tures. Given off from a molten surface, ascending, expanding, and cooling, these will presently reach a limit of elevation above which they can not exist as vapor, but must condense and precipitate. Meanwhile the upper stratum, habitually charged with its quantum of these denser matters, as our air with its quantum of water, and ready to deposit them on any depression of temperature, must be habitually unable to take up any more of the lower stratum; and therefore this lower stratum will remain quite distinct from it. We conclude, then, that there will be two concentric atmospheres having a definite limit of separation. And however problematical this structure may be thought, it is at any rate far less so than that gratuitously assumed in the current hypothesis, which involves five atmospheric strata. HURRICANES IN THE SUN. needs but a moderate knowledge of optics to see that there must result from this an appearance like that of a solar spot. When rays of light passing out of one medium into another, make with the limiting surface a tolerably large angle, some of them are reflected from it, and some of them, going through it, are refracted; but when they strike it at an acute angle, varying according to the medium, they are all reflected-no light at all passes through the surface. Now, against the highly inclined side of one of these funnel-shaped vortices, the light radiating from the body of the Sun underneath will strike at a very acute angle, and will not penetrate it; and therefore the central part of the cyclone will appear to us as a black spot. The change from entire reflection of the light, to partial reflection and partial transmission, taking place suddenly at a particular angle, this central black, spot will have a perfectly sharp outline. This inference, too, corresponds exactly with observation. The Now, Sir John Herschel has shown surface of the vortex being smooth in its that the disturbances which produce the interior, it follows that light will pass solar spots, are in sundry respects analo- through it more freely close to the central gous to the hurricanes of our own tropics. spot than elsewhere; and the fact is, that He has further shown that there must be the part of the penumbra immediately conflicting currents in the solar atmo- surrounding the central spot is brighter sphere which will produce them as they than the rest; while the outer part of the are produced here. And, adhering as he penumbra, answering to the agitated does to the favorite supposition of a margin of the vortex, is comparatively "photosphere," or light-generating enve- dark. "But," it may be said, "accordlope at a distance from the Sun's body, ing to this hypothesis one of these maculæ he argues that a spot results when the should be quite circular, whereas they are vortex of one of the hurricanes tempo- extremely irregular." Very true: and rarily disperses the "photosphere," and we may add that their irregularities are makes visible the dark surface of the Sun. of a kind totally inexplicable on the curAccepting the conclusion, for which rent hypothesis. Here, however, the exthere is very strong evidence, that hurri- planation is easy. These cyclones occurcanes or cyclones are the active causes of ring in the dense lower atmosphere, are the solar spots, but assuming that the seen by us through the rarer upper atsupposed "photosphere" is the actual mosphere, which is a distorting medium. incandescent body of the Sun, let us ask, It is necessarily full of currents of differwhat will be the optical appearance re-ent densities, and covered with waves; sulting from a cyclone? The conflict of and the refractions produced by these iraerial currents which occasions one of regularities of surface and substance must these enormous whirlwinds necessarily greatly complicate the appearances. Space generates a vortex; and on the upper surface of the atmosphere this vortex must show itself as a depression, shaped like a whirlpool in water. One of these cyclones, then, occurring in the dense aerial stratum which we have described as immediately surrounding the Sun's body, will produce a funnel-shaped vortex upon the surface of this dense stratum. It permitting, it might be shown that the mottled penumbra, its reëntrant angles, the bridges of light, the lateral repetitions of the spots, etc., are thus fully accounted for, as well as the faculæ and pores. But without going into details, we think we have shown that, assuming the Sun to have that constitution which the nebular hypothesis implies, and taking for granted monstration as indirect proof can do. nothing beyond the established principles that not only the absolute, but also the reof physics, we are supplied with an ex-lative temperatures of the sun and planets planation of the solar spots, which, to say are thus accounted for. When we conthe least of it, is quite as tenable as the template these various evidences in their one ordinarily given. totality-when we observe that, by the nebular hypothesis, all the leading phenoHad there been a few pages to spare, mena of the solar systen, and the heavens we should here have entered upon yet in general, are explicable; and when, on another class of facts of great significance; the other hand, we consider that the combut we must forbear. However, we think mon cosmogony is not only without a that, considered in their ensemble, the single fact to stand upon, but is at variseveral groups of evidences already as-ance with all our positive knowledge of signed are tolerably conclusive. We Nature; we see that the proof becomes have seen that, when critically examined, overwhelming-approaches as near dethe rash speculations of late years current respecting the nature of the nebulæ, commit their promulgators to sundry gross absurdities; while, on the other hand, we see that the various appearances these nebulæ present are clearly explicable as different stages in the precipitation and aggregation of diffused matter. We find that comets, alike by their physical constitution, their immensely elongated and variously-directed orbits, the distribution of those orbits, and their manifest structural relation to the solar system, bear testimony to the past existence of that system in a nebulous form. Not only do those obvious peculiarities in the motions of the planets which first suggested the nebular hypothesis supply proofs of it, but on closer examination we discover, in the slightly diverging inclinations of their orbits, in their various rates of rotation, and their differently-directed axes of rotation, that the planets yield us yet further testimony; while the satellites, by sundry traits, and especially by their occurrence in greater or less abundance where the hypothesis implies, confirm this testimony. By carefully tracing out the process of planetary condensation, we are led to conclusions respecting the internal structure of planets which at once explain their anomalous specific gravities, and at the same time reconcile various seemingly contradictory facts. Once more, it turns out that what is à priori inferable from the nebular hypothesis respecting the temperatures of the resulting bodies, is just what observation establishes; and It remains only to point out, that while the genesis of the solar system, and of countless other systems like it, is thus rendered comprehensible, the ultimate mystery continues as great as ever. The problem of existence is not solved; it is simply removed further back. The nebular hypothesis throws no light upon the origin of diffused matter; and diffused matter as much needs accounting for as concrete matter. The genesis of an atom is not easier to conceive than the genesis of a planet. Nay, indeed, so far from making the Universe less wonderful than before, it makes it more wonderful. Creation by manufacture is a much lower thing than creation by evolution. A man can put together a machine; but he can not make a machine devolop itself. The ingenious artisan, able as some have been, so far to imitate vitality as to produce a mechanical piano-forte-player, may in some sort conceive how, by greater skill, a complete man might be artificially produced; but he is totally unable to conceive how such a complex organism gradually arises out of a minute structureless germ. That our harmonious universe once existed potentially as formless diffused matter, and has slowly grown into its present organized state, is a far more astonishing fact than would have been its formation after the artificial method vulgarly supposed. The nebular hypothesis implies a First Cause as much transcending “the mechanical God of Paley," as this does the fetish of the savage. From Bentley's Miscellany. A LADY IN SPITZBERGEN.* Ir is not every day that a lady goes to Spitzbergen. A group of islands which extend to within ten degrees of the Pole, are the greater part of the year wrapped in darkness or fog, have only one day of four months, and a summer of a month or six weeks' duration, are not exactly the place for the less hardy sex. It will be necessary, then, to explain, in the words of Madam Léonie d'Aunet, how it was that she came to go to Spitzbergen: "A few friends were at my house. Among them was M. Gaimard, the celebrated traveler. M. Gaimard has been twice round the world, and has been engaged in I don't know how many expeditions to the Pole; on that day he was relating to us, in his characteristic southern and picturesque style, the shipwreck of the Uranie, and he took especial pleasure in dwelling in his narrative upon the evidences of coolness and courage manifested under the circumstances by Madam Freycinet, who accompanied her husband, the commander of the Uranie. "When he had finished, some one said: 'Poor woman, she must have suffered a great deal!' "You pity her?' I said; 'I-I envy her!' "M. Gaimard looked at me. "Are you speaking seriously, madam ?' "Very seriously. "Would you like to go round the world?' "That is my dream.' "And do more?' "I do not understand; I thought M. Gaimard was quizzing me. 66 6 'Yes, more,' he continued; 'many have been round the world, but no one has yet penetrated sufficiently into the Polar regions to determine if one can pass that way from Europe to America.' "Well, you know the way?' No, we are going to seek for it; I start three weeks hence, with a scientific commision, of which I am the president, to explore the Arctic Ocean in the neighborhood of Spitzber gen and Greenland.' "How lucky you are!' "I should be still more so if this expedition would tempt your husband, and if he would give to it the aid of his talent.' "I think such a proposition might be made to him.' And so it was that Madam Léonie d'Aunet made up her mind to go to Spitzbergen. The scientific expedition was to go by sea; she and her husband were to join it at Hammerfest. On her way there, her carriage, which was not a Norwegian one, was precipitated into the ravine of the Lougen. In this extremity a young Norwegian officer passed by in his cariole, wrapped up in his water-proof, and smoking a long pipe with amber mouth-piece, on his way to Drontheim. The servant the carriage being suspended by the pines ran up to inform him of the sad accident; half-way down the ravine, its inmates had with difficulty extricated themselves from their dangerous position. Madam d'Au 66 net had thus reached the top of the pre- The first of the ill-omened prophecies had already come to pass! "Spitzbergen is a country that lies farther to the north than the country of the Samoieds, than Siberia or Nova Zembla; it is an island veritably placed at the confines of the earth; it truth, known; for when I was in Denmark and is a strange place, of which very little is, in Sweden, several persons, hearing that I was going to Spitzberg, asked me if I really intended ascending to the summit. The word Spitzberg, which means pointed mountain, led them into error, and they were thus induced to imitate the monkey of La Fontaine, who mistook the name of a port for that of a man. "Little as it is known, Spitzbergen has a master; it belongs to the Emperor of Russia, who has not yet made use of it as a place of relief to Siberia. Such an act would, at all events, be one of mercy, as here the exile would be sure to perish the first winter. In November quicksilver freezes, brandy is broken with a hatchet, and from 45 to 50 degrees of cold may be noted." The greater island of Spitzbergen is in the form of the letter N, being penetrated by two deep gulfs, one to the north and another to the south. It has even been supposed that it really consists of two islands soldered together by a glacier, but the fact has never yet been ascertained. The bay of Magdalena is on the western side, confronting Greenland; it is surrounded on all sides by mountains of granite from fifteen to eighteen hundred feet high. Immense glaciers nearly fill up the spaces between the mountains, and they are said to have a convex form, whereas those of the Alps are said to be concave. The expedition sailed from Hammerfest on the 17th of July, and gained the open sea, after nearly carrying off the ship's bowsprit by missing stays when on too close a tack, and afterwards nearly smashing the pilot's boat. Our fair traveler excuses herself from saying much concerning the first portion of the journey, for she acknowledges that she found it à propos d'être très-malade. But on the fourth day she had so far recovered as to make her apearance on deck, when the corvette was making good way in a heavy sea, but with a favorable breeze. The next day they fetched Cherry Island, but which, she tells us, ought, from its original discoverers, to be called Beeren Eiland, or Bear Island. This island presented in the interior an almost continuous snowy mass, but its outskirts seemed like a place fortified by giants; its formidable rocks, incessantly mined by the waves, having as sumed monumental forms, advancing at At the epoch when the French expetimes in immense arches like antediluvian dition arrived at Magdalena Bay, the brief bridges into the ocean, their parapets en- summer of the Arctic regions had just comlivened by the presence of an infinite menced, and where our fair traveler exmultitude and variety of sea-fowl. A pected in nothing but gloom and silence, landing was effected, and the geologist there was, on the contrary, a very great discovered fossil corals, while the astrono- commotion, tumult, and noise. The ship mers determined its geographical position was surrounded by floating ice, whose vato be in 76 deg. 30 min. north longitude rious forms and hues she dilates upon instead of 74 deg. 30 min., as had been with a woman's prolixity. If we are to bebefore assumed! lieve her, there were "clochers, colonnes, minarets, ogives, pyramides, tourelles, coupoles, créneaux, volutes, arcades, frontons, assises colossales," and "sculptures délicates," all in ice-a glossary of architecture ready illustrated. The same evening a dense fog came on, and the weather became unfavorable; the sea was very heavy, and the snow accumulated on the decks so as to impede exercise. With some trifling exceptions, this same untoward weather continued for upwards of a fortnight, till at length, on the 30th, they fetched Prince Charles Island, and the next day entered into Magdalena Bay. "We had then arrived at the end of our long and adventurous voyage: at Spitzbergen! "The sea, bristling with sharp-pointed icebergs, was loudly agitated; the elevated peaks and fell into the gulf with a frightful noise; of the coast slipped away, detached themselves, mountains cracked and split open; waves beat furiously against the capes of granite; islands of ice broke up with reports which resembled the discharge of musketry; the wind raised up columns of snow with hoarse moanings; altogether it was terrible, yet magnificent; one fancies one's self listening to a choir from the abyss of the old world, preluding a new chaos." If the aspect of Magdalena Bay was not very inviting, that of the shore was not much more so. There was indeed no land visible at that time-nothing but snow, save where the beach was seawashed, and the scene there exhibited was not that which was most agreeable to a lady. "On all sides the soil was covered with the bones of walruses and seals, left there by Norwegian or Russian fishermen who used to come to manufacture oil in these remote regions, but for some years past they have ceased to do so, the profits not counterbalancing the perils of such an expedition. These great fish-bones, whitened by time and preserved by cold, seemed like the skeletons of giants, the inhabitants of the city which had just foundered close by. The long, fleshless fingers of the seals, so like those of the human hand, rendered the illusion striking, and caused feelings of terror. I left this charnel-house, and, making my way over the slippery soil with precaution, I went on towards the interior. I soon found myself in the midst of a kind of cemetery; this time it was really relics of humanity that lay upon the snow. Several coffins, half open and empty, had contained bodies which had been profaned by the teeth of bears. In the impossibility there was to dig graves, on account of the thickness of the ice, a number of enormous stones had been primitively piled upon the coffin-lids and around, so as to serve as a rampart against wild beasts; but the sturdy arms of the gros homme en pelisse-the fat man in a furred robeas Norwegian fishermen picturesquely designate the Polar bear, had displaced the stones and devastated the tombs; several bones were scattered about, half-broken and gnawed, sad relics of ursine repasts. I gathered them together with care, and piously replaced them in the coffins. Some of the tombs had been spared, and they contained skeletons in various degrees of preservation; most of the coffins bore no inscriptions. On one, however, a friendly hand had cut, with a knife, these words: Dortrecht, Hollande, 1783. A name had preceded the date, but it was no longer legible. Another sailor had come from Bremen; his death dated 1697. Two coffins placed in the hollow of a rock were in excellent keeping; the bodies which they inclosed had not only their flesh on, but even their clothes, but no inscription recorded either the name or the country of the dead. I counted fifty-two tombs disseminated in this cemetery, more frightful than any other, without epitaphs, without monuments, without flowers, without reminiscences, without tears, without regrets, without prayers; most desolate ceme tery, where it seems as if forgetfulness twice enshrouds the dead, where a sigh, or a voice, or even a footfall is never heard; most fearful solitude; deep, icy silence, only broken by the howl of the white bear or the roaring of the tempest! "I was seized with an inexpressible horror amidst these sepultures; the thought that I had come to take my place among them suddenly came upon me in fearful distinctness. I had been forewarned as to the dangers of our expedition; I had accepted, and thought that I understood its risks, yet did the sight of these tombs make me shudder, and for the first time I cast a thought of regret at France, my family, my friends, the fine sky, and the quiet, easy life which I had left, to confront the chances of such a dangerous pilgrimage! As to the poor dead men now around me, their history was the same for all. They were neither learned men who had been led thither by the love of discovery, nor curious men urged thither by the attraction of the unknown; they were honest Norwegian, Russian, or Dutch fishermen, who had come there to seek by hard toil, and amidst great dangers, a subsistence for their family. At first all might go on well; the walruses might be plentiful, the seals easy of capture; they were successfully hunted; oil was made on the coast itself; the great green ivory teeth of the walruses, so esteemed in Sweden, were shipped; they were talking of the value of their cargo, and of the profits and the pleasures of their anticipated return. And then suddenly an unexpected cold would come on; winter would seize upon them when least expected, the sea would become firm and motionless around their little ship, and the way to their country would be closed for nine, perhaps for ten, months; ten months in such a place is condemnation to death! They would be thus exposed to undergo fortyfive degrees of cold in the midst of a perpetual night! What tragedies have not these solitudes seen! What must have been the agonies they suffered? By what prodigies of courage and perseverance did man keep off from day to day that death which he yet knew to be inevitable? In what manner did he sustain that supreme struggle? At first they would keep to the ship, enconomizing provisions, warming themselves with bear's grease, fish-bones, oil, and every thing on board that could be destroyed without affecting the safety of the ship, for that was a sacred thing; man thinks of the future even under the most desperate circumstances, and no doubt each of these poor fishermen expected to sec accomplished in his person that rare miracle, a return from wintering in Spitzbergen. As the provisions became exhausted, privations would become also greater, and the Polar bear and blue fox, the only inhabitants of the islands, would be hunted with renewed zeal. Then one day, a terrible day, after the death of one of their number, after fearful sufferings, they would decide upon warming themselves with the ship; holes would be dug in the ice, a kind of hut constructed on shore, and they |