But that it's based upon delusion, because there is no definiteness, no
homogeneity, no stability, only different stages somewhere between them
and indefiniteness, heterogeneity, and instability. There are no
chemical elements. It seems acceptable that Ramsay and others have
settled that. The chemical elements are only another disappointment in
the quest for the positive, as the definite, the homogeneous, and the
stable. If there were real elements, there could be a real science of
chemistry.
Upon Nov. 12 and 13, 1902, occurred the greatest fall of matter in the
history of Australia. Upon the 14th of November, it "rained mud," in
Tasmania. It was of course attributed to Australian whirlwinds, but,
according to the _Monthly Weather Review_, 32-365, there was a haze all
the way to the Philippines, also as far as Hong Kong. It may be that
this phenomenon had no especial relation with the even more tremendous
fall of matter that occurred in Europe, February, 1903.
For several days, the south of England was a dumping ground--from
somewhere.
If you'd like to have a chemist's opinion, even though it's only a
chemist's opinion, see the report of the meeting of the Royal Chemical
Society, April 2, 1903. Mr. E.G. Clayton read a paper upon some of the
substance that had fallen from the sky, collected by him. The Sahara
explanation applies mostly to falls that occur in southern Europe.
Farther away, the conventionalists are a little uneasy: for instance,
the editor of the _Monthly Weather Review_, 29-121, says of a red rain
that fell near the coast of Newfoundland, early in 1890: "It would be
very remarkable if this was Sahara dust." Mr. Clayton said that the
matter examined by him was "merely wind-borne dust from the roads and
lanes of Wessex." This opinion is typical of all scientific opinion--or
theological opinion--or feminine opinion--all very well except for what
it disregards. The most charitable thing I can think of--because I think
it gives us a broader tone to relieve our malices with occasional
charities--is that Mr. Clayton had not heard of the astonishing extent
of this fall--had covered the Canary Islands, on the 19th, for instance.
I think, myself, that in 1903, we passed through the remains of a
powdered world--left over from an ancient inter-planetary dispute,
brooding in space like a red resentment ever since. Or, like every other
opinion, the notion of dust from Wessex turns into a provincial thing
when we look it over.
To think is to conceive incompletely, because all thought relates only
to the local. We metaphysicians, of course, like to have the notion that
we think of the unthinkable.
As to opinions, or pronouncements, I should say, because they always
have such an authoritative air, of other chemists, there is an analysis
in _Nature_, 68-54, giving water and organic matter at 9.08 per cent.
It's that carrying out of fractions that's so convincing. The substance
is identified as sand from the Sahara.
The vastness of this fall. In _Nature_, 68-65, we are told that it had
occurred in Ireland, too. The Sahara, of course--because, prior to
February 19, there had been dust storms in the Sahara--disregarding that
in that great region there's always, in some part of it, a dust storm.
However, just at present, it does look reasonable that dust had come
from Africa, via the Canaries.
The great difficulty that authoritativeness has to contend with is some
other authoritativeness. When an infallibility clashes with a
pontification--
They explain.
_Nature_, March 5, 1903:
Another analysis--36 per cent organic matter.
Such disagreements don't look very well, so, in _Nature_, 68-109, one of
the differing chemists explains. He says that his analysis was of muddy
rain, and the other was of sediment of rain--
We're quite ready to accept excuses from the most high, though I do
wonder whether we're quite so damned as we were, if we find ourselves in
a gracious and tolerant mood toward the powers that condemn--but the tax
that now comes upon our good manners and unwillingness to be too
severe--
_Nature_, 68-223:
Another chemist. He says it was 23.49 per cent water and organic matter.
He "identifies" this matter as sand from an African desert--but after
deducting organic matter--
But you and I could be "identified" as sand from an African desert,
after deducting all there is to us except sand--
Why we cannot accept that this fall was of sand from the Sahara,
omitting the obvious objection that in most parts the Sahara is not red
at all, but is usually described as "dazzling white"--
The enormousness of it: that a whirlwind might have carried it, but
that, in that case it would be no supposititious, or doubtfully
identified whirlwind, but the greatest atmospheric cataclysm in the
history of this earth:
_Jour. Roy. Met. Soc._, 30-56:
That, up to the 27th of February, this fall had continued in Belgium,
Holland, Germany and Austria; that in some instances it was not sand, or
that almost all the matter was organic: that a vessel had reported the
fall as occurring in the Atlantic Ocean, midway between Southampton and
the Barbados. The calculation is given that, in England alone,
10,000,000 tons of matter had fallen. It had fallen in Switzerland
(_Symons' Met. Mag._, March, 1903). It had fallen in Russia (_Bull. Com.
Geolog._, 22-48). Not only had a vast quantity of matter fallen several
months before, in Australia, but it was at this time falling in
Australia (_Victorian Naturalist_, June, 1903)--enormously--red
mud--fifty tons per square mile.