderful, but exceedingly beautiful,
when viewed from the lofty perch that
the observer with telescope seems to
occupy This Is especially true Of the
mountains. There being no air on
those rocky heights, there is no grada-
ton of light and the shadows are abso-
lutely black. Therefore, night and day
confront one another without any inter
vening twilight. If one could stand
upon n lunar mountain he might be in
the full blaze Of the sun on the summit,
while ten feet below all would he buried
in the blacklist night. The scene recalls
the Plague of Darkness that was sent
upon Egypt when the habitations Of the
Israelltes were filed with light, while
the adjoining lands of the Egyptians
were walled up IN night The effect Of
this sharp contrast Of light and shadow
in the moon il wonderfully beautiful -
A chain Of mountains just at the edge of
the Illuminated portion lies under the
telescope pictured in silhouette upon the
adjacent plain by the long shadows that
arc as sharp IN outline as If cut from
| black psper. Yet more beautiful are
the circular mountains, or Craters, that
are the Characteristic features of lunQr
scenery. Some Of these are forty or
| fifty miles in diameter. aud in the centre
Of the fiat floor enclosed by the ring
mountain rise one or more high peaks.
The effects of the light and shade among
there craters are almost endless in di-
versity.
with good three inch telescope, and
little practice in tie management Of
the lnagnifyng powers one may easily
see all the famous mountains of the
moon, and most Of the strange looking
objects that have at different times been
taken for Notifications, roads and other
works Of man. There are number of
excellent maps Of the moon, by whose
aid every conspicuous object may be re-
cognized, The point Of greatest inter-
est to the observer IL the long, Jagged
line, called the terminator, that marks
the sharp division between day aud
night. If you watch that line for mn
hour or two You will be astonished at
the changes that have taken place under
your eye. You will see the sunshine
creeping down the steep inner side
Of rnged mountain, until the floor
OF the vast basin, which had before
been perfectly black looking like hole
right through the moon, Is reached and
lighted up, while the rocky nauks of the
central peak, or cluster Of peaks, come,
into view, and begin to east long, splry
shadows over the crater floor. A lofty
mountain, whose summit glldcd by the
sunlight, has been visible for an hour,
shining out of the dense obscurity that
covers the region about II which le yet
stepped Mt night, like little island lying
of sunny coast, gradually swings into
view, and the line Of sunshine goes
sweeping up its craggy sides, chasing
the shadows, and revealing rocky spires
and precipilous gorges deeper than the
valley Of the Mere dc Glace.
The vast dark plains, which were
formerly supposed TO be real seas, but IN
which modern astronomers see only the
bottoms Of seas whose waters disappear
ed ages ago, retain their old romantic
nnmes.
There Is the Ocean Of storma, cover
ing vast region IN the Eastern lIcmls-
phere. With It's equatorial situation,
and surrounded by some Of the most 81
gantlc mountains In the moon, II may
have been before its waters were stolen