THE EARTH AS SEEN FROM VENUS.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume LVIII, Issue 8945, 20 December 1907, Page 3

THE EARTH AS SEEN FROM VENUS.

It is au interesting speculation to consider how the earth would look viewed from a vantage poiut ou the

planet Venus. The distance of this plauet from the earth at certain times «i's not much moro than twenty-live •■pillion miles. With an ordinary teleWcope this would be reduced to about the distance of the moon, and with a magnifying power of 1000 diameters, it would be reduced to ouly .25,000 miles. At this apparent distauce the earth must be beautiful and imposing beyond description. Its whole round surface is visible. Its great globe rotating once in twenty - four hours, presents iv succession all its variegated features — continents, oceans, mountain ranges, vast forest districts, broad deserts, great lakes aud seas, like the Black Sea and the Caspian, aud, in addition to. this, the kaleidoscopic spectacle of the clouds! No doubt whatever cau remain in the minds of tiie astronomers of Vemis as to the habitability of the earth. Europe, Asia, Africa, the two Americas, Australia, the oceans, the polar regions—they must possess accurate maps of all these, aud oue can imagine the intensity of interest with which they study these features of our globe, and speculate about us and our probable character and doings. They can trace the whole course of our great storms crossing North America aud speeding over the ocean towards Europe. They can watch the clouds of a West Indian hurricane jA curving around the islands, skirting Florida and Carolina coasts, and following the bend of the Gulf Stream eastward into the Atlantic. They can see the typhoons of the China Sea; they caueven follow the smoke drifting from a great volcanic eruption like that of Krakatoa or of Mount Pelee.