The herald., 1894-10-31
THE WORLD IS WOBBL|NG NOW
1t Acts Like That Every Few
Thousand Years.
DR.. Swift Lectured About 1t Last
Evening.
Wonders of the Midnight Skies Revealed
by tho Telescope Are Told In
Simple and Lucid
Way.

The earth is now wobbling on it's
axis and has been for some time, which
accounts for the peculiar things that
have happened lately. But there is
really little cause for alarm, because it
takes the earth exactly 10000 years to
wobble cnce, and it never wobbles be-
tween wobbles.
DR.. Lewis Swift Of the Echo mount
ain observatory told all shout the earth
and things for 60. 000, ,000,0 900 miles out
iuto the suburbs in his lecture last
night at the Unity church. 1t had been
on Mars, but the learned gentleman
stated at ouce that he would say little
about Mare.
''The burden of my story shall be
something about the wonderful things
which the midnight skies reveal, and
the beautiful thoughts which the STAR
lit skies beget." he said.
VIM. H. Knight, president OF both
the Unity club and the Southern Cali
fornia Science association, under the
auspices OF which organizations this
lecture was given, introduced the lee
turer.
A large audience OF cultured, intelli-
gent people was present. DR.. Swift 10 q
large man, of commanding appearance,
with iron gray hair and beard, bright,
piercing eye and well-poised head. He
speaks eloquently and powerfully.
Il will tell you of some of the wonders
which night unfolds. The butterfly has
25, 900 six.sided eyes, and every one is
provided with perfect lens; the spider
spins a thread of 1000 strands 30 fine
that the point of needle will sever it,
and more wonderful than this is the sky.
81 have witnessed three total eclipses
OF the sun. In 1864 l went 1000 miles to
see one. 1t occurred just three.quarters
OF second later than the astronomers
of hundred years before had said it
would.
"We wonder if there are any more
planets moving round the suns, and peo-
pie living upon them. Every object
visible in the Hky tonight. except Mars
and Neptune, is sun, and every sun
has planet moving round 1t. We know
less about Mercury and Venus than we
do about the more distant planeto.
What sort OF man would build
houses and cities where no people are?
We insult the divine intelligence when
we cay thst the planets. where there is
night and day, summer and winter,
lanL and water, mountalns and valleys,
are not innab
I'VE never zee but one side of the
moon and never will. That is because
the moon rotates and revolves in the
same time as the earth.
- hn rv..
habited, because 1t is hot enough on
Mercury to melt zine, but why could
not the good God above have made peo-
pie to stand the heat that will melt
zinc?
"Mars is world half ss large as ours
and twice as for from the sun. 1t has
enow in the winter and verdure in sum
mer.
Lord Ross sees stars through his
great 6-ioct telescope which are like
diamond duet in the sunlight. Every
star is q sun and around it planets re-
volve. 1t took the light 100000 years
to get from the nearest fixed etar to the
earth; how much longer must it have
taken from the other suns which the
telescope reveals? The Lick telescope
shows 100, ,000,0 suns.
THE most wonderful instrument in
the world ia the spectroscope. With it
we discover nine substances in the Dog
star, % in the sun, and in other planets
and suns over 800.
The leaf is not green, nor the rose
red, nor the lily white. The rays of
light are reflected from theee objects
onto the eye, which vibrates 960,O00,-
000, 600 times a second. The leaf rejects
the green light and it strikes the eye.
the rose rejects the red.
"The sun gives out 40 heat. The rays
Of light makes waves which strike the
earth and make the heat. So, ON the
mountain top, nearer the sun, it is
colder, for the air is not 80 dense and the
waves are fewer.
"How long will the stars be shining?
Multiply the sands of earth with the
stars OF the sky end tell me the num-
ber."
The lecturer used no deep scientific
terms, but spoke in a simple, direct way,
that made the great problems he han
died seem easy of comprehension. The
audience listened with marked atten-