EARTH TREMORS.

Auckland Star, Volume LX, Issue 242, 12 October 1929, Page 16 (Supplement)

EARTH TREMORS.

MOVE IN CYCLES. TRENCH ASTRONOMER'S ASSERTION. FORESEES RENEWAL IN 1931. In a recent issue of "Le Petit Journal" the Abbe Th. Moreux, director of the Observatory of Bourges, discussed the always interesting question of earthquake periodicity, on which he is a recognised authority. He said:— . "It seems to be still the style in certain official quarters to deny periodicity in earthquakes. In fact, we register, one year and another, about 3000 shocks, but as far as intensity goes the years do not resemble one another. "As our technique improves we succeed_ in noting the slightest seismic manifestations, and as long as a savant studies the phenomena Avith a magnifying glass the broad laws which regulate them will very probably escape him. "Here is a fact anaiagous to what the astronomers observe. At present our instruments have attained such precision that we can detect the slightest perturbations in the march of the planets. These are far from following orbits absolutely elliptical, so that the general laws of celestial mechanics would be more difficult to outline now than when Kepler laid them down for the first time with the aid of rudimentary observations. "All the same, one would have an incredible lack of good sense not to notice in- certain years 'seismic phenomena of extraordinary amplitude. Passed Through Crisis in '23. "That we passed through such a crisis in 1923 cannot be doubted by those who read the newspapers regularly. I announced that crisis, after November 23, 1922, in these, columns and also in my review—'Revue du Ciel'—in the following January issue. It was, moreover, not my first venture of this sort, since my first previsions date from 1902. "If I insist on this point it is not at all to grant myself the title of prophet. There are enough Nostradamuses. My idea goes further. In the thirty years in which I have studied the sun I have asserted '- " 7 1 quarters of the world that all our climatology depends on the sun. My campaign caused smiles at first, and at the beginning they called me, maliciously, the 'almoner of the sun/ But now the matter is so far advanced that it is a question as to who is entitled to the honour of having discovered that the sun's spots engender all calamities. "In fact, those who have followed my work know very well that the sun spots are only one single manifestation of the general activity of the great star.

"And I claim that this activity not only exercises an influence on our exterior meteorology—rains, seasons, temperatures—but also on what I call endogenous meteorology—that which goes on under our feet. "By what mechanism? It matters little, for I mistrust scientific theories like a pest and I always remember those words of Henri Poincaire: 'See,' he used to say , , *by hypotheses in science—that is the asset which we lack least.' "In a general way, I have been able to show that the earth troubles increase when solar activity increases and then brusquely diminishes. "It is thus that, forecasting the curb of solar activity, I wrote on October 1, 1927: 'Earthquakes are going to diminish the world over during 1928. The years 1929 and .1930 will be a little more agitated, and 1931 will see a new beginninjp Of a period of calm until 1934-35.' of Shocks in 1931. "On February 18, 1929, I wrote in an article in 'The Daily Mail': 'We must wait till 1931 for a renewal of earthquakes.' "If you follow in your newspaper dispatches from different points of. the globe, or even of Europe, you.can note that my prediction is being realised to the' letter. The seismologists continue to register shocks. At the end of the year they will be delighted, to observe that the average is about the same, but their, instruments, will be unable to reveal to them the, number of, victims or the amount of damage caused."