THE TECHNICAL WORLD MAGAZINE

VOL. XIII

JULY, 1910

NO. 5

IN THE YEAR OF THE COMET

S

By

BAILEY MILLARD

TAGGERING questions, not un-
like some of the posers with
which children stump their
elders, have been put to many

scientific men in relation to the supposed effect of Halley's comet upon our pleasant planet. Over and over again have the wise ones been asked, Was the comet responsible for the unprecedented atmospheric and seismic disturbances that brought so much woe to the human race during the first half of the present year? Is a man a superstitious fool to blame any of those cataclysmic upheavals, devastating inundations, terrible typhoons, frightful and unseasonable frosts and snows, or unprecedented heat, upon the comet? On this misty subject of cometary influence upon mundane affairs are the scientific any wiser than the unscientific?

I own that I have done my fair share of this questioning, and that I have been as free as anyone possibly could have been in putting these posers to astronomical and meteorological experts in various. parts of the country. The astronomers,

judging by their replies,
have been too busy
squinting into their tele-
scopes or computing the
mass of the comet, or
figuring out the chem-
ical constituents of its

tail, to have looked about them for evidences of the physical effect of the erratic visitor upon this planet. They have been millions of miles away in interstellar space, and have hardly considered it worth while to look down upon the good gray earth and see what has been happening there. Some of the star-gazers who have essayed to reply to my questions have either denied the logic of my premises or have evaded the points set forth. Even so liberal a speculator upon astronomical subjects as Dr. Edward S. Holden, formerly director of the great Lick Observatory in California, replied: "I have nothing to say for publication on the possible effect of comets upon our earth as to weather, etc."

I have found the meteorological authorities as little given to speculation upon this highly important subject as the astronomers. Willis L. Moore, Chief of the United States Weather Bureau, wrote to me from Washington in May: "I beg to state that this bureau has no observations that would support a view that there is any such influence."

The question that most bothers all scientific investigators in this connection is, May not the comet have exerted a great magnetic influence upon the earth and may

Copyright. 1910, by Technical World Company

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not that influence have been expressed in the abnormal meteor-
ological conditions which certainly existed? Here is a field
that few have explored and none fully, and yet nearly all the
scientists are willing to admit that in it lie immense possibilities.
On searching the literature of the subject it will be found
that few modern investigators have committed themselves to
the theory of cometary influence of any sort upon the physical
conditions of the earth or its atmosphere, and those who have
done so are generally regarded as empiricists. But on the
other hand I fail to find that any exhaustive or even fairly
studious attempts have been made by scientific men of high
rank in support of the hypothesis or against it.

If a layman who approaches the subject hat in hand, with
great diffidence and with all due deference to the opinions of
scientific investigators, may be permitted to make a suggestion,
it is that too little attention has been paid to this important
matter. For example, no one has taken the trouble to ascertain
by thorough examination and comparison of meteorological
records whether comets might have any relation to the weather
or whether they might be in any way responsible for seismic
disturbances. In referring to this subject, Prof. George Fred-
erick Chambers, the well-known English writer upon astro-
nomical phenomena, says, with an obvious sneer, that such an
investigation might afford profitable occupation for those who
are fond of "shooting the air."

Now I am not fond of shooting the air, but I will claim the same privilege as that enjoyed by the scientist speculating upon what I can lay hold of by way of physical fact. And my facts are not gathered from the misty realms of interstellar space, but from what has actually happened upon this solid and perfectly obvious planet. What study I have made of the records, though far from adequate, because the task is a tremendous one and should be undertaken by experts only, proves conclusively the fact that those years commonly known as "comet years" have invariably included seasons of phenomenal atmospheric disturbance and unseasonable weather. Abnormal heat and abnormal cold, abnormal drought and abnormal rainfall have been visited sporadically on the earth's surface during such years. There have also been great earthquakes, great wars and great disasters during those years. After making due allowance for the credulity of the superstitious in attributing these things directly to comets, may we who are not in the least superstitious be excused for attempting so to attribute them? With the testimony of the records at hand, it is not to be wondered at that the people of all ages have looked upon the approach of comets with dire misgivings and even with great dread.

We do not have to go away back to uncertain historical

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records to prove that
there have been phe-
nomenal meteorolog-
ical conditions in

comet years. Take
this present year 1910.
Has it not already in-
cluded enough scorch-
ing heat, of blighting
frost, seasonable and
unseasonable, and of
high winds, rains and
electric storms such as
rarely have been wit-
nessed during the past
three or four hundred
years, beyond which
time the records grow
dim? Before we pro-
ceed any further let
us look at these re-
cent conditions:

In the month of February, while the comet was faint in the sky, but driving to

ward this earth at the rate of fifteen thousand miles an hour,
a great rainfall along the headwaters of the Seine raised that
historic river to a mark unprecedented since the year 1658.
The mighty waters burst through the dikes, flooded the
Champs Elysees and transformed Paris into a greater Venice.
The gayety of the Parisians was dampened and chilled. Many
of them fled from the city in fear. To get to their Chamber
the Deputies had to go in boats. Never in the history of
France was there a flood that did so much damage to property.
The next phenomenal condition occurred in America, where
at many stations, all over the country, the highest temperature
for March ever recorded officially was reached, the thermome-
ter standing at 78 degrees in New York on three different days,
and at 85 in Washington. The unseasonable warmth caused
much illness along the Atlantic coast. In his report upon
these abnormal conditions, Prof. F. H. Bigelow of the United
States Weather Bureau says:

"For continued high temperature and deficient precipitation,
March, 1910, established new records over many districts of
the United States. Probably not within the recorded history
of the country has there been a month of the same name with

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