SCHIAPARfiLLl's LATEST VIEWS REGARDING MARS. 127 



the geometrical appearance of tlie gemination, but it is not at all neces- 

 sary for sucli a purpose. The geometry of nature is manifested in many 

 other facts from wliicb are excluded tlie idea of any artificial labor 

 whatever. The perfect spheroids of the heavenly bodies and the ring 

 of Saturn were not constructed in a turning lathe, and not with com- 

 passes has Iris described within the clouds her beautiful and regular 

 arch. And what shall we say of the infinite variety of those exquisite 

 and regular polyhedrons in which the world of crystals is so rich? In 

 the organic world, also, is not that geometry most wonderful which 

 presides over the distribution of the foliage upon certain j^lauts, which 

 orders the nearly symmetrical, star-like figures of the flowers of the 

 field, as well as of the animals of the sea, and which produces in the 

 shell such an exquisits conical spiral that excels the most beautiful 

 masterpieces of Gothic architecture? In all these objects the geomet- 

 rical form is the simple and necessary consequence of the principles 

 and laws which govern the physical and physiological world. That 

 these principles and these laws are but an indication of a higher intel- 

 ligent Power we may admit, but this has nothing to d© with the present 

 argument. 



Having regard, then, for the principle that in the explanation of 

 natural phenomena it is universally agreed to begin with the simplest 

 suppositious, the first hypotheses of the nature and cause of the gemina- 

 tions have for the most part put in operation only the laws of inorganic 

 nature. Thus, the gemination is supposed to be due either to the eflects 

 of light in the atmosphere of Mars, or to optical illusions produced by 

 vapors in various manners, orto glacial phenomena of aperpetual winter, 

 to which it is known all the planets will be condemned, or to double 

 cracks in its surface, or to single cracks of which the images are doubled 

 by the eflect of smoke issuing in long lines and blown laterally by the 

 wind. The examination of these ingenious suppositions leads us to 

 conclude that none of them seem to correspond entirely with the 

 observed facts, either in whole or in pafrt. Some of these hypotheses 

 would not have been proposed had their authors been able to examine 

 the geminations with their own eyes. Since some of these may ask me 

 directly. Can you suggest anything better? I must reply candidly, No. 



It would be far more easy if we were willing to introduce the forces 

 pertaining to organic nature. Here the field of plausible supposition 

 is immense, being capable of making an infinite number of combina- 

 tions capable of satisfying the appearances even with the smallest and 

 simplest means. Changes of vegetation over a vast area, and the pro- 

 duction of animals, also very small, but in enormous multitudes, may 

 well be rendered visible at suoh a distance. An observer placed in the 

 moon would be able to see such an appearance at the times in which 

 agricultural o])erations are carried out upon one vast plain — the seed- 

 time and the gathering of the harvest. In such a manner also would 

 the flowers of the plants of the great steppes of Europe and Asia be 



