Wichita eagle., 1888-06-23
VIEWING THE RED PLANET.
Speoulations About the Canals" In Mare
and Their Builders

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 this 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 telescope Of such
power IS the monster refractor on Mount
Hamilton.
It may be interesting to lovers of as
tronomy to know that the eminent French
astronomer, NJ Perrotin, is engaged In a
minute study of Mars, and that his dis
coveries confirm those of M. SchiaparilH
in every particular 1t seems actually
true that the longitudinal stripes which
circle round the planet are bodies Of water,
which must. according to all laws OF
probability, be artificial No one ever
saw or conceived q system OF parallel
rivers from 1000 to 1900 miles long and
straight as plumb lines. Everything is
possible, of course, but such straight
rivers 1T is impossible to reconcile with
the principles Of cosmogony as we under
stand them. On this planet. at al events,
nature abhors q straight line. and by
analogy it should do so in Mars
Yet, if these bodies Of water are canals,
as Schiaparilh believed and Perrotin seems
hardly to doubt. what monstrous works
they must be. They are from Fifty TO
eighty 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 trifing in comparison The
SGez canal Is 1871 feet wide at the surface
and the Nicaragua somewhat wider Our
canals on this one horse globe are con
sidered long when they reach 100 miles In
length The Panama canal VIII be less
than sixty miles long The canals Of
Mars reach length of 1000 miles-say as
far as from here to Omaha What traffic
there must be TO support such enterprises
On the waterways of China travellers de-
scribe the incessant ebb and flow Of
mutitudinous crowds, but 10 require
canals of such dimensions as We have de-
scribed, the movement Of traffic In Mars
must be far more prodigious. In fact,
they imply 8 population which almost
staggaEs belief, considering that the
volume of the planet Is only one-sixth
that Of the earth, the diameter being
4, 100 miles as against 5000 miles, they
warrant the widest conjectures as to the
density with which 1t may be peopied
What manner Of man lives IN Mars. II
there be men there. has always been 3
favorable topic of speculation The law
Of gravitation tells Us that be may be
fourteen feet hieh-not such q son Of
Anak as the inhs bitant of the asteroids,
but still one who would regard the Belgisa
giant as a remark able dwarf Possibly
the enormous pubic works on Mars may
be explained On the theory that these tai
fellows can work tn proportion to their
stature-that one citizen o! Mars can
shovel as much dirt as two and half den
liens OF this world
whether the grass Of Mars is red. ss
the old astronomers averred- modern tsle-
scopes have failed to decide II Is very
difficult 20 determine colors when al OBJ
Jet lens collects 80. 00e times as much
light as normally enters the human eye
But the speculative astronomer Is safe n
asserting bis belief that Marian cabbages
are Of the color Of our beet roots. as 10
che can disprove the assertion San
Francisco Call