Oct. 26, 1 888.] 



SCIENTIFIC NEWS. 



433 



MARS AND ITS " CANALS." 



DURING the last few years the attention of astro- 

 nomers has been increasingly drawn to certain 

 curious phenomena observed in the planet Mars. These 

 appearances are of the higher scientific value since two 

 only of the heavenly bodies, Mars and Venus, are likely 

 to throw fresh light on the important question in how far 

 any of the other planets may resemble our earth ? Mer- 

 cury is too small, too distant, and too much lost in the 

 sun's rays to afford us any evidence. The exterior planets 

 Jupiter, Saturn, and the rest seem to belong to a totally 

 different class of bodies. 



Of the only two planets which remain, Mars offers us 

 the better facilities for observation. Though smaller 

 than Venus, and at a greater distance from the earth, 

 he is at times seen " full," whilst Venus never turns to 

 us more than a portion of her illuminated disc, like the 

 moon about the first quarter. Hence the importance of 

 a thorough scrutiny of Mars. A long time ago it was 



We have been thus obliged to premise facts, doubtless 

 well known to the majority of our readers, for the better 

 comprehension of what is to follow. 



Such was the state of our knowledge of the surface of 

 Mars when in 1877 Professor Schiaparelli, an Italian 

 astronomer, discovered what are now known as the 

 "canals." The continents of Mars are intersected with 

 lines, most frequently straight, sometimes fine, very 

 dark and distinctly traced, sometimes broader and misty, 

 sometimes black, sometimes grey, blueish, or reddish. 

 These lines seem to place the seas in communication with 

 each other, and they cross and re-cross each other, form- 

 ing at certain points knots which the telescope has not 

 succeeded in disentangling. In some regions these lines 

 — canals or whatever they may be — display slight wind- 

 ings resembling those of our rivers, though in a much 

 less pronounced degree. 



A general notion of the aspect presented by Mars, as 

 seen with a powerful telescope, may be formed by an 



Fig. i.— Mars as it appeared on the Sth, qth, and 



ioth of May, 1888. (after Schiaparelli.) 



b. White spaces. 



discovered that around the poles of this planet 

 there exist whitish " caps," which increase or decrease 

 periodically with the season of the year, and which at 

 once remind us of the snowy regions investing our north 

 and south poles. 



Further, there appear on the disc of the planet spots 

 fairly permanent in their outline, and differing in their 

 colour. There are sombre regions which are supposed 

 to be seas, and there are also brighter tracts of a reddish 

 colour which astronomers regard as continents. The 

 land and water, if such they be, as we may provisionally 

 assume, differ both in relative proportion and in configu- 

 ration from those of our earth. Our ocean occupies at 

 least two-thirds of the earth's surface, and our land is 

 mainly grouped in two large masses, beginning near the 

 North Pole and extending southwards. On Mars the 

 proportions of land and water are nearly equal, and we 

 find, as the late Mr. Proctor puts it, a great number of 

 long and narrow necks of land and of seas, shaped like 

 the neck of a bottle. 



Mars as it appeared on the 2nd, 4TH, and 6th of 

 June, 1888. (after Schiaparelli.) 



b. White spaces. 



examination of figure 1, for which we are indebted to our 

 contemporary del et Terre. 



Strange to say, this discovery of Schiaparelli was re- 

 ceived at first with almost as much incredulity as was 

 bestowed upon Galileo's early observations of the phases 

 of Venus, of the moons of Jupiter, or of mountains in 

 the moon. The canals were pronounced by some to be 

 mere illusions due to defects of the telescope or to at- 

 mospheric peculiarities. But when other observers con- 

 firmed substantially Schiaparelli's results, using other 

 instruments, this sceptical attitude was, of necessity, 

 abandoned. 



The next step in the study of a phenomenon, which 

 has been rightly called mysterious, was again taken by 

 Professor Schiaparelli in 1881-82. At that time Mars 

 was in opposition, its entire illuminated disc being turned 

 towards us. Utilising this favourable circumstance, the 

 Italian astronomer observed that nearly all the canals 

 appeared double. This phenomenon, spoken of techni- 

 cally as their gemination, requires to be precisely 



