The Grenada gazette. (Grenada, Miss.) 1885-18??, 1886-06-26


meteorites in like manner, we find the
two series coinciding over the greater
portion of the longer-the volcanic
series. We might not indeed have
known how closely the most ferrugin-
ous volcanic products resemble the
iron m~eteorites in structure but for the
accident that Nordenskjold discovered
a mass which he mistook for All iron
meteoritc, but which is found now 10
be really a volcanic election, akin in
structure to the field of basaltic lava
lat Ovifak on the shores Of Greenland),
in the midst of which it had fallen
while the lava was still plastic to re-
tain this missile as it fell after its fight
through many miles of air.
Regarding a large proportion of the
material visitants of the earth as orig.
inally earthborn, we may conclude
that in the remote time when our
earth was a baby world, sunlike in
condition, her path was traversed by
hundreds Of comets, her own progeny.
These comets were followed severally
by their trains of meteoric attendants.
They were exposed to the action Of
those solar forces by which, within the
last half century, a once promising
member of another comet family be-
came dissipated until it finally lost al
together its cometic character. Mill
ions Of years ago, probably, every one
of them had been thus broken up until
nothing remained but the streams of
meteoric bodies, travelling round the
orbit which had once been that Of the
earth-ejected comet.
But this being the case with the earth,
was the case also no doubt with every
planet. Even our little moon, whose
SCARED face still shows signs of the
volcanic energies she once possessed,
played her part in giving birth to such
comets as she was equal to. If she pos
sessed less volcanic power than the
earth Cat the same stage of the life OF
each) she required less power to eject
matter forever from her interior. On
the other hand the giant planets re,
quired greater power; but then they
also possessed it. If Jupiter, for ex,
ample, required power enough to eject
bodies with a velocity of forty or fifty
miles per second, yet it must be re-
membered that he is three hundred and
ten times as massive and therefore three
hundred and ten times as strong as our
earth. (For matter, ''inert matter
as many choose to call it, measures in
reality the strength in the orbs in space,
and not only possess power, but a
power acting so swiftly across vast dis
tances that the velocity of light is resi-
by comparison. Moreover, this power
possessed by ''inert'' matter is the
source of every form of energy of (which
we know, even of life itself.) So with
the other giant planets.
Jupiter. then, and each one OF his
giant brethren, must during its sun
like stage have possessed the comet
ejecting power. Each giant planet
must have had its comet-family at thai
remote time in the history of the solal
| system. And the comets thus formed
by the giant planets, while no doubt
very numerous, must, many of them,
have been far more important than
those to which Il earth gave birth
Some of the members of these families
are among those from which the asso'
citation between meteors and comets
came first to be known. For instance,
the meteors of November 1914 (the
L~eonides) are associated with a comet
depending on the orbit of Uranus; and
the meteors of November 27-2S are as
ISOLATED with a comet depending on the
orbit of Jupiter-Biela' famous comet.
Chicago Tribune.