†‘History’, from , to contemplate.
*The word ‘purification’ seems here to be used with reference to its root in the Greek , fire.
*The subjoined jeu d’esprit with the preceding heading in magnificent capitals, well interspersed with notes of admiration, was originally published, as matter of fact, in the ‘New York Sun’, a daily newspaper, and therein fully subserved the purpose of creating indigestible aliment for the quidnuncs during the few hours intervening between a couple of the Charleston mails. The rush for the ‘sole paper which had the news’, was something beyond even the prodigious; and, in fact, if (as some assert) the ‘Victoria’ did not absolutely accomplish the voyage recorded, it will be difficult to assign a reason why she should not have accomplished it.
* Note. – Mr Ainsworth has not attempted to account for this phenomena, which, however, is quite susceptible of explanation. A line dropped from an elevation of 25,000 feet, perpendicularly to the surface of the earth (or sea), would form the perpendicular of a right-angled triangle, of which the base would extend from the right angle to the horizon, and the hypothenuse from the horizon to the balloon. But the 25,000 feet of altitude is little or nothing, in comparison with the extent of the prospect. In other words, the base and hypothenuse of the supposed triangle would be so long when compared with the perpendicular that the two former may be regarded as nearly parallel. In this manner the horizon of the æronaut would appear to be on a level with the car. But, as the point immediately beneath him seems, and is, at a great distance below him, it seems, of course, also, at a great distance below the horizon. Hence the impression of concavity; and this impression must remain, until the elevation shall bear so great a proportion to the extent of prospect, that the apparent parallelism of the base and hypothenuse disappears – when the earth’s real convexity must become apparent.
*The coralites.
† ‘One of the most remarkable natural curiosities in Texas is a petrified forest, near the head of Pasigno river. It consists of several hundred trees, in an erect position, all turned to stone. Some trees, now growing, are partly petrified. This is a startling fact for natural philosophers, and must cause them to modify the existing theory of petrifaction.’ – Kennedy. [Texas, 1, page 120.]
This account, at first discredited, has since been corroborated by the discovery of a completely petrified forest, near the head waters of the Chayenne, or Chienne river, which has its source in the Black Hills of the Rocky chain.
There is scarcely, perhaps, a spectacle on the surface of the globe more remarkable, either in a geological or picturesque point of view, than that presented by the petrified forest, near Cairo. The traveller, having passed the tombs of the caliphs, just beyond the gates of the city, proceeds to the southward, nearly at right angles to the road across the desert to Suez, and after having travelled some ten miles up a low barren valley, covered with sand, gravel, and sea shells, fresh as if the tide had retired but yesterday, crosses a low range of sandhills, which has for some distance run parallel to his path. The scene now presented to him is beyond conception singular and desolate. A mass of fragments of trees, all converted into stone, and when struck by his horse’s hoof ringing like cast iron, is seen to extend itself for miles and miles around him, in the form of a decayed and prostrate forest. The wood is of a dark brown hue, but retains its form in perfection, the pieces being from one to fifteen feet in length, and from half a foot to three feet in thickness, strewed so closely together, as far as the eye can reach, that an Egyptian donkey can scarcely thread its way through amongst them, and so natural that, were it in Scotland or Ireland, it might pass without remark for some enormous drained bog, on which the exhumed trees lay rotting in the sun. The roots and rudiments of the branches are, in many cases, nearly perfect, and in some the worm-holes eaten under the bark are readily recognisable. The most delicate of the sap vessels, and all the finer portions of the centre of the wood, are perfectly entire, and bear to be examined with the strongest magnifiers. The whole are so thoroughly silicified as to scratch glass and be capable of receiving the highest polish. – Asiatic Magazine. [III. p. 359: Third Series.]
* The Mammoth Cave of Kentucky.
† In Iceland, 1783.
‡ ‘During the eruption of Hecla, in 1766, clouds of this kind produced such a degree of darkness that, at Glaumba, which is more than fifty leagues from the mountain, people could only find their way by groping. During the eruption of Vesuvius, in 1794, at Caserta, four leagues distant, people could only walk by the light of torches. On the first of May, 1812, a cloud of volcanic ashes and sand, coming from a volcano in the island of St Vincent, covered the whole of Barbadoes, spreading over it so intense a darkness that, at mid-day, in the open air, one could not perceive the trees or other objects near him, or even a white handkerchief placed at the distance of six inches from the eye.’ – Murray, p. 215, Phil. edit. [1. Encyclopaedia of Geography.]
* ‘In the year 1790, in the Caraccas, during an earthquake, a portion of the granite soil sank and left a lake eight hundred yards in diameter, and from eighty to a hundred feet deep. It was a part of the Forest of Aripao which sank, and the trees remained green for several months under the water.’ – Murray, p. 221. [ Encyc. of Geog. ]
†The hardest steel ever manufactured may, under the action of a blowpipe, be reduced to an impalpable powder, which will float readily in the atmosheric air.
‡The reion of the Niger. See Simmond’s ‘Colonial Magazine’.
¶ The Myrmeleon – lion-ant. The term ‘monster’ is equally applicable to small abnormal things and to great, while such epithets as ‘vast’ are merely comparative. The cavern of the myrmeleon is vast in comparison with the hole of the common red ant. A grain of silex is, also, a ‘rock’.
*The Epidendron, Flos Aeris, of the family of the Orchideœ, grows with merely the surface of its roots attached to a tree or other object, from which it derives no nutriment – subsisting altogether upon air.
† The Parasites, such as the wonderful Rafflesia Arnoldi.
‡ Schouw advocates a class of plants that grow upon living animals – the Plantœ Epizoœ. Of this class are the Fuci and Algœ.
Mr J. B. Williams, of Salem, Mass., presented the ‘National Institute’, with an insect from New Zealand, with the following description: – ‘ “The Hotte”, a decided caterpillar, or worm, is found growing at the foot of the Rata tree, with a plant growing out of its head. This most peculiar and most extraordinary insect travels up both the Rata and Puriri trees, and entering into the top, eats its way, perforating the trunk of the tree until it reaches the root, it then comes out of the root, and dies, or remains dormant, and the plant propagates out of its head; the body remains perfect and entire, of a harder substance than when alive. From this insect the natives make a coloring for tattooing.’
¶ In mines and natural caves we find a species of cryptogamous fungus that emits an intense phosphorescence.
§ The orchis, scabius and vallisneria.
** ‘The corolla of this flower, (Aristolochia Clematitis,) which is tubular, but terminating upwards in a ligulate limb, is inflated into a globular figure at the base. The tubular part is internally beset with stiff hairs, pointing downwards. The globular part contains, the pistil, which consists merely of a germen and stigma, together with the surrounding stamens. But the stamens, being shorter than even the germen, cannot discharge the pollen so as to throw it upon the stigma, as the flower stands always upright till after impregnation. And hence, without some additional and peculiar aid, the pollen must necessarily fall down to the bottom of the flower. Now, the aid that Nature has furnished in this case, is that of the Tipula Pennicornis, a small insect, which entering the tube of the corolla in quest of honey, descends to the bottom, and rummages about till it becomes quite covered with pollen; but, not being able to force its way out again, owing to the downward position of the hairs, which converge to a point like the wires of a mouse-trap, and being somewhat impatient o
f its confinement, it brushes backwards and forwards, trying every corner, till, after repeatedly traversing the stigma, it covers it with pollen sufficient for its impregnation, in consequence of which the flower soon begins to droop and the hairs to shrink to the side of the tube, effecting an easy passage for the escape of the insect.’ – Rev. P. Keith – ‘System of Physiological Botany’.
* The bees – ever since bees were – have been constructing their cells with just such sides, in just such number, and at just such inclinations, as it has been demonstrated (in a problem involving the profoundest mathematical principles) are the very sides, in the very number, and at the very angles which will afford the creatures the most room that is compatible with the greatest stability of structure. During the latter part of the last century, the question arose among mathematicians – ‘to determine the best form that can be given to the sails of a windmill, according to their varying distances from the revolving vanes, and likewise from the centres of revolution.’ This is an excessively complex problem; for it is, in other words, to find the best possible position at an infinity of varied distances, and at an infinity of points on the arm. There were a thousand futile attempts to answer the query on the part of the most illustrious mathematicians; and when, at length, an undeniable solution was discovered, men found that the wings of a bird had given it with absolute precision, ever since the first bird had traversed the air.
* He observed a flock of pigeons passing betwixt Frankfort and the Indiana territory, one mile at least in breadth; it took up four hours in passing; which, at the rate of one mile per minute, gives a length of 240 miles; and, supposing three pigeons to each square yard, gives 2,230,272,000 pigeons. ‘Travels in Canada and the United States’, by Lieut. F. Hall.
† ‘The earth is upheld by a cow of a blue color, having horns four hundred in number.’ – Sale’s Koran.
* ‘The Entozoa, or intestinal worms, have repeatedly been observed in the muscles, and in the cerebral substance of men.’ – See Wyatt’s Physiology, p. 143.
†On the great Western Railway, between London and Exeter, a speed of 71 miles per hour has been attained. A train weighing 90 tons was whirled from Paddington to Didcot (53 miles,) in 51 minutes.
** The Daguerreotype.
*Maelzel’s Automaton Chess-player.8
† Babbage’s Calculating Machine.9
‡ Chabert, and since him, a hundred others.10
¶ The Electrotype.
§Wollaston made of platinum for the field of views in a telescope a wire one eighteen-thousandth part of an inch in thickness. It could be seen only by means of the microscope.
** Newton demonstrated that the retina beneath the influence of the violet ray of the spectrum, vibrated 900,000,000 of times in a second.
*The Voltaic pile.
† The Electro Telegraph transmits intelligence instantaneously – at least so far as regards any distance upon the earth.
‡ The Electro Telegraph Printing Apparatus.
¶ Common experiments in Natural Philosophy. If two red rays from two luminous points be admitted into a dark chamber so as to fall on a white surface, and differ in their length by 0.0000258 of an inch, their intensity is doubled. So also if the difference in length be any whole-number multiple of that fraction. A multiple by 2¼, 3¼, &c., gives an intensity equal to one ray only; but a multiple by 2½, 3½, &c., gives the result of total darkness. In violet rays similar effects arise when the difference in length is 0.000157 of an inch; and with all other rays the results are the same – the difference varying with a uniform increase from the violet to the red.
Analogous experiments in respect to sound produce analogous results.
§ Place a platina crucible over a spirit lamp, and keep it a red heat; pour in some sulphuric acid, which, though the most volatile of bodies at a common temperature, will be found to become completely fixed in a hot crucible, and not a drop evaporates – being surrounded by an atmosphere of its own, it does not, in fact touch the sides. A few drops of water are now introduced, when the acid immediately coming in contact with the heated sides of the crucible, flies off in sulphurous acid vapor, and so rapid is its progress, that the caloric of the water passes off with it, which falls a lump of ice to the bottom; by taking advantage of the moment before it is allowed to re-melt, it may be turned out a lump of ice from a red-hot vessel.
** The Daguerreotype.
* Although light travels 200,000 miles in a second, the distance of what we suppose to be the nearest fixed star (Sireus) is so inconceivably great, that its rays would require at least three years to reach the earth. For stars beyond this 20 – or even 1000 years – would be a moderate estimate. Thus, if they had been annihilated 20 or 1000 years ago, we might still see them to-day, by the light which started from their surfaces, 20 or 1000 years in the past time. That many which we see daily are really extinct, is not impossible – not even improbable.
The elder Herschel maintains that the light of the faintest nebulæ seen through his great telescope, must have taken 3,000,000 years in reaching the earth. Some, made visible by Lord Ross’ instrument must, then, have required at least 20,000,000.
* Schehallien, in Wales.20
* ‘Murders in the Rue Morgue’.
*Here describe the whole process as one instantaneous flash.27
† Succinctly – The surfaces of spheres are as the squares of their radii.
* Page 238.
* A sphere is necessarily limited. I prefer tautology to a chance of misconception.
*Laplace assumed his nebulosity heterogeneous, merely that he might be thus enabled to account for the breaking up of the rings; for had the nebulosity been homogeneous, they would not have broken. I reach the same result – heterogeneity of the secondary masses immediately resulting from the atoms – purely from an à priori consideration of their general design – Relation.
†When this book went to press the ring of Neptune had not been positively determined.
* Another asteroid discovered since the work went to press.
*I am prepared to show that the anomalous revolution of the satellites of Uranus is a simply perspective anomaly arising from the bouleversement of the axis of the planet.
*See page 256.
* Page 232.
*‘Views of the Architecture of the Heavens’. A letter, purporting to be from Dr Nichol to a friend in America, went the rounds of our newspapers, about two years ago, I think, admitting ‘the necessity’ to which I refer. In a subsequent Lecture, however, Dr N. appears in some manner to have gotten the better of the necessity, and does not quite renounce the theory, although he seems to wish that he could sneer at it as ‘a purely hypothetical one’. What else was the Law of Gravity before the Maskelyne experiments? and who questioned the Law of Gravity, even then? The late experiments of Comte, however, are to the Laplacian theory what those of Maskelyne were to the Newtonian.
* It is not impossible that some unlooked-for optical improvement may disclose to us, among innumerable varieties of systems, a luminous sun, encircled by luminous and non-luminous rings, within and without and between which, revolve luminous and non-luminous planets, attended by moons having moons – and even these latter again having moons.
* Page 235.
*I must be understood as denying, especially, only the revolutionary portion of Mädler’s hypothesis. Of course, if no great central orb exists now in our cluster, such will exist hereafter. Whenever existing, it will be merely the nucleus of the consolidation.
† Betrachtet man die nicht perspectivischen52 eigenen Bewegungen der Sterne, so scheinen viele gruppenweise in ihrer Richtung entgegengesetzt; und die bisher gesammelten Thatsachen machen es auf’s wenigste nicht nothwendig, anzunehmen, dass alle Theile unserer Sternenschicht oder gar der gesammten Sterneninseln, welche den Weltraum füllen, sich um einen grossen, unbekannten, leuchtenden oder dunkeln Centralkörper bewegen. Das Streben nach den letzten höchsten Grundursachen macht freilich die reflectirende Thätigkeit
des Menschen, wie seine Phantasie, zu einer solchen Annahme geneigt.
* Page 233.
† ‘Gravity, therefore, must be the strongest of forces.’ – See page 235 seq.
* See page 280, Paragraph commencing ‘I reply that the right,’ and ending ‘proper and particular God.’
* With a gratuitous pun on Wagner’s Der fliegende Holländer (Dresden, 1843).
* Harry Levin, The Power of Blackness (1958), ch. 4 ‘Journey to the End of the Night’, p. 103.
† To borrow, with Poe, Sir Walter Scott’s terminology: ‘On the Supernatural in Fictitious Composition’, Foreign Quarterly Review vol. 1 (July 1827), pp. 60–98.
* For he patently contradicts another statement, made twenty-three years earlier : ‘At my instance he called on me several times, and entered at length into the discussion of subjects on which he proposed to employ his pen…’ (December 1852).
The Science Fiction of Edgar Allan Poe (Penguin Classics) Page 52