Morning journal and courier., 1882-01-10

from the truth. Perhaps you may think l that if we looked back to still earlier epoch, ! the day would become still less and finally ] disappear altogether! This is, however, not the case. The day can never have been much less than three hours in the present order of things. Everybody knows that the earth is not sphere, but that there is a protuberance at the equator, so that, as our school books tell us, the earth is shaped like an orange. It is we'll known that this protu- berance is due to the rotation of the earth on it's axis, by which the equatorial parts bulge out by centrifugal force The quicker the earth rotates the greater is the protuberance. certain limit the equatorial portions of the earth could no longer cling together. The attraction which unites them would be over come by centrifugal force, and general break up would occur. It can be shown that the rotation of the earth when on the point of rupture corresponds to length of ! the day some where about the critical value of three hours. which we have already adopt ed. It is therefore impossible for us to sup | pose day much shorter than three hours. ! Let us leave the earth for few minutes,
 and examine the past history of the moon. We have seen the moon revolves around the earth in an ever widening orbit, and conse- l quently the moon must in ancient times have | been nearer the earth than it is now. No | QOuDG tu6 CuduR0 IS SlOW- lu6T0 IS uOU 1uuCIl difference between the orbit of the moon thousand years ago and the orbit In which the moon is now moving. But when we rise to millions of years the difference becomes very appreciable. Thirty or forty millions l of years ago the moon was much closer to
 the earth than it is at present; very possibly the moon was then only half it's present
 distance. We must, however, look still earlier to certain epoch not less than fifty millions of years ago. At that epoch the moon must have been so close to the earth that the two bodies were almost touching. Everybody ! knows that the moon revolves now around
 the earth in period of twenty-seven days.
 The period depends upon the distance be-
 tween the earth and the moon. In earlier
 times the month must have been shorter than
 our present month. Some millions of years ago the moon completed it's journey in week instead of taking twenty seven days as at present. Looking back earlier still, we find the month has dwindled down to day, then down to few hours, until at that wondrous
 epoch when the moon was almost touching
 the earth, the moon spun round the earth I once every three hours.
 In those ancient times I See our earth to ! be a noble globe, as it is at present. Yet 1t is not partly covered with oceans and partly
 clothed with verdure. The primeval earth seems rather fiery and half molten mass,
 where no organic life can dwell. Instead of ! the atmosphere WHICH we now nave, see
 dense mass of vapors in which perhaps ali the oceans of the earth suspended as clouds. I see that the sun still rises and
 sets to give the succession of day and of
 night, but the day and the night together
 only amount to thfee hours instead of twen,
 ty-four. Almost touching the chaotic mass
 of the earth is another much smaller and
 equally chaotic body. Around the earth see this small body rapidly rotating. The
 two revolve together as if they were bound
 by invisible bands The smaller body is the ! moon.