Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1901-01-19
FUTURE OF SCIENCE
Lines Along Which Great Disoov-
cries May Be Looked For,
MANY PROBLEMS IN GEOGRAPHY
Vexed Questions That Call for
Study and Research.
WORK FOR ENPLORER s
WORK FOR EXPLORER S

| NopNrlsIt. iSti ny ~ fielpFHf
Written for The Evening Star by Prof. Angelo He'll
! The late Sir Balfour Stewart when pre-
| Siding over the British Association for the
Advancement of Science a few years ago,
remarked that we were on the eve of one
| IF the greatest discoveries that had ever
oeen made, but that he had not the faint
| est idea what it might be. The distn-
guished physicist, recognizing the POSSIBLE
| tiles of science as they were rapidly record
| ed In such discoveries as the telephone,
| the monograph and wireless electric
| transmission felt the new thing ito be in
| the air. but, like Prof. Huxley, he be-
| lieved that scientist need not be a de-
tective, and failing in this office, he could
not detect the atmospheric germ Of the
| new discovery
| The determination and application of the
| Roentgen rays. the manufacture and APP
| plcation of liquid air, are happenings of
| the later days. and if they are not to be
clasSed with the very greatest of discoV-
cries, they are yet sufficiently striking and
| important to have justified Prof. Stewards
| prophecy.
For the Future Explorer.
| The ciose of the century finds the sci
enlist again eager for the startlngly new,
| but. as 1t was a few years ago, he can
hazard little as regards definite out
| come of the present researches. Nor is
he in a position to state from which branch
of science the most is to be expected. One
department of knowledge at least clearly
shows It's deficiencies, and indicates the
quarter wherein discoveries OF Importance
may yet be made-expluration. Millions of
| square miles of the earth's surface, inCred-
ibe though it may appear, yet a
blank on our maps Decade following de
cade has seen the roaming grounds of
fancy in the geography of unknown At
RIGA, Asia and Australia steadily filled in,
with little space left for discoveries of any
great magnitude to be made there. Nan
| sens brilliant traverse of the Polar
| in 1S9J-lS96, whereby the forefoot of arc
| tic exploration was suddenly advanced 2e0
| miles nearer to the pole-as much as had
| been accomplished in 200 years of previous
! effort-has drawn the rein of knowledge
| closely about the forbidden NORTH, al
| though not yet to the extent of preclud-
| ing the possibility of discoveries of real
| magnitude being made in the region. For
go miles completely surrounding the pole
our knowledge is still blank and it con-
tinues such for nearly double this distance
on at least one side. The present work of
Lieut.. Peary may largely solve what is
still to be found in this tract
1t is, however, in the antipodal regions
of the earth's surface, in the antarctic,
| that discovery still has its chance. for an
area of unknown or of only passiVely
known territory exists there which meas
and perhaps more nearly treb!es it. To it,
after interval of fifty years-during
which the fame of Sir James Clark Ross
of Dumont D. Urville, and Captain Com
modore) Wilkes. early Investigators after
truth, has not become dimmed-the eye OF
the explorer is again directed. Belgium,
England, Germany, Sweden and Australia
have during the last decade sent their
| votaries of science to this terra incognita,
not alone to seek out new geographical
knowledge regarding the ice-bound UNI
known, but to ascertain facts from other
departments of science tending to throw
light upon many veXed problems which
| continue to agitate the minds of the zoolo-
gist and geoogist.
Problems of the Far South.
What are some of these problems? One
is that which pertains to the origin and
derivation Of the fauna of the southern con-
tinents: another to a probable land connec-
ton formerly existing by way Of the ant
arctic tract between South America,
Africa and Australia, and third. that
which relates to the actual form of the
globe. The impetus to the first two in
quiries given by the discovery. hardy
seven years ago, of the fossilized remains
of forest trees on Graham Land. or Island,
far south of Patagonia, of type similar
to that of the South American pines or
araucarians of today. Before this discov
cry, by Captain LARSEN. no trace of vege-
tation of higher type than the lowest
lichens, whether fossilized or living, was
known in any part of the antarctic tract,
and the supposition had become well
grounded that for vast ages If not through
out nearly all time, the ice desert of the
south was a region apart Ky itself, indie
pendent in its make up from the rest of the
word.
The new discovery has developed a con-
ception of far-reachng significance - the
former extension southwark of the South
American continent. and its comparatively
recent rupture from terra antarctica.
With this conception brought clearly be-
fore it is violence to conditions of
sion southwark of the other continents. and
union or coalescence of the parts in some
region which is now occupied by the sea
or the ocean ice. Many striking peculiari-
ties of the southern fauna would receive an
easy explanation on any theory of commu-
nifty of origin on common land of the
south. whose fragments now seemingly lie
buried beneath the sea. The remarkable
discoveries that have lattery been made
among the extinct vertebrate of Patagonia
throw a most interesting light upon this
same question of faunal originaton and
clearly demonstrate the eXtra-continental
relationship which the facts of physical
geography have foreshadowed-
Shape of the Earth.
No fact connected with the physics of
our planet has been thought to be more
| securely established than that Of its form.
To the doctrine taught to every school
| child that the earth is simply round and
fattened at the poles,' or is In the form of