The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1888-05-09
THE RED PLANET.
Speculations About the Canals OF
Mars and Their Builders.

Mars and Their Builders.
From the San Francisco call AprI p.
People who can obtain the privilege Of
looking at Mars through the Lick tele-
scope should not neglect the opportunity.
Several years have elapsed since that re-
markable planet could be seen to such ad-
vantage as at present, and it Will be three
years before we have an equal chance
again. 1t has certainly never been exam
ined before through a telescope Of such
power as the monster refractor on Mount
Hamilton.
1t may be interesting to lovers of astron-
omy to know that the eminent French as
tronomer, NJ. Perrotin, is engaged in min
ute study of Mars, and that his discoveries
confirm those of NJ. Schiaparilli in every
particular. 1t seems actually true that the
longitudinal stripes which circle round the
planet are bodies of water, and must, &C
cordlng to all laws of probability, be arti-
fetal No one ever saw or conceived a sys-
tenn of parallel rivers from 1000 to 1000
miles long and straight as a plumb line.
Everything is possible of course. but such
straight rivers it is impossible to reconcile
with the principles of cOsmogOny as we
understand them. On this planet at all
events, nature abhors a straight line, and
by analogy it should do so in Mars,
Yet, if these bodies of water are canals, az
Schiaparilli believed and Perrotin seems
| hardly to doubt, what monstrous works
they must be! They are from so to 80
miles wide Fancy the labor of digging
such a canal, the time it must have taken,
| and the number of workmen it must have
| employed. The pyramids of Egypt are
| trlhlng In comparison. The SueZ canal is
l97 feet wide at the surface, and the Nicar-
aqua canal is to be $50 feet; the Martial
canals are 1880 times wider. Our canals
on this one-hOrse globe are considered long
when they reach 100 miles in length. The
Panama Canal will be less than go miles
long The canals of Mars reach a length of
1000 miles-say as far as from here to
Omaha. What a traffic there must be to
support such enterprises! On the water
ways of China travellers describe the in
| cessant ebb and flow of multitudinous
crowds, but to require canals of such di-
| mansions as we have described, the move
ment of traffic in Mars must be far more
prodigous. In fact, they imply popu-
lation which almost staggers belief; con-
sidering that the volume of the planet is
| only one-sixth that of the earth, the dia-
meter being 4,400 miles as against 5000
miles, they warrant the widest conjectures
as to the density with which it may be
peopled.
What manner of man lives in Mars, if
| there be men there, has always been a
| favorlte topic of speculation. The law of
| gravitation tells us that he may be IA feet
high; not such son of Anak as the lnhabi-
tant of the asteroids. but still one who
would regard the Belgian giant as re-
markable dwarf. Possibly the enormous
public works ON Mars may be explained on
the theory that these tall fellows can work
in proportion to their stature-that one citi-
zen of Mars can shovel as much dirt as two
and half deniZens of this world
Whether the grass of Mars is red, as the
old astronomers averred, modern telescopes
have failed to decide. 1t is very difficult to
determine colors when an object lens col
lects thirty thousand times as much light as
normally enters the human eye. But the
| speculative astronomer is safe in asserting
his belief that Marian cabbages are of the
color of our beet-roots, as no one can dis
prove the assertion.