The Camden chronicle. (Camden, Tenn.) 1890-current, 1904-05-20
BEAUTY OF THE MOON.
WHAT is DISCLOSED BY A POWER.
Full TELESCOPE.

title OF most interesting and instruc-
tive paper, prepared and read by DR.
Albert D Watson before tho Toronto
Astronomical society at its last meet
ing. Excerpts from the paper are civ
en- below:
Notwithstanding the facilities that
the telescope affords for seeing distant
objects, 1t is still true that Of celestial
bodies the less distant are often the
more interesting At any rate, in any
rapid review of tho hosts that ride
within the zodiac, and deck with unex-
ampled beauty and endless reach of
sky, the record must contain some ac-
count of our own beautiful comrade
in the heavens-the moon, the time
measurer of the east, the great ref1ec-
tor of the solar splendor.
I'm lunar research the telescope is
of the utmost Importance. What ap-
pears to be unaided vision as pale
disc, constantly varying its faces, and
partly uimmed with great shadows, be-
comes, when seen through the tel
whose luminous mountains stand in
clear, almost startling outline of rings
and chains and beads cleaning and
sparkling like frosty diamonds upon
a snowy globe, or, still more beautiful
shining out bright and dazzling against
the unilluminated portion of the
moons surface.
What fantastic forms the Alps and
Apprentices of the moon and the lunar
crater vast steep and SCARED with
volcanic power, fling out into clear re-
lief beyond the edge Of the terminator!
Imagine the picture even at the
earth's distance, crater wall rising to
hight of 10000 to 1900 feet over a
vast depression so miles in diameter,
in whose centre is a volcanic mountain
5000 or 5000 feet high. Imagine white
rays striking out into all directions
for hundreds of miles from this CEN
tire and clasping in their arms large
fraction of the moons surface. Such
is Mount Tycho, that mountain within
mountain, the bright particular
crater of the moon. We look in vain
to the moon for examples of single
mountain peaks, rising precipitously,
one browning bastion standing upon
another, as in many of the earth's
ranges. Here, instead, we see craters
and moving plains wide and deep,
yawning like monster worthless that
might once have been the abode of a
race entirely shut off from communica-
ton with the other lunarians Such
ring plains as Plato and Archimedes
present wide areas Of comparatively
level surface enclosed within high, jag
ged walls, extending in some places
far into the adjacent plains. Elser
where Eratosthenes, Ptolemy, Aristar-
chus and Copernicus present similar
walls, but within them are enclosed
mountains or hills or craters,
pointing as it seems to volcanic action.
The form of the moon, which COM
monty seems to be fiat, is seen through
the telescope to be that of beautiful
spheroid. This curved surface is
feature of charming beauty, even when
seen with very low power. The more
The delighted observer is entranced by
the glory and beauty of the surface of
The moon which lies open to his vision
he more he regrets the impossihility
If seeing the further hemisphere. Ty-
tho has been described as the metro
oolitan crater of the MOON but how
10 we know? What of the others that
We have never seen? What glories
nay be concealed from us and revealed
n some degree to the possible former
of Mars? Or has some
errestrial influence brought it to pass
hat all the lunar craters lean to the
'arthly side, and that on the further,
which, without intending to suggest
my unpleasant antithesis, we might
all the heavenly half of the moon,
lothing is to be seen but one vast level
ca bottom, or perhaps monster
mountain may stand sad, solemn and
ilent in Prometheuslike Punishment
rom the brightness that the earth re-
Iects upon the moons earth-lit hemis-
here?
Sunlight far surpasses the moon
ght in power and usefulness, but what
ould be more softly and beautifully
leasant than the earth shine must be,
ould only some impossible inhabitant
f the moon bask in it's silvery radi~
nee? When the moon is new the |
arth is full, that is, at new moon the
un shines full upon the moon and
emisphere of the earth. Now, if we
ook upon the evening moon with a
elescope upon such an occasion we
hall see the part beyond the termina-
or-all that part, indeed, of the earth
,ard hemisphere upon which the sun