The river press. [volume] (Fort Benton, Mont.) 1880-current, 1909-05-12
MARK TWAIN ON NEW PLANET
Humorist Tells Why He IL Sure There
IL One Near Neptune.

Humorist Tells Why He ls Sure There
10 One Near Neptune.
Mark Twain, whose interest in ceie
tial affairs is generally known. caltri-
utes to Harper's Weekly his IL.
sions Of the new planet wiki.
cording to astronomers of Harv..,r i
believed to be causing perturoa
to Neptune. He says:
I believe in the new planet. I was elev-
en- years old in 1876. when Leverrier ard
Adams and Mary Somerville discovered
Neptune through the disturbance and d.
Comfort 1t was causing Uranus. per
turbations' they call that kind of dis
t~urbance. 1 had been having those PEI
turbations myself for more thar two
months-in fact. all through watermelon
time. for they used to keep dogs In some
Of the patches in those days. You notice
that these recent perturbations are con-
sidered remarkable because they pertur-
bate through three seconds Of arc, but
really that is nothing. Often I used to
perturbate through Is much as half an
hour IT 1t was a dog that. was attending
to the p~erturbating. There isn't any Nep-
tune that can outperturbate a dog, and l
know. because l am not speaking from
hearsay. Why. II there was a planet
OVsVV A6AS yCdIS lu0 OIU0T sue OIL
Neptune's orbit Professor Pickering would
discover 1t in a minute If it could pertur-
bate equal to a dog. Give me a dog every
time when 1t m to perturbating. You
let a dog jump out at o all Of a sudden
In the dark Of the moon and you will see
what a small thing three seconds Of arc
Is. The shudder that goes through you
then would open the seams of Noah's ark
itself from f%isurehead to rudder post, and
you would drop that melon the same as If
you had never had any but Just a casual
interest in it. I know abou these things,
because this is not tradition I am writing.
but history.
Now, then, notice this: About the end of
August. 1876. a change came over me-, and
I resolved to lead a better life, so I re-
formed. But it was just as we'll anyway,
because they had got to having guns and
dogs both. Although I was reformed, the
p~erturbations did not stop. Does that
strike you? They did not stop; they went
right o n and IN and on for three weeks,
clear up to the sd Of September. Then
Neptune was discovered, and the whole
mystery stood explained. It shows that
I am so sensitively constructed that I per-
turbate when any other planet is dis
turbed. This has been going on all my
life. 1t. only happens in the watermelon
season, but hat has nothing to do with
1t and has no significance. Biologists and
anthrOpOlogists and horticulturists all tell
me it is only ancestral and hereditary,
and that Is what I think myself. Now,
then, I got to perturbating again last
summer-all summer through-all through
watermelon time, and where do you
think? Up here on my farm in Connecti-
cut. Is that significant? Unquestionably
1t Is. for you couldn't raise a watermelon
on this farm with a derrick.
That perturbating was caused by the
new planet. That Washington observa-
tory may throw as much doubt as 1t
ANTS to, it annot affect me, because I
know there is a new planet. I know it
because I on p~erturbate for nothing.
There has got to be a dog or a planet,
one or the other, and there isn't any dog
here, so there's got to be a planet.
I hope it is going to be named after me.
T should just love it il I can't have q
constellation.