The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1895-06-06
THE STORY or THE MOON.
CIRCUMSTANCES or ITS BIRTH,
WHAT 1T HAS DONE, AND II
DOING.

dcau Professor of Astronomy ana
Geometry Mt Cambridge University,
England, and Formerly Royal A.
tronomer of Ireland.
From the New York sun.
do not think there is any chapter I'm
modern science more remarkable than
that which here propose TO describe. 1t
has indeed all the elements OF a romance.
am to sketch an event Of the very great
est moment in the history OF this un;-
verse. which occurred az a period Of the
most extreme antiquity and has been dis
covered In the most remarkable manner.
The period OF which 1 write is Tar more
ancient than that OF the pyramids Of
Egypt, or Of any other monuments erect
ed by human effort. It is even more early
than that very remote time. hundreds Of
thousands OF years ago. when man himself
first came upon this globe our retro
spect has to pierce right through those
vastly protracted cycles which the ge0io-
gists have opened up to us. We speak OF
"a period long anterior TO the ages during
which our continents were being sculp-
turcd into their present mountain chains
and river courses. We have to look
through those periods. still earlier, when
great animals, now long extinct, flourish
ed on this earth The time of which I
write j. more remote than that very re-
narkaDle epoch In earth history during
which the great coal forests nOurished
IL Is earlier than the supreme moment,
countless millions of years ago, when hV-
ing organisms first became inhabitants Of
this globe. Even here, however, our ret
respect must not stop. We have yet once
more TO look when our earth was in it's
earliest youth. The chapter of history
ABOUT which l write is indeed In the very
dawn OF things terrestrial.
IL might be thought that il would be ut
terly impossible for us to learn ANYTHING
with regard to what took place at a
time so UNNECESSARILY anterior to all
sources Of tradition, and, indeed, to all
the ordinary channels for obtaining
knowledge by observation. 1t, however,
fortunately happens that the darkness of
this early period is Illuminated by =
bright ana steady source of light, which
viii never deceive US IL only we will fol-
low II properly. our trustworthy guide is
10 be the pen OF the mathematician, for
II is wei known that, unless we are go
ing TO dispute the fundamental proposition
that two and two make four we cannot
bIinpugh tnS truths which mathematics
disclose. This science knows no bounda-
ries OF space. 1t recognizes no limits in
time. 1t Is ever ready for discussing op-
eratons which take place either in the
hlllionth part OF second or in the lapse
on uncounted millions of centuries. The
processes OF mathematics are alike avail
able Tor tracing out the delicate move
ments in the interior of a molecule not
one-millionth part of the size of a grain of
sahd, or Tor investigating the properties
OF space so vast that the whole solar
system occupies only an inconsiderable
point by comparison. Let us, therefore
see what this infauible guide has to teach
US about that m6mentous epoch in the
history OF our system when the moon was
born.
Our argument proceeds from an ex-
tremely simple and familiar matter. Ev-
ehtg ohs VINO mas ever been on the sea-
shore knows the daily ebb and flow of
lhe waters which we call the tides. Long
ere the true nature of the forces by which
the moon acts upon the was under
stood, the fact that there was a cOnnec-
tlon between the tides and the moon had
become certainly known. Indeed the
dally observation of a fisherman or any
the great deep would have taught him
tnat the time OF high water and the time
OF full moon stood at each place in
certain dennite relation. The fisherman
might not have understood the precise in
nuence OF the moon upon the tides but
u he had observed, as he might in some
places, that when the moon was full the
tlde was nigh at 10 o'clock in the morn
ing, IL would be perfectly obvious 10
MN that the moon had some special
relation to this ebbing and flowing Of the
ocean. Indeed, we are told of some saw
age race who, recognizing that the moon
and the tides must be associated ere
sun IN some considerable doubt as 10
whether IL was the moon which was tho
cause of the tides, or the tides which were
Inc cause of the moon
The ebbing and owing of the tide opans
UP TINS chapter in IemOte history which
we can now explore mainly by the helm of
the researches of Professor George Dar-
WIN. FOR as the tides course backward and
Forward, sweeping to and fro vast volumes
OF water, II IS obvious that the tides must
be doing work. In fact, in some places the
tides have been made to do useful work
If the water as II rises be impounded i'm
large reservoir, IL can be made to turn q
water wheel as II enters, while another
Nae. Ir.avr
voir empties itself few hours later Thus
we produce tidal mill 1t is quite true that
so long as coal remains tOlerablv chean
ana steam power Is consequently readily
available, II Is not often possible to EMPLOY
the direct power of the tides in an econom-
zeal manner For our purpose it is merely
necessary to note that, year after wear
ly doing work of some kind
Every practical man knows that a GER
tain quantity OF work can be done only nv
the expenditure of a certain quantity 81
energy. He also knows that there is in ma
ture no such thing as the creation of ener-
Ky. II is just as impossible to create out Of
nothing the energy which should lift an
ounce weight through a single inch as II
would be to create a loaf of bread ONT ~
nothing. IT. therefore, the tides are doinar
work, Il follows that there must he some
source of energy on which the tides arc
enabled to draw. A steam engine is ahIe
10 put forth power because of the energy
developed from the coal which is contin
ually supplied to the furnace Rut who're
tidal engine? We might at first hazard tbe
superstition that as the moon is the cs1Ise
of the tides, so we must look to the moe,