Peninsula enterprise. [volume] (Accomac, Va.) 1881-1965, 1885-01-24
A DRY PERIOD Is COMING.
When Old Mother Earth Drinks up
Her Oceans.

Prof. Cookley, of New York, SAYS:
Most of the planets have probably
cooled down by radiation to Il solid
under crust like the earth. The
sun owing to his greater mass is
still q fiery mass not yet cooled
down so rs to have Il solid crust
But our moon being body of
small mass only about onc.ciglth-
ieth Of the earth's mass, is sup
posed to have had time to cool
down to a solid globe all the way
from its surface to its center. It's
internal heat is supposed TO shavc
been rldiated away into the sur
rounding cold space. Now the hot
Interior mass Of the earth can. of
course, contain no water, and little
OF none of the free gases that con-
stitute an atmosphere. But when
the earth shall have parted with all
its internal heat. having thrown it
into the surrounding cold ace
as the moon has done, then the
cold, solid but porous mass within
its present crust, which is now in
capable of absorbing water or air,
on account of the present high
temperature, will begin to drink up
tbs water and air just as the parch-
Ell soil after a summers drought
drinks up the rain, and the gronp.l
is dry in ~ few minutes after the
shower. But you may we'll ask,
could the solid porous mass within
the present crust of the earth thur
drink up the Whole Of the waters of
the Atlantic and Pacific oceans and
cause all the waters of our globe to
disappear? Let us examine this
more closely. .
While the interior of the eartIS
remains rs hot as il is at present
it is no more possible for the wa.
ter and air OF our globe to pene
trate to these fry regions than it
is for a drop Of water to remain on
4 hot stone. But the earth is los.
ing its heat day by day and by
year, radiating it out into the sur.
rounding cold space. l know ithas
been computed that earth receives
from the sun annually just asmnch
heat as it loses in Il year by rldi
alton into the surrounding space
Grant that it he so for the present
and for the many thousands Of
years to come. But the trouble is
the sun himself is cooling off. and,
therefore, will not be always able
to return to us. Then it will be
only a question of time for the
earth gradually to cool down, as
the moon has already done, from
surface to center. When that time
comes will not the dry but solid
and porous core of our globe drink
up our oceans and atmosphere,
causing them to disappear, not in
to large cavernonS pockets, but in
to the minute pores of its sub.
stance?
The proposition appears to be es-
tablished by strict calculation that
the interior Of the earth when cold
will be able to absorb more than
four times, possibly more than
thirty times, the amount Of water
now on its surface. Now, it seems
certain that in the manner first cx-
planned the earth will continue to
lose both its superficial water and
its atmosphere. The earth, the
other planets, and even the sun
himself, are doomed ut some future
day TO the same fate. Melancholy
fate. some will say. But why com
plain Of the general law of nature'
Everything in nature has its morn
ing of life, its high meridian Of
glory and strength, its evening de.
cline and its mic night OF blackness
and death.