Savannah morning news. [volume] (Savannah) 1868-1887, 1886-12-19
BIRTH AND LIFE OF COMETS.
The Great Products of Solar Vol
Canic Action.
From the CoyahXk .Ha04zjns

From the COCahttE Magazine.
If an orb like the sun elects from its
interior the materials for forming first
class comet it must send forth that flight
of meteOrs in good style, or else the
cometic progeny will return to the bosom
of IT'S solar parent "like the prodigious
sOn'-as LauncelOt has it-a disappOint-
ment and failure. The elected matter
must start forth at the rate of few
hundreds of miles per second. In our
SUMS case $50 miles per second would
suffice. A noteworthy effort must be
made, even by such a giant as sun, to
effect this livery election. But that sun
is capable of IL no one who considers the
might OF our own sun can for
moment question. He is
$4,000 times as strong as this little
earth on which we live. His vitality is
shown by his lustre, which is about
equal to the light which would
come from two millions OF MIL
lions OF millions OF millions of
electric burners. 1t is shown also by his
what would result from burning each
second mass of coal { OF the best quality
be it understood 200 miles broad, 300
miles long and 200 miles high-that is,
100000 cubic miles of coal. This would
be about $4,000 millions OF millions of
tons per second the whole output of our
exceptionally cOal-producing country is
but about 100 millions of tons per an
num). The sun, then, and doubtless
every one of his fellow suns. the stars.
has undoubtedly the requisite power, il
only 1t had the will, to EJECT the matter In
the required manner. Now, of course.
our own sun IL not often engaged upon
such work as this. Although most act
i've and vigorous, the source, indeed (di-
rectly or indirectly, of all life and energy
within his system, ne works steadily, not
httuily. Yet every now and then he
spurts into sudden though local ACTIVITY
Of the most amazing kind. In one of
these fits he shoe out a flight OF bodies
whose swift motion through the
hydrogen atmosphere which enwraps
the sun was measured at 100 miles pc +
second, and indicated Gas was show n
by mathematical oomputatIon) a
velocity OF 400 miles per second as the
missiles left the SUMS surface. Since the
time 1922 when the sun was first caught
in the act Of thus ejecting matter away
from mis- own interior forever because
he can never bring back matter which
leaves him with velocity OF more than
$50 miles per sec0nd) he has been de-
tected four or five times at the same
lively business. There can be no doubt.
then, either about the SUMS power to
eject matter from MS interior as The giant
planets and our own earth seem to have
done, or about mis- exerting that power
from time TO time. And what the sun
can do his fellow suns can do likewise.
In fact, just as our earth is sample
planet, 30 the sun 10 sample star.
Now surprising there are ten thous-
aud millions of stars in our galaXy-a
most moderate calculatiou-that each one
OF them has been in the suu-llke state for
lO,00O,000 OF years (our earth actually
tells us by her crust that tho sun has been
at work as now for $1,000. 900 years J, and
that In ten years on the AVERAGE only one
election such as we are considering has
taken place, then there would be 10000
000, 600, 100000 star-ejeeted meteor flights
or comets travelling about the lnterste ar
spaces. With 80 goodly probable
supply we need not wonder
II our solar system is from time
10 time visited by larger
comets, such as these elections might bo
supposed 10 have given birth to In the
past. But a few OF the comets which
! from time TO time visit our lsun may be