The Hartford republican. (Hartford, Ky.) 18??-1926, 1913-12-26
FATE OF A WORLD
Its Course From Chaos to Its
Hopeless Death Struggle.
THREE ACTS IN THE TRAGEDY
The First 10 Shown by Jupiter, the
Second by the Earth and the Third
by Mars, While the Moon Shows The
Empty Stage After the Play 10 Done

No stage was ever ret for such
tragedy us the planet Mars presents
1t is the last act in the drama Of
wor is history. tfif,4
The first act in such drn ma consist;
OF scenes from chaos. The huge plan
ct Jupiter offers us spectacle Of tina
kind In lis streaming belts of thio,
clouds and its whirling valWrs. glow
ing like steam above a furnace.
The second act is represented by thu
earth. with Its fertile crust. its cool. In
MIGRATING atmosphere and its life sus
tanning seas that give birth to the
clouds which. condeusing on the
mountains, furnish the rains and sci
the rivers flowing.
The closing act is the role Of Mars
where the seas have vanished. the ut
mosphere has thinned ont. the rivers
have disappeared. the continents have
formed into deserts. and life. driven into
a corner, Is battling against final ex
tinction.
That there is yet Intelligent life on
Mars Is the universal belief Of all the
observers whom Mr.. Lowell has gath
cred about him at his Flagstaff OBJ
servatOry. where the extraordinary phe
nOmena OF that wonderful planet are
studied as nowhere else In the world.
More than that. they tell US with
ever increasing emphasis that the PEG
pie Of Mars. compelled by necessity.
have developed u command over natu.
raj forces which wonld seem miracu.
Ious n exhibited upon the earth.
with them II has become simply u
question ,Of brain power against the
inani,nste powers u b6ture.
They have nights and days of the
same length as ours. They have sea.
sons almost precisely corresponding
with ours. except that they are each
twice as long. But their oceans are
dried up. no rains fall Though there
may be eewsD. and nearly all the Mt.
mospherit moisture IL alternately lock.
ed up in ,ne or the other Of the polar
sn0wcaps
In sucha situation no vegetation can
flourish unless artifcially stimulated
by a gigantic system Of irrigation. And
without vegetation animal existence is
impossible.
But whence can the inhabitants Of
Mars derive the wH1sr needed for irri.
eation9 The ans Iven is that they
get 1t pctipdicsl - che melting of
the polar SHOWS. - without seas
and river, they ban ~ other source
Of supply F
On Mari the reign Of universal peace
must havb begun ages ago, introduced
not by moral or sentimental consid-
erations, but by the necessity Of unit
Ing all tie engineering skill. all the in.
ventive bowers and all the physical
| forces OF the entire population Of the
! planet in a common battle for life.
The only thought Of their inventors
Is of improved means for controlling
the slowly lessening supplies of mois-
tpre that once IN Shout two of our
years may be drawn away from one
of the poles while ths snmmer sun
shine Is dissolving itssthln SHOWS.
This aufversal concentration Of men.
tai energy upon single aim is con-
ceived a. having developed upon Mars
a knowledge of the hidden forces Of
nature such as has up to the present
merely been drea med Of on the earth.
We hare just begun to learn how to
use electricity In the mechanic arts.
but they may have unlocked the secret
Forces inclosed In the atoms Of matter
which our science has recently assured
Us exist without showing US how to
utilize them. IN
Only by suc6 suppositions can the
canals" hundreoskof miles wide and
thousands Of miles( Hong. he accounted
for. II. al the FlaEstaff observers In
slst. thost objects are really Of arti-
dcial origin. u should be said. how
ever. that.ln MIR. Lowell's opinion the
bands called canals are, In fact. irri.
gated heaks
The real canals within them are in
visible while the progressive darken-
ing Of these belts. as the polar melting
increases. IL due To the growth Of veg
citation. stimulated by the water.
After The world life drama closes
there Is left an empty stage. and this
Is represented by the moon. The lunar
world has lost all its water. Its trag-
edy il finished. The actors are all dead
Millions Of years ago there may have
been n battle for life there like that
which now appears TO be raging on
Mars And millions Of years In the
future the stage OF the earth will prob
ably he set for similar tragedy. For
10 the ewes of the overlooking gods Ito
change a little Shakespeares fgureI:
All the sky's a stage.
And all The worlds and suns are merely
actors
--iarrett p. serviss In New York Jour-
nal 80