SPECIAL FEATURES OF MARS.
De L'Ester—Again we have the pleasure of greeting you and of observing your attempt to secure yourself from intrusion, and we urge upon you the imperative necessity of continuing this precaution. Now, assume a comfortable position. How close your eyes and endeavor to compose your too active mind by joining us in harmonizing prayer.
Eternal Infinite Intelligence! Eternal Infinite Energy, we, Thy children, desire to come into conscious relation with Thee. Unto Thee we offer our loving, reverent adoration, and Thou wilt guide us in all our ways. Amen, amen.
George, for a little while, we will move slowly, so that madame may more clearly observe the scene below us. To physical vision the Earth's surface would appear somewhat depressed, but to our spirit vision this illusion is not apparent. To mortals, at this altitude, the atmosphere would be too rarefied and too cold to be endurable, but, as you perceive, Spirits sufficiently evolved, are not subject to physical conditions. How deep is Earth's atmosphere? He who estimates the depth of the oxygenated portion of Earth's atmospheric envelope at ten English miles may safely add another half-mile, and the entire depth of Earth's atmosphere is so greatly in excess of what your scientists conceive it to be that on your account I a little hesitate to say that it runs into hundreds of miles, and through the activities of natural forces ever it is deepening. Yes, necessarily, all inhabited Planets possess oxygenated atmospheric envelopes, but you are not to confound atmosphere with ether, which fills all interstellar space, and is substance, but so refined as to be imperceptible to physical sense.
Upon all the planets of our solar system, our glowing, radiant Sun sheds its life-preserving beams. Its magnetic waves, pouring across space, quicken into activity latent energies, thus making progress in all directions not only possible, but inevitable. Mars, being many millions of miles further away from the Sun than is our Planet necessarily it receives less direct solar heat. On the other hand, Mars' atmosphere is such as to both receive and retain an amount of solar heat sufficient to render its climatic conditions very favorable for its various life expressions, and being much older, and hence, in proportion to its bulk, far more magnetic than Earth, its density, as compared with that of Earth, much less, its atmosphere rarer and lighter, it follows that to a limited degree its climatic conditions vary from those of Earth. Still, as you will have opportunity to observe, the temperature of its different zones is not greatly unlike that of the various corresponding zones of our own Planet.
Yes, the panorama now below us is a reminder of many similar views on various portions of our far distant World, which, to our vision, now appears as a rather diminutive, luminous sphere in immensity of space.
Certainly, madame, ask such questions as may occur to you, to which, as we slowly move onward, I shall to the utmost of my ability reply.
No, the depth and quality of a Planet's atmosphere does not altogether depend upon the age of the Planet. With both its quantity and its qualities other factors are concerned. Were not this true, Mars' atmosphere, relatively, would be deeper than that of Earth.
As a fact, the depth of Mars' oxygenated atmosphere is rather under half the depth of that of Earth. As to its qualities you already are informed. Yes, equability of temperature characterizes the various regions of Mars, only at the equator, and on either side for about seven hundred English miles, can the temperature be considered high, and even at the equator the heat is less torrid than in a corresponding latitude on our Planet. Disintegration and attrition have so worn away Mars' mountain ranges and other elevations that they offer slight diversions for its air currents. Through ethereal disturbances cyclonic storms occur, but at rare intervals. A noticeable peculiarity of Mars' atmosphere, which later will attract your observation, is its extreme humidity, which ancient Mars spirits have told me increases as the Planet ages. Even the polar regions are under the influence of this exceptionally humid condition, and there, during the year, snow falls nearly continuously. As spring approaches, at the north pole vast accumulations of ice and snow begin to melt, and as the season advances, immense volumes of water threaten to inundate portions of the Planet. Against such a calamity wise provision has been made, but of this presently you will become better informed.