IS THE PLANET MARS INHABITED?
The opponents of the doctrine of the Plurality of Worlds allow that a greater probability exists of Mars being inhabited than in the case of any other planet. His diameter is 4100 miles; and his surface exhibits spots of different hues,—the seas, according to Sir John Herschel, being green, and the land red. “The variety in the spots,” says this astronomer, “may arise from the planet not being destitute of atmosphere and cloud; and what adds greatly to the probability of this, is the appearance of brilliant white spots at its poles, which have been conjectured, with some probability, to be snow, as they disappear when they have been long exposed to the sun, and are greatest when emerging from the long night of their polar winter, the snow-line then extending to about six degrees from the pole.” “The length of the day,” says Sir David Brewster, “is almost exactly twenty-four hours,—the same as that of the earth. Continents and oceans and green savannahs have been observed upon Mars, and the snow of his polar regions has been seen to disappear with the heat of summer.” We actually see the clouds floating in the atmosphere of Mars, and there is the appearance of land and water on his disc. In a sketch of this planet, as seen in the pure atmosphere of Calcutta by Mr. Grant, it appears, to use his words, “actually as a little world,” and as the earth would appear at a distance, with its seas and continents of different shades. As the diameter of Mars is only about one half that of our earth, the weight of bodies will be about one half what it would be if they were placed upon our globe.