5 i6 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



made up, offer the best known solution, as they are literally worlds 

 without air or water, enveloped in a strange and ever-changing sub- 

 stitute for atmosphere; ghostly worlds, which seem to be drawn to 

 the sun, then thrown out into space again to repeat the act until the 

 mighty change from close contact with the fiery mass to the intense 

 cold of distant realms wrecks them, scatters their fragments through 

 the infinity of space where they form gigantic rings or clusters of 

 meteoric matter, raining down upon the sun and planets and all 

 heavenly bodies which meet them, adding fuel to the former, ma- 

 terial substance to the latter, and in the case of the moon pitilessly 

 bombarding her crust — illustrating the effect of the bombardment of 

 the earth were it deprived of its atmospheric armor. 



The evidence which enabled astronomers to definitely associate 

 comets with meteoric showers and falling stars leads one into a world 

 of romance. Schiaparelli, the distinguished Italian astronomer, 

 made the discovery that meteors had a cometic origin. He had been 

 calculating the orbit and motion of the meteorites which produce the 

 August showers, when it occurred to him that they corresponded with 

 those of a certain comet. By following up this clew it was dis- 

 covered that the orbit of Tempel's comet corresponded with that of 

 the meteors of the November star shower. The most remarkable 

 evidence was that produced by Biela's comet, discovered in 1826. It 

 had a revolution about the sun of six years and eight months. It 

 was seen in 1772, 1805, 1832, 1845, and 1852. The vast mass, 

 which appeared to be rushing around the sun with remarkable ve- 

 locity, became separated in 1846, dividing into two parts, one hun- 

 dred and fifty thousand or two hundred thousand miles from each 

 other. In six years the separation had increased to about one and 

 a half million miles. What mighty cataclysm in infinite space 

 caused this rupture the mind of man can not conceive, but some- 

 thing occurred which rent the aerial giant asunder, and so far as 

 known completed its wreck, as from that time Biela's comet has not 

 been seen. In 1872 the comet was looked for, and astronomers pre- 

 dicted that if it did not appear a shower of stars or meteors would 

 be visible — the remains of the lost traveler through space — and that 

 they would diverge from a point in Andromeda. 



This remarkable prediction was verified in every particular. 

 When the moment for the appearance of the comet arrived, Novem- 

 ber 27, 1872, there burst upon the heavens, not Biela's comet, but 

 a marvelous shower of shooting stars, which dashed down from the 

 constellation of Andromeda as predicted. In 1885 this was dupli- 

 cated, and the atmosphere was apparently filled with shooting stars. 

 Biela's comet had met disaster in infinite space, and the earth was 

 being bombarded with the wreckage. 



