EVOLUTION IN THE SUNS 57 



marked calcium lines, in the spectrum of a 

 given star or nebula, and with certainty 

 conclude that he is observing millions of 

 millions of miles off, a body so hot and 

 incandescent that iron is not merely molten 

 but vapourized in it, and even beyond that 

 stage is showing certain lines enhanced, 

 as it is termed, as on this earth they only can 

 be by a high tension electric current sparked 

 in a vacuum between iron electrodes — a tem- 

 perature hotter than anything which can be 

 given by the electric arc burning in air. It is 

 just in such hottest suns that the spectra of 

 hydrogen and of the rare gases of the group 

 produced in radio-activity are to be observed 

 in great predominance. Here, evidently, at 

 this enormous temperature, either there is 

 visible before our eyes dissociation of matter 

 into its very first and simplest forms, or, it 

 may be that the available high energy 

 concentration at such a temperature is 

 actually synthesizing and producing from the 

 ether those first steps in the formation of 

 matter. The first process, or that of disrup- 

 tion of matter, forms the orthodox view which 

 at present holds the field, but the second is 

 by no means excluded. The chemist knows 

 well that it is just at the balancing point 

 that a reaction may run in either direction 



