294 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



circumstances with great care for some years. I must be per- 

 mitted to say that, having carefully studied what Mr. Lowell has 

 set forth, and having tested his facts and figures in every way in 

 my power, most astronomers have come to the conclusion that, 

 however astonishing his observations may seem to be, we can not 

 refuse to accept them. 



No one has ever seen inhabitants on Mars, but Mr. Percival 

 Lowell and one or two other equally favored observers have seen 

 features on that planet which, so far as our experience goes, can be 

 explained in no other way than by supposing that they were made 

 by an intelligent designer for an intelligent purpose. Mr. Lowell 

 has discovered that there are certain operations in progress on the 

 surface of Mars which, if we met with on this earth, we should cer- 

 tainly conclude, without the slightest hesitation, were the result of 

 operations conducted under what we consider rational guidance. 



A river, as ISTature has made it, wends its way to and fro; it 

 never takes the shortest route from one point to another; the width 

 of the river is incessantly changing; sometimes it expands into a 

 lake, sometimes it divides so as to inclose an island. If we could 

 discern through our telescopes a winding line such as I have de- 

 scribed on Mars it might perhaps represent a river. 



But suppose, instead of a winding line, there was a perfectly 

 straight line, or rather a great circle on the globe drawn as straight 

 as a surveyor could lay it out — if we beheld an object like that 

 on Mars I think we should certainly infer that it was not a river 

 made in the ordinary course of natural operations; no natural 

 river ever runs in that regular fashion. If such a straight line 

 were indeed a river, then it must have been designedly straight- 

 ened by human agency or by some other intelligent agency for 

 some particular purpose. In its larger features Nature does not 

 work by straight lines. A long and perfectly straight object, if 

 found on our earth, might be a canal or it might be a road; it 

 might be a railway or a terrace of some kind; but assuredly no 

 one would expect it to be a natural object. 



We have the testimony of Schiaparelli, now strengthened by 

 that of Mr. Lowell and his assistants, that there are many straight 

 lines of this kind on Mars. They appear to be just as straight as 

 a railway would have to be if laid across the flat and boundless 

 prairie, where the engineer encountered no obstacle whatever to 

 make him swerve from the direct path. These lines on Mars run 

 for hundreds of miles, sometimes, indeed, I should say for thousands 

 of miles. They are far wider than any terrestrial river, except 

 perhaps the Amazon for a short part of its course. The lines on 

 Mars are about forty miles wide. Indeed, the planet is so distant 



