MARS
Meanwhile the work of the Observatory went on, partly in the direction
of the special lines of the several observers, but mainly in that of the
founder whose interest was then predominantly planetary, especially in
Mars; and from this the site of the dome came to be called Mars Hill.
The clear atmosphere yielded the results that had been hoped for, and
much was discovered about the planets, their period of rotation,
satellites etc., but above all were the Martian observations fruitful.
There the object was to watch the seasonal changes beginning with the
vernal equinox, or spring of the southern hemisphere, the one inclined
toward the earth when the two bodies approach most closely, and follow
them through the summer and autumn of our neighbor. For those not
familiar with the topography of Mars it may be said that the greater
part of its surface is a reddish or orange color interspersed with
patches or broken bands of a blue, or greenish blue, in the southern
temperate zone. These had been supposed to be seas, and are still known
by names recalling that opinion, while the lighter regions derived their
nomenclature from the theory that they are continents or islands
standing out of the water. This is confusing, but must be borne in mind
by anyone who looks at a map of the planet and tries to understand the
meaning of the terms. There are several reasons for thinking that the
dark areas are not seas: one that they change in depth of color with the
seasons; another that light reflected from water is polarized and in
this case it is not; also they never show a brilliant specular
reflection of the Sun as seas would do.
Now in the winter of the Martian southern hemisphere the region around
that pole turned white, that is it became covered by a mantle appearing
like snow or ice, and as the summer advanced this became less and less
until it disappeared altogether. Meanwhile there formed around it a dark
mass that spread downwards, toward the temperate zone and into the
bluish areas there, which assumed a darker hue. After the deepening
color had reached the edge of the wrongly called sea, very thin straight
lines appeared proceeding from it into the lighter reddish regions
(mistaken for continents) toward the equator, and increased rapidly in
number until there was a great network of them. It very often happened
that more than two of these intersected at the same point, and when that
occurred there usually came a distinct dot much larger than the
thickness of the lines themselves. After this process was fairly under
way the dark areas faded down again, and then similar fine lines
appeared in them, connecting with those in the light areas, and
apparently continuing toward the pole. Moreover, some of the lines in
the light region doubled, that is two parallel lines appeared usually
running in this case not to the centres, but to the two sides of the
dark dots. It is essential to add that the limit of thickness for any
line on Mars to be seen by their telescopes was estimated at about
fifteen miles, so that these fine lines must have been at least of that
width.
Such is in brief the outline of that which the observers saw. What did
these things mean? What was the interpretation of the phenomena, their
opinion on the causes and operation? This, with the details of the
observations, is given by Percival in his book “Mars,” written
immediately after this first year of observation, the preface bearing
the date November, 1895. But it must not be supposed that he started to
observe with any preconceived idea that the planet was inhabited, or
with the object of proving that the so-called canals were the work of
intelligent beings, for in the preface to the fourth edition he says:
“The theory contained in this book was conceived by me toward the end of
the first year’s work at Flagstaff. Up to that time, although the
habitability of Mars had been often suggested and strenuously opposed,
no theory based upon sufficient facts had ever been put forth that bound
the facts into a logical consistent whole—the final rivet perhaps was
when the idea of the oases occurred to me.” The oases were the dots at
the intersection of the fine lines which were called by Schiaparelli
“canali” and have retained the name canals.
“Mars” begins with a description of the planet, of its orbit, size and
shape, as compared with that of the Earth. By means of its trifling
satellites its mass was determined, and from this and its dimensions the
force of gravity at its surface, which was found to be a little over one
third of that on the Earth; so that living creatures, if any, could be
much larger than those of the same type here. From the markings that
could be seen on its face the period of rotation, that is the length of
the Martian day, was measured with great accuracy, being about forty
minutes longer than our own; while the Martian year, known from its
revolution round the sun, was about twice the length of ours. All this
led to a calculation of the nature of the planet’s seasons, which for
its southern hemisphere—the one turned toward the Earth when the two
bodies are near together as in 1894—gave a long cold winter and a summer
short and hot.
He then takes up the question of atmosphere, which, with water, is
absolutely necessary for life, and even for physical changes of any kind
“when once what was friable had crumbled to pieces under the alternate
roasting and refrigerating, relatively speaking, to which the body’s
surface would be exposed as it turned round on its axis into and out of
the sun’s rays. Such disintegration once accomplished, the planet would
roll thenceforth a mummy world through space,” like our own moon, as he
says, where, except for the possible tumbling in of a crater wall, all
is now deathly still. But on Mars changes occur on a scale vast enough
to be visible from the Earth, and he tells in greater detail the first
of those noted in the preceding summary, the formation and melting of
the polar snows. Moreover, a change was observed in the diameter of the
planet, which could be explained only by the presence of a twilight
zone, and this meant an atmosphere refracting the rays of the sun, a
phenomenon that he dwells upon at some length. He then turns to the
nature of the atmosphere, and from the relative cloudlessness and the
lesser force of gravity concludes that its density is probably about one
seventh of that on the surface of the Earth. So much for its quantity.
For its quality he considers the kinetic theory of gases, and calculates
that in spite of its lesser gravity it could retain oxygen, nitrogen,
water vapor, and in fact all the elements of our atmosphere.
He next considers the question of water, the other essential to the
existence of life, animal or vegetable; the phenomenon of the
diminution, and final disappearance, of the polar cap, the behavior of
the dark blue band which formed along it; and says: “That the blue was
water at the edge of the melting snow seems unquestionable. That it was
the color of water; that it so persistently bordered the melting snow;
and that it subsequently vanished, are three facts mutually confirmatory
to this deduction. But a fourth bit of proof, due to the ingenuity of
Professor W. H. Pickering, adds its weight to the other three. For he
made the polariscope tell the same tale. On scrutinizing the great bay
through an Arago polariscope, he found the light coming from the bay to
be polarized. Now, to polarize the light it reflects is a property, as
we know, of a smooth surface such as that of water is.” The great bay of
which he speaks is the widest part of the blue band. He discusses the
suggestion that the white cap is due, as had been suggested, to
congealed carbonic acid gas instead of ice or snow from water, and
points out that with the slight density of the Martian atmosphere this
would require a degree of cold impossible under the conditions of the
planet; an important conclusion later fully confirmed by radiometric
measures at Flagstaff and Mt. Wilson.
Assuming therefore that the polar cap is composed of snow or ice, he
traced its history, as observed more closely than ever before at
Flagstaff, and gives a map of its gradual shrinking and final
disappearance, with the corresponding condition of the blue water at its
edge. All this from June 3 to October 13 of our year, or from May 1 to
July 13 of the Martian seasons, and this was the first time the cap had
been seen to vanish wholly. It is interesting to note that in the early
morning of June 8 “as I was watching the planet, I saw suddenly two
points like stars flash out in the midst of the polar cap. Dazzlingly
bright upon the duller white background of the snow, these stars shone
for a few moments and then slowly disappeared. The seeing at the time
was very good. It is at once evident what the other-world apparitions
were,—not the fabled signal lights of Martian folk, but the glint of
ice-slopes flashing for a moment earthward as the rotation of the planet
turned the slope to the proper angle ... nine minutes before they reach
Earth they had ceased to be on Mars, and, after their travel of one
hundred millions of miles, found to note them but one watcher, alone on
a hill-top with the dawn.”
Seven years before Green, at Madeira, had seen the same thing at the
same spot on the planet, drawn the same conclusion, and named the
heights the Mitchell Mountains, after the man who had done the like in
1846. Later the blue belt below the cap turned brown; “of that mud-color
land does from which the water has recently been drained off,” and at
last, “where the polar ice-cap and polar sea had been was now one ochre
stretch of desert.”
The geography of Mars he describes, but what he tells cannot be made
intelligible without the twelve successive views he gives of the planet
as it turns around; while the names of places, given in the main by
Schiaparelli, are based in large part on the mistaken impression that
the dark regions were seas and bays, the light ones continents and
islands. “Previous to the present chart,” Percival writes, “the most
detailed map of the planet was Schiaparelli’s, made in 1888. On
comparison with his, it will be seen that the present one substantially
confirms all his detail, and adds to it about as much more. I have
adopted his nomenclature, and in the naming of the newly found features
have selected names conformable to his scheme, which commends itself
both on practical and on poetic grounds.” By this, of course, he does
not mean to commend naming the dark areas as seas, for his description
of the features on the planet’s surface is followed by a statement of
the reasons, apparently conclusive, for assuming that the blue-green
regions cannot be seas, but must be vegetation; while the reddish ochre
ones are simply desert.
“Upon the melting of its polar cap, and the transference of the water
thus annually set free to go its rounds, seem to depend all the seasonal
phenomena on the surface of the planet.
“The observations upon which this deduction is based extend over a
period of nearly six months, from the last day of May to the 22d of
November. They cover the regions from the south pole to about latitude
forty north. That changes analogous to those recorded, differing,
however, in details, occur six Martian months later in the planet’s
northern hemisphere, is proved by what Schiaparelli has seen.” In order
that the reader may not be confused, and wonder why the changes at the
north pole do not begin shortly after those in the southern hemisphere
are over, he must remember that the Martian year has 687 days, and is
thus nearly twice as long as ours, or in other words that the period of
these observations covered only about four months in Mars.
“So soon as the melting of the snow was well under way, long straits, of
deeper tint than their surroundings, made their appearance in the midst
of the dark areas,” although the dark areas were then at their darkest.
“For some time the dark areas continued largely unchanged in appearance;
that is, during the earlier and most extensive melting of the snow-cap.
After this their history became one long chronicle of fading out. Their
lighter parts grew lighter, and their darker ones less dark. For, to
start with, they were made up of many tints; various shades of
blue-green interspersed with glints of orange-yellow.... Toward the end
of October, a strange, and, for observational purposes, a distressing
phenomenon took place. What remained of the more southern dark regions
showed a desire to vanish, so completely did those regions proceed to
fade in tint throughout.” He points out that such a change is
inexplicable if the dark areas were water, for there was no place for it
to go to. “But if, instead of being due to water, the blue-green tint
had been due to leaves and grasses, just such a fading out as was
observed should have taken place as autumn came on, and that without
proportionate increase of green elsewhere; for the great continental
areas, being desert, are incapable of supporting vegetation, and
therefore of turning green.” By the continental areas he meant the
barren regions, formerly thought to stand out from seas in contrast with
the darker ones supposed to be water.
“Thus we see that several independent phenomena all agree to show that
the blue-green regions of Mars are not water, but, generally at least,
areas of vegetation; from which it follows that Mars is very badly off
for water, and that the planet is dependent on the melting of its polar
snows for practically its whole supply.
“Such scarcity of water on Mars is just what theory would lead us to
expect. Mars is a smaller planet than the Earth, and therefore is
relatively more advanced in his evolutionary career.” And as a planet
grows old its water retreats through cracks and caverns into its
interior. The so-called seas were, he thinks, once such, and “are still
the lowest portions of the planet, and therefore stand to receive what
scant water may yet travel over the surface.” With this agrees the fact
that the divisions between the dark and light areas run south-east
north-west; as they would if made by currents in water flowing from the
pole toward the equator.
“Now, if a planet were at any stage of its career able to support life,
it is probable that a diminishing water supply would be the beginning of
the end of that life, for the air would outlast the available water.[11]
...
“Mars is, apparently, in this distressing plight at the present moment,
the signs being that its water supply is now exceedingly low. If,
therefore, the planet possess inhabitants, there is but one course open
to them in order to support life. Irrigation, and upon as vast a scale
as possible, must be the all-engrossing Martian pursuit....
“At this point in our inquiry, when direct deduction from the general
physical phenomena observable on the planet’s surface shows that, were
there inhabitants there, a system of irrigation would be an
all-essential of their existence, the telescope presents us with perhaps
the most startling discovery of modern times,—the so-called canals of
Mars.”
He then takes up these so-called canals or lines which start from the
edge of the blue-green regions, proceed directly to what seem centres in
the middle of the ochre areas, where they meet other lines that come, he
says, “with apparently a like determinate intent. And this state of
things is not confined to any one part of the planet, but takes place
all over the reddish-ochre regions,” that is the arid belt of the
planet. “Plotting upon a globe betrays them to be arcs of great circles
almost invariably, even the few outstanding exceptions seeming to be but
polygonal combinations of the same.” These two facts, that the lines are
great circles, or the shortest distance between points on the surface of
the planet, and that several of them often meet at the same place, must
be borne in mind, because they are essential elements in his argument
that they are the result of an intelligent plan.
The lines are of enormous length, the shortest being 250 miles, and the
longest 3,540, and at times three, four, five, and even seven come
together at one spot. By them the whole region is cut up, and how many
there may be cannot now, he says, be determined, for the better the air
at the observatory the more of them become visible. At Flagstaff they
detected 183, seen from once to 127 times, and there were in the
aggregate 3,240 records made of them.[12]
In seeking for the origin of the lines he begins by discarding natural
causation on the ground first of their straightness, and second of their
uniform width, regularities not to be found to any such a degree in the
processes of nature. His third ground is “that the lines form a system;
that, instead of running anywhither, they join certain points to certain
others, making thus, not a simple network, but one whose meshes connect
centres directly with one another.... If lines be drawn haphazard over
the surface of a globe, the chances are ever so many to one against more
than two lines crossing each other at any point. Simple crossings of two
lines will of course be common in something like factorial proportion to
the number of lines; but that any other line should contrive to cross at
the same point would be a coincidence whose improbability only a
mathematician can properly appreciate, so very great is it.... In other
words, we might search in vain for a single instance of such encounter.
On the surface of Mars, however, instead of searching in vain, we find
the thing occurring _passim_; this _a priori_ most improbable
rendezvousing proving the rule, not the exception. Of the crossings that
are best seen, all are meeting places for more than two canals.”
He then takes up the question of cracks radiating from centres of
explosion or fissure, and points out that such cracks would not be of
uniform breadth. There are cracks on the moon which look like cracks,
while the lines on Mars do not. Moreover, the lines fit into one another
which would not be true of cracks radiating from different centres. The
lines cannot be rivers for those would not be the same width throughout,
or run on arcs of great circles. Nor can the lines be furrows ploughed
by meteorites, since these would not run straight from one centre to
another; in short the objection from the infinitesimal chance of several
lines crossing at the same point applies. “In truth,” he concludes, “no
natural theory has yet been advanced which will explain these lines.”
The development, or order in the visibility, of the canals throws light
on their nature. Early in the Martian spring they were invisible, then
those nearest to the melting snows of its south pole appeared, and in a
general succession those farther and farther away; but when they did
appear they were always in the same place where they had been seen
before. Each canal, however, did not darken all at once, but gradually;
and this he accounts for by saying that what we see is not water but
vegetation which takes time to develop. “If, therefore, we suppose what
we call a canal to be, not the canal proper, but the vegetation along
its banks, the observed phenomena stand accounted for. This suggestion
was first made some years ago by Professor W. H. Pickering.
“That what we see is not the canal proper, but the line of land it
irrigates, disposes incidentally of the difficulty of conceiving a canal
several miles wide. On the other hand, a narrow, fertilized strip of
country is what we should expect to find; for, as we have seen, the
general physical condition of the planet leads us to the conception, not
of canals constructed for waterways,—like our Suez Canal,—but of canals
dug for irrigation purposes. We cannot, of course, be sure that such is
their character, appearances being often highly deceitful; we can only
say that, so far, the supposition best explains what we see. Further
details of their development point to this same conclusion.” Such as
that with time they darken rather than broaden.
To the objection that canals could not be built in straight lines
because of mountain ranges he replies that the surface of Mars is
surprisingly flat, and this he proves by careful observations of the
terminator, that is the edge of that part of the planet lighted by the
Sun, where any considerable sudden changes of elevation on the surface
of the planet would appear, and do not.
He then tells of the discovery by Mr. Douglass of the canals in the dark
regions toward the south pole. They could not be seen while those
regions remained dark, but when they faded out the canals became
visible, and supplied the missing link explaining how the water from the
melting polar cap was conveyed to the canals in the arid space north and
south of the equator. Mr. Douglass found no less than forty-four of
them, almost all of which he saw more than once, one on as many as
thirty-seven occasions.
Then came the phenomenon that convinced Percival of an artificial system
of irrigation: “Dotted all over the reddish-ochre ground of the desert
stretches of the planet ... are an innumerable number of dark circular
or oval spots. They appear, furthermore, always in intimate association
with the canals. They constitute so many hubs to which the canals make
spokes”; and there is not a single instance of such a spot, unconnected
by a canal, and by more than one, with the rest of the system. These
spots are in general circular, from 120 to 150 miles in diameter, and
make their appearance after, but not long after, the canals that lead to
them, those that appear first becoming after a time less conspicuous,
those seen later more so. In short they behave as oases of vegetation
would when a supply of water had reached them, and thus give “an end and
object for the existence of canals, and the most natural one in the
world, namely, that the canals are constructed for the express purpose
of fertilizing the oases.... This, at least, is the only explanation
that fully accounts for the facts. Of course all such evidence of design
may be purely fortuitous, with about as much probability, as it has
happily been put, as that a chance collection of numbers should take the
form of the multiplication table.” He does not fail to point out that
great circles for the canals, and circular shapes for the oases, are the
forms most economical if artificially constructed; nor does his
reasoning rest upon a small number of instances, for up to the close of
observations at that time fifty-three oases had been discovered.
Finally he deals with the corroborating phenomena of double canals and
the curious dark spots where the canals in the dark regions debouch into
those that run through the deserts.
In his conclusion he sums up his ideas as follows:
“To review, now, the chain of reasoning by which we have been led to
regard it probable that upon the surface of Mars we see the effects of
local intelligence. We find, in the first place, that the broad physical
conditions of the planet are not antagonistic to some form of life;
secondly, that there is an apparent dearth of water upon the planet’s
surface, and therefore, if beings of sufficient intelligence inhabited
it, they would have to resort to irrigation to support life; thirdly,
that there turns out to be a network of markings covering the disk
precisely counterparting what a system of irrigation would look like;
and, lastly, that there is a set of spots placed where we should expect
to find the lands thus artificially fertilized, and behaving as such
constructed oases should. All this, of course, may be a set of
coincidences, signifying nothing; but the probability points the other
way.”
Such was the harvest of facts and ideas garnered from Mars at the
Observatory during this summer of tireless watching. Both the facts and
the conclusions drawn from them were received with incredulity by
astronomers whose atmospheres and unfamiliarity with the things to be
observed hindered their seeing the phenomena, and to whom the
explanations seemed fantastic. With more careful observation skepticism
about the phenomena decreased, one observer after another seeing the
change of color on the planet, the growth of vegetation, and in some
form the lines and the dots, although many skilled observers still see
them as irregular markings rather than as fine uniform lines. The
hypothesis of artificial construction of the canals by intelligent
beings has met with much more resistance. It runs against the blade of
Occam’s razor, that nothing should be attributed to conscious
intelligent action unless it cannot be explained by natural forces.
Percival seems to have made a very strong argument against any natural
cause yet suggested, and a rational case for an intelligent agency if no
natural one can be found. There, for the present, his hypothesis may be
said to rest.
The favorable period for observation during the opposition of Mars
having come to an end, the two larger telescopes, which had been hired
or borrowed for the expedition, were returned in the spring to their
owners, the observatory at Flagstaff being dismantled, and the rest of
the apparatus brought East and stored; but plans for further work on
Mars were by no means given up; and Percival—bent on still better
equipment for the next opposition of Mars, in the summer of
1896—arranged with Alvan Clark & Sons for the manufacture of a 24-inch
refractor lens. The Clarks were then the most successful makers of large
lenses in the world; for up to that time it had not been possible to
cast and cool these large pieces of glass so that they were perfectly
uniform in density, and the art of the Clarks consisted in grinding and
rubbing the surface so as to make its slight departure from the
calculated curves compensate for any unevenness in density; and to a
less extent it is still necessary. It required a skill of eye and hand
unequalled elsewhere, and Percivals’ lens was one of the most perfect
they ever made.
Where the telescope should be set up was not yet decided; for it will be
remembered that he wanted to make his observations in any accessible
place in the world where the clearest, and especially the steadiest,
atmosphere would be found. As already explained, he believed this lay in
one of the two great desert belts that encircle the Earth north and
south of the equator; and, for practical purposes, that meant Arizona,
Mexico and South America in the Western Hemisphere, and the Sahara in
the Eastern. Mr. Douglass had therefore been sent—probably with the
faithful 6-inch telescope—to Mexico and South America, while Percival
proposed to examine the Sahara himself.