Page:The evolution of worlds - Lowell.djvu/76

52 What the present densities of the planets enable us to infer of the cataclysm from which they came, a remarkable set of spectrograms taken not long ago by Dr. V. M. Slipher, at Flagstaff, seems to confirm.

The spectrograms in question were made possible by his production of a new kind of plate. His object was to obtain one which should combine sufficient speed with great photographic extension of the spectrum into the red. For it is in the red end that the absorption lines due to the planets' atmospheres chiefly lie. With the plates heretofore used it was impossible to go much beyond the yellow, the C line marking the Ultima Thule of attent. Not only was it advisable to get more particularity in the parts previously explored, but it was imperative to go beyond into parts as yet unknown. After several attempts he succeeded, the plates when exposed showing the spectra beyond even the A band. Of their wealth of depiction it is only necessary to say that in the spectrum of Neptune 130 lines and bands can easily be counted between the wave-lengths 4600μμ., 7600 μμ. Of these 31 belong to the planet, which compares with 6 found by Huggins, 10 by Vogel, and 9 by Keeler in the part of its spectrum they were able to obtain.

The result was a revelation. The plates exposed a host of lines never previously seen; lines that do not appear in the spectrum of the Sun, nor yet in the added