Miscellaneous Papers. 233 



Darding us with messages in the form of meteorites propelled 

 by reversed gravity, lo, these many years. A meteorite that 

 fell near Rochester, N. Y., several years ago, by the indubita- 

 ble testimony of a public school teacher of that city, and the 

 New York Sim, has some cuneiform writing that must be a 

 celestial message, from Mars in all probability. One thing to 

 be regretted is that the author failed to translate this "coelo- 

 gram," a feat much less tiring to the imagination than the 

 formation of many of his truly original hypotheses. Bodily 

 nutrition and growth are very simple phenomena, identical, 

 in fact, with electroplating, with the "tissue atoms" as the 

 ions. Space he proves in three short sentences, without any 

 of the usual preliminary investigation so necessary to the 

 ordinary clumsy intellect, to be the ''originary" matter from 

 which all other matter is derived, and mcidentally to be un- 

 limited in extent. The famous whirlpool nebula he calls 

 "Cane's Venatici," but fails to identify the Mr. Cane after 

 whom it was probably named. He has a much more intimate 

 knowledge of the moon than any other scientist, as is clearly 

 shown by a cut which he insists is a photograph, but which 

 bears some of the earmarks of a woodcut. The photograph, 

 if authentic, must have been exposed somewhere on our sat- 

 ellite's surface. 



But it is in connection with the polar regions his volume is 

 most replete with original information. As one sails due 

 northward, at about eighty degrees latitude the polar star 

 rapidly approaches the zenith and drifts to the rear of the 

 vessel. One wonders if his data for this interesting piece 

 of information is not the nautical yarn concerning the ap- 

 prentice pilot whom the captain left in charge of the wheel 

 with the injunction to steer straight for the north star. A 

 few minutes later the captain was aroused by a call to come 

 up and pick out another star, as the vessel had passed the 

 other one. The regions about the poles, contrary to the usual 

 belief, are the hottest places on the globe during their long 

 day, and, of course, the coldest during their long night. He 

 darkly hints that Andre certainly perished from excessive 

 heat, if he ever succeeded in approaching the pole. During 

 the arctic night the temperature frequently falls so low that 

 liquid air falls as a gentle rain. This is stated on the testi- 

 mony of "many explorers." Glaciers consist of alternate 

 layers of ice and liquid air. There are several polar islands 



