the department of Planetary Astronomy.*
The entire trip is much too lengthy to be
taken without halting for rest and refreshment
by the way; so we will content ourselves
with the briefer treat of a short half-hour's
drive,—a little lunar episode,—at the
same time availing ourselves, by the way, of
other guide-books than those kindly
furnished by M. Lecouturier himself.

* Panorama des Mondes, Astronomic PlantStaire. Par
M. Lecouturier. Paris, 1S5S.

We are arrived, then, at the surface of the
moon, and a sublimely terrible scene lies
before us. Nought but silence and desolation
reigns throughout our short-lived satellite.
Although far younger than her mother,
earth, who still continues vigorous and green,
she is already stiff, stark, and inanimate.
That the moon is considerably junior to the
earth, is no modern phantasy. In ancient
times, the Arcadians, who wished to be
considered the most ancient of all existing
nations, conceived the clever idea of enriching
their coats of arms and heightening
their nobility, by claiming descent from
ancestors who lived at an epoch when the earth
had no attendant moon. They assumed the
title of Proseleni, that is, anterior to the
moon.

That men dwelt on earth before the birth
of the moon, is more than doubtful; it is
highly improbable, for several forcible
considerations, although certain terrestrial plants
and animals might have enjoyed a pre-lunar
existence. The latest teachings of modern
science tend to prove that while chaos
reigned, while the earth was without form
and void, the atmosphere was so heavy, deep,
and thick, was in such a state of density,
laden with innumerable matters which now
form part of the crust of the globe, that light
could not penetrate its murky veil. Darkness
was upon the face of the deep. Afterwards,
when the vast atmospheric laboratory
had fulfilled its office, and had deposited,
amongst other things, all the water which
now fills the seas, there was light. But a
calm was far from being established on the
surface of the globe when it was first covered
by the primitive waters. The vibratory
movements of the earth's incandescent mass
did not cease then, and have not ceased yet.
Earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, and upraisings
of mountains, must have been frequent.
Then appeared the primaeval plants, developing
themselves with extraordinary vigour in
the hypercarbonated atmosphere; then, came
the monstrous reptiles and the numerous
races of marine animals, whose remains we
find petrified in strata of flint and calcareous
rock. The marvellous preservation, to this
very day, of their minutest details of structure,
proves the deep tranquillity which
reigned in the ocean at the epoch when these
creatures met their death. There could be
no tides in the antelunar seas, since the tides
are owing to the moon, and the moon as yet
was not. The majority of fossil animals
remain so complete and uninjured in their
organisation, that they look as if they had
met with sudden death, by some general cause
of suffocation, in the midst of the profoundest
quiet of nature.

And then came the most fearful
catastrophe which has ever occurred on the face
of the earth. Will a similar cataclysm ever
take plrtce at any future time? Several very
powerful arguments tend to prove that it
may and will. The stupendous event was no
less than this. An explosive eruption of
inconceivable extent and violence shook the
whole frame of the earth, and she relieved
herself by shooting out into open space a
mass of matter in a state of fusion, in the
midst of which mass were carried away
portions of the solid crust of the globe. The
projected heap of fiery substance was naturally
arrested at the point where the sphere of the
earth's attraction ceases and that of the
sun's preponderance commences; it was then
carried away by the earth as she advanced in
her orbit, and became henceforth her satellite.
The volume of the material torn off by
this fearful explosion was equivalent to, and
is still equivalent to, the forty-ninth part of
the earth's whole mass. This fragment of the
globe was blown away from the part of the
world now covered by oceans. A deep abyss
was hollowed out; it tilled rapidly. The
waters under the heaven were gathered together
unto one place, and the dry land
appeared. The earth assumed somewhat of its
present aspect; it brought forth grass and
fruit-trees; and, above all, there rode in the
firmament the leaser light to rule the night.
All pre-existing animals must have been
smitten at once with death; they were
intombed in mud and mummified in
sandstone, leaving their place unoccupied and
clear for the new creation which was to follow
them.

Three facts of a different nature (geological,
hydrographical, and astronomical) are alleged
in evidence that the earth was once without
a moon. Geology proves that the majority
of the strata which intervene between the
primitive and the diluvian formations were
deposited at the bottom of perfectly tranquil
waters which almost entirely enveloped the
globe. But, if the seas accompanied the
earth in its rotatory and progressive motion
without being subject to the slightest
disturbance, the reason is, that the flux and
influx of the tides were still unknown; in
other words, the moon did not exist.

Again; the real bnsin of the ocean is far
from having the precise extent and configuration
which we behold when we walk along
its shores. In the neighbourhood of low lands,
the depth of the sea gradually increases up
to a certain distance, when you suddenly
come upon a precipitous submarine cliff,
which plunges perpendicularly, and the waters