Washington standard. [volume] (Olympia, Wash. Territory) 1860-1921, 1897-06-11
THE MEN OF MARS.
PROF. LOWELL SAYS THE PLANET
is PEOPLED.
And Venus Has No Day-TWO Great
Discoveries About Personality OF
Our Nearest NeighbOrs In Space
observations In Mexico.

nished to the New York Herald 10y
Percival Lowell, the astronomer, who
has Just returned from long season
of study and observation in the south
west. Mr.. Lowell has indorsed this
presentation of the interesting and
valuable results of his work.
Mr.. Lowell, who has recently re
turned from Mexico, has made some
discoveries of great interest regarding
the planets Mars and Venus. The OBJ
servations of the planets made at the
Lowell observatory, in Arizona, were
confirmed and enlarged upon by the
recent observations in Mexico. The
results are of special significance to
dwellers on the earth, because in the
solar family circle Venus and Mars, on
either hand, are the nearest neighbOrs
to our own planet. AS the life OF the
planets is believed to pursue the same
general course, it follows that we can
learn much from study of their con-
ditions about the past and future, the
history and the destiny of our earth.
Mars is in many respects the most
interesting object i'll the solar system.
Its phenomenal brightness when near
est the earth has attracted the gaze
and excited the Imagination of men OF
all ages, while the beautiful coloring
which the telescope discloses to OBJ
servers has made it the more admired
the better it has been known.
Its general conditions are more like
our earth than those of any other
planet. Its day is about forty minutes
longer than ours. 1t has four seasons
like our own, though the greater &C.
centricity of its orbit and the slightly
greater inclination of its axis accentu-
ate its seasons, giving it colder win
ter and hotter summer.
Mars has an atmosphere slightly less
dense than our own. This serves to
keep the surface at a mean tempera-
ture above that of the earth. We
know this because, while Mars shows
polar caps like our own planet, these
melt off in the late summer very
much more than on the earth. The
presence of polar snow indicates that
there is water on the surface of
Mars, but these last observations at
Flagstaff and Mexico have shown that
there is almost no water on the planet,
visible as such-that is, in the form of
lakes or oceans or seas. The observa-
tions have shown that the blue-green
patches formerly supposed to be water
are, in reality, tracts of vegetation.
We know this for the following rea-
sons:
First, They are not of the same tint
throughout the whole Marian year.
Second, They are darkest just at
the season when vegetation would be
most luxuriant and lightest when it
would be most in decay.
Third, They undergo a process oi
transform alton.
AS soon as the polar snow has begun
to melt its retreating edge is surround.
ed by a dark blue belt, which follows
it as it goes back toward the poles
This is apparently the only body ol
water visible to us.
As soon as the melting of the snow
is well under way-a phenomenon
which occurs as on the earth in the
late spring and early summer the
blue green areas in its neighborhood
darken and continue to darken for 9
couple Of Marian months. Then a.
autumn advances they proceed to fade
out, owing, as it is believed, to thu
falling of the leaves.
At the same time throughout tht
rose orange parts of the planet, which
are undoubtedly great desert tracts
the so-called "canals" make their ap
pearance, and then gradually darken
just as the other blue-green areas did
and they themselves are also appar
emily of a blue-green tint.
This is not all. As the large blu'
green areas tighten, canals make thei
appearance through them also, show
ing conclusively that they are no
oceans, but tracts of vegetation
These canals in the dark region con
meet directly with those in the ligh
one and with others that run straigh
up to the snow. This makes q com
plete chain to conduct the water from
the pores 70 every part OF the planet.
Now such a marvellous system a
this appears to be cannot we'll be du'
to any natural forces, and finds its bes
explanation in the presence of loca
intelligence on the planet, which ha
purposely created system of irriga
ton for the perpetuity of its own ex
istence.
Such is Mr.. Lowelrs theory, as il
was enunciated after the discoveries q
Flagstaff.
The theory has been confirmed b!
the observations at Mexico. 1t ha
there been seen that the north pola