68 SCENERY IN A PATCH 



" With Jove we must begin ; not from Him rove ; 

 Him always praise, for all is full of Jove ! 

 He fills all places where mankind resort, 

 The wide-spread sea, with ev'ry shelt'ring port. 

 Jove's presence fills all space, upholds this ball ; 

 All need his aid, his power sustains us all. 

 For we his offspring are ; and He in love 

 Points out to man his labor from above ; 

 Where signs unerring show when best the soil 

 By well-tim'd culture shall repay our toil." 



NOTE. The superficial extent of the earth includes up- 

 ward of a hundred and ninety-seven millions of square miles, 

 and its solid contents amount to two hundred and sixty 

 thousand millions of cubical miles. Huge as this ball is, it 

 sinks into insignificance, when contrasted with Jupiter, Sat- 

 urn, or Uranus. The areas, and solid contents, of these 

 planets, are about as follows : 



Area. Solid contents. 



Jupiter 24,884,000,000 square miles 368,283,200,000,000 cubic miles 

 Saturn* 19,600,000,000 261,326,800,000,000 



Uranus 3,848,460,000 22,437,804,000,000 



Including the other planets and the satellites, their com- 

 bined surface cannot be estimated at less than sixty thousand 

 millions of square miles, which is about three hundred times 

 the surface of the globe. The mind can only imperfectly 

 embrace this vastness of territory ; yet it is but as a prov- 

 ince to an empire when compared with a single object in the 

 system the Sun. In its solid bulk, as already stated, the 

 solar globe is equal to five hundred times the volumes of 

 the planets, and to nearly one and a quarter millions such 

 worlds as ours. 



* MARS, the nearest to us of the exterior planets, was, in former ages 

 of superstition, the dread of the terrestrials on account of his fiery aspect, 

 and ministered more than any other celestial object to give employment 

 to the astrologers, and to fill their coffers : 



" But most is Mars amisse of all the rest; 

 And next to him old Saturne." 



