Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 20.djvu/502

486 months ago. But the evidence is unimpeachable, and it is, indeed, wonderful to see how such information has been gained by merely looking at the ripples of the tide.

Everybody knows that the moon revolves now around the earth in a period of twenty-seven days. The period depends upon the distance between the earth and the moon. The time and the distance are connected together by one of Kepler's celebrated laws, so that, as the distance shortens, so must the time of revolution shorten. In earlier times the month must have been shorter than our present month. Some millions of years ago the moon completed its journey in a week instead of taking twenty-eight days as at present. Looking back earlier still, we find the month has dwindled down to a day, then down to a few hours, until, at that wondrous epoch when the moon was almost touching the earth, the moon spun round the earth once every three hours.

It would require the combined powers of a poet and a mathematician to portray the scene with becoming dignity. I have only promised to give you that glimpse along the Corridors of Time which I have myself been able to obtain. The scene is laid in the abyss of space; the time is more than 50,000,000 years ago; the dramatis personæ are the earth and the moon.

In those ancient times I see our earth to be a noble globe, as it is at present. Yet it is not partly covered with oceans and partly clothed with verdure. The primeval earth seems rather a fiery and half molten mass, where no organic life can dwell. Instead of the atmosphere which we now have I see a dense mass of vapors, in which perhaps all the oceans of the earth are suspended as clouds. I see that the sun still rises and sets to give the succession of day and of night, but the day and the night together only amount to three hours instead of twenty-four. Almost touching the chaotic mass of the earth is another much smaller and equally chaotic body. Around the earth I see this small body rapidly rotating. The two revolve together as if they were bound by invisible bands. This smaller body is the moon. Such is the picture which I wish to present to you as a glimpse through the Corridors of Time.

I have hitherto refrained from introducing any merely speculative matters. If we can believe anything of mathematics, anything of dynamics, we must admit that the picture I have attempted to outline is a faithful portrait. The only uncertain elements are the date and the periodic time. I do, however, now propose to venture on one speculation in which Mr. Darwin has indulged. I propose to offer a suggestion as to how a small body came into this most remarkable position close by the earth, and how its motion was produced.

We have hitherto been guided by the unerring light of dynamics, but at this momentous epoch dynamics deserts us, and we have only probability to guide our faltering steps. One hint, however,