The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1884-04-26
The Era Of Physical Connections.

At the last January session of the
Paris Academy of Sciences, M. Faye
gave a rather startling summary of re-
cent physical connections both on the
earth and on the sun. Among the
numerous exceptional phenomena noted
for some time, such as the frightful
volcanic explosion of Krakatoa, the
immense sea waves and air waves
which have swept round the globe and
the strange celestial lights and colora-
tons, he mentioned that the month of
January in Europe resembled in tenn
perature the month of April, while sys-
tematic observations disclose singular
variations in sun spot frequency andno
less singular behavior of the magnetic
needle. During the present summer in
the southern hemisphere extraordinary
heat has been recorded, the thermome-
ter at Buenos Ayres rising in the shade
to l01 and in Queensland to LOG de-
grees In consonance with the dis
turbed state of the earth M. Wolf, of
Zurich, reports two pronounced sun
spot maxima, in April and October
last, and only four days in 1883 on which
the sun was not spotted. Though these
maxima were not as high as that of
April, 1882, and there are now indica-
tons that the suns activity is decreas-
ing, physicists will not be slow to con-
meet the terrestrial disturbances with
the solar storms The French scientist
may now add to his list of strange phe-
nomena the late unparalleled Ohio
foods, the extraordinary Southern tor
nadoeS of recent date, with the reported
death roll of several hundred persons,
and the phenomenally early and extern
sive efliuX of Arctic ice upon the At
lantic.
1t is impossible, perhaps, to trace all
these exceptional phenomena to a
single cause. But by the theory that
the sun has for the last two years been
excessively active in radiating heat
upon the earth. as seems most likely,
all these anomalies may possibly be ac-
counted for. Since the cred skies"
eral astronomers, following Mr.. Lock
yer, have been so ready to explain them
by the diffusion of Java volcanic dust,
whirled through the upper air at the
rate of two thousand miles day, that
it is to be feared some of this dust has
gotten in their eyes. These sky glows,
as the Herald suggested on December
/ and subsequently, were due largely
''to an excess of evaporation, espe-
cially from the oceans, ''indicating eX-
ceptional activity of the solar fires.
The exceptional evaporation from the
oceans and consequent excess of
aqueous vapor in the atmosphere for
which we then argued, seem to have
been pretty well unmasked by the re-
cent extraordinary ocean cyclones and
barometric minima as well as by the
torrental rainfalls in New Zealand. in
the Gulf Stream region, in Great
Britain, in parts of Southern Europe
and in the Ohio Valley. The mere fact
that microscopes have found dust re-
sembling volcanic ash in the winter
SHOWS by no means proves that the
worldwide sky colorations were due to
this agent. The most careful observ-
ations of the phenomena by the French
scientists on the summit of the Puy de
Dome lead NJ. Alluard evidently to
think that the Gght-reiiecting medium
was not necessarily dust, but may have
peeH Hldue up Vi pdftIcIeS Ol eAceS-
sively minute frozen water" The
English investigator, Mr.. Mattieu Will
Jams. also thinks that the suns radi-
alton has recently been exceptionally
great, and that its warming effect on
the upper atmosphere might enable it
to hold much aqueous vapor Sin the
form of liquid particles" which would
perfectly explain the red and green suns.
No competent meteorologist, so far as
we have noticed, has undertaken to
otherwise explain these meteorological
! o