MOON, RECENT OBSERVATIONS AND STUDY OF THE. 



579 



telescope. Lord Rosse's telescope was the only 

 one capable of revealing great masses that had 

 fallen from the mountain-rims of some of the 

 circular basins upon the 

 plain below, and they 

 were as large as the 

 Capitol at Washington. 

 The result of these mis- 

 apprehensions is ex- 

 tremely detrimental to 

 scientific progress, inas- 

 much as it suppresses 

 the desire to investigate 



composed of the oxides of matter ; but we shall 

 find that the same causes that gave to our 

 globe its shell-covering of those oxidized com- 

 ponents gave to our 

 near neighbor the same 

 constituency through- 

 out. Remove the oxi- 

 dized shell of the earth, 

 and life would forever 

 cease to exist upon her 

 surface, for we shall 

 find upon careful inves- 

 tigation that the prepa- 



the nature of our 

 kindred world, be- 

 cause a dead world 

 or worn-out planet 

 necessarily 



ration of matter 

 for the coming of 

 life was oxidation. 

 Water, for exam- 

 ple, is an oxide of 



sumes in our estimation the character and hydrogen, and without it no form of life could 

 value of a mere cinder. exist. Carbonic acid is an oxide of carbon, 



It is only the thin crust of the earth that is and without it none of the vegetation of land 



