and its ``canals'' are phenomena utterly unlike anything on
the earth. Yet it is precisely upon these divergences between the
earth and Mars, this repudiation of terrestrial standards, that the
theory of ``life on Mars,'' for which Mr Lowell is mainly responsible,
is based. Because Mars is smaller than the earth, we are told it must
necessarily be more advanced in planetary evolution, the underlying
cause of which is the gradual cooling and contraction of the planet's
mass. Mars has parted with its internal heat more rapidly than the
earth; consequently its waters and its atmosphere have been mostly
withdrawn by chemical combinations, but enough of both yet remain to
render life still possible on its surface. As the globe of Mars is
evolutionally older than that of the earth, so its forms of organic
life may be proportionally further advanced, and its inhabitants may
have attained a degree of cultivated intelligence much superior to
what at present exists upon the earth. Understanding the nature and
the causes of the desiccation of their planet, and possessing
engineering science and capabilities far in advance of ours, they may
be conceived to have grappled with the stupendous problem of keeping
their world in a habitable condition as long as possible. Supposing
them to have become accustomed to live in their rarefied atmosphere (a
thing not inconceivable, since men can live for a time at least in air
hardly less rare), the most pressing problem for them is that of a
water-supply, without which plant life cannot exist, while animal life
in turn depends for its existence upon vegetation.
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