358 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



strung like beads on a wire, while from his vast bulk seven 

 hundred planets like ours could be formed. But just here comes 

 a factor which has an important bearing upon the present con- 

 dition of Saturn. In spite of his enormous bulk, he " weighs " 

 only ninety times as much as the earth, which at once shows us 

 that the materials of which he is formed are much lighter than 

 those composing our world. In fact they are but three quarters 

 the weight of an equal amount of water, so that theoretically, if 

 placed in an ocean large enough to hold it, this huge planet would 

 float on the surface like a wooden ball. 



There is but one conclusion from this and also from some 

 other facts connected with the planet. Saturn is not, like the 

 earth, a solid sphere covered with oceans and continents capable 

 of supporting animal and vegetable life, but is midway between 

 this state and that of the sun. In other words he might be called 

 a semi-sun, perhaps giving forth but little light, yet so intensely 

 heated still that its vast bulk is probably but a distended mass of 

 liquid fire a world where " the solid land as yet is not, and the 

 foot could find no resting place." It is too bad to destroy the 

 pleasant theories we often see about the inhabitants of this far- 

 off world and the conditions of life upon its surface, but we can 

 not evade the facts as they open up to us. 



When viewed through a good telescope the planet presents a 

 most beautiful sight a huge golden ball, crossed by parallel 

 belts of a brownish tinge, and capped at the poles with a bluish 

 or greenish gray ; and, most wonderful of all, surrounded by a 

 thin, broad, flat ring, likewise of a golden hue. As if this were 

 not enough, it is accompanied by a retinue of at least eight satel- 

 lites or moons, some of which will be in the field of view. 



Under very favorable conditions faint markings can be dis- 

 cerned on the belts, which seem in every way similar to those of 

 Jupiter, and like his may safely be assumed to be masses of roll- 

 ing clouds ranged in belts parallel to the equator by currents 

 analogous to our trade winds. It seems very probable that these 

 clouds may be mostly aqueous, and we may thus regard them as 

 the future oceans of these planets, suspended in the air at present 

 because the surface is not yet sufficiently cool to allow them to 

 settle and remain as bodies of water upon it. 



That this must be the case is shown by a moment's thought. 

 We know that on the earth clouds are formed by the condensa- 

 tion, in the upper and cooler portions of the air, of the water 

 vapor raised from the surface waters by the sun's heat. But at 

 Saturn, nearly ten times farther away, this heat is reduced to one 

 one-hundredth of its intensity here. On the earth too, as a rule, 

 the clouds are somewhat sparsely distributed, so that a large part 

 of the globe has usually fairly clear weather. On Saturn, how- 



