The daily morning journal and courier., 1907-02-16
TO SPY ON MARTIANS.
PROB LOWELL, FROM FLAG
 STAFF, ARFZ. WILL

| lfNSSCNa
 the Opposition" of that wonderful
 planet occurs on July 13 next. On the
 day of Opposition" Mars will come
 within 35,O0O.O .OOO miles of the earth, the nearest approach on record and already elaborate preparations are making in the | scientific world for observations and
 photographs which, by their recordings,
 shall definitely decide, it is hoped, the
 vexed problem of the habitability of
 Mars.
 Prof Percival the distinguished as- | tronomer who has done much to carry
 on the work of Schiaparelli, the
 original discoverer of the so-called
 Martian canalsS and the first scientist
 to set up the theory of habltation will make many observations from the
 Lowell Observatory at Flagstaff, Ariz, ! while both the telescope and camera will be extensively employed at the Harvard Observatory in Peru. Owing
 to the calm and clear character of the atmospherical conditions obtaining at
 that season of the year in Arizona, the
 situation of the Lowell observatory is l peculiarly adapted to the obtaining of
 satisfactory results in Martian obser-
 vations, and it is no reflection on the
 Harvard institution in Peru to say that | the world of science looks especially to
 the Lowell Observatory for information
 tending to substantiate or destroy the
 habitation theory when the 'opposi-
 tion'' takes place
 Prof. Lowell is an ardent supporter of
 the theory He has written a book, re-
 gently published by the MacMillans in which he sets forth number of com paratively new discoveries in regard to Mars, discusses the canal system and proceeds to prove, to his own satisfac-
 tion, at least, that any theory regard
 ing the planet, which does not involve habitation, is preposterous.
 Quite as interesting as his canal and habitation arguments, in the opinion of eminent scientists, is the startling pro- position advanced in the volume that
 Mars is a planetary prophecy of what
 the earth is eventually destined to be- come. Prof Lowell doesn't attempt to say how long it will take for the earth to assume the aspect of Mars, but, if his theory is correct, it. is only a ques- tion of time when the terrestial we now inhabit will run dry of streams, rivers and lakes and he left dependent for its
 water supply on whatever it may be possible to draw through vast canals from the ice-caps surrounding the poles. In that light the Panama Canal may be regarded as the advance agent of the gigantic canal system with which it will ultimately be necessary to cohweb the earth.
 It was in 1877 that Schiapereli first discovered the so-called Martian Canal system For years the discovery was ridiculed, and even at the present time the number of astronomical schools by which the canal theory is accepted are comparatively few. In 1905 however, Prof Lowell, who is an astronomer of independenent means operting a private observatory, succeeded in making ob
 servations and photographs which re-, suited in convincing many scientists
 that the canal theory was not so ab SuTu dS IL Ildu DCSll IlCld lO pC' T lbllh these observations. Prof. Lowell has plotted several hundred canals on the planet, and has produced a globe giving a very excellent and comparatively ex- act reproduction of the topography of
 Mars.
 Mars, it appears is about one-sev- enth the size of the earth. Its seas- sons correspond to the terrestrial sea- sons, only that the Martian spring, | summer, autumn and winter are twice as long as the four seasons we of the earth knew-or did know until within the last two years. It is a planet, ac- cording to Prof Lowelrs observations,
 absolutely waterless. It has no seas, no lake, no rivers, no springs. Wa
 ter on Mars is to be found only in a frozen form in the great ice caps which
 hood the poles
 Recent photographs seem to show that the planet is divided into blue and orange areas, which indicate the pres ence, or absence, of vegetation, and which vary relatively in size with the
 change of seasons. In winter, for exam pei the photographs show the brown area is so extended as to envelop near l ly the entire planet. This is scientifi cally interpreted to mean an almost total absence of vegetation, the tempor
 ary metamorphosis of the planet Is to
 gigantic desert, 212,OOO,OOO square in extent. In spring and fall the brown and blue areas are about equal while
 in summer, more blue is observed than | brown.
 What Schiaparelli and Lowell hold
 to be Martian canals appear as hair lines in the observations and photo7 graphs. They cowweb the planet, stretching from pole to pole either in straight lines of mathematical precision
 or in semi-circles. They intersect at noints termed "oases''- supposed to be the Martian cities-and are laid out with such regard to system that it seems impossible to believe them the work of nature. In the average the canals are perhaps fifteen hundred miles long. and then vary in width from 3 to 25 miles. Lowell believes that in viewing Mars through the telescope, one does not observe the canals them
 selves, but the vegetation along their banks. Observations can last for only few seconds at the utmost. The boiling of the atmosphere" renders longer vision impossible.
 It is on the evidence of artificiality
 in the system of Martian canals that Lowell and his followers predicate the theory of habitation. They argue that
 in the first place, it is contrary to every