Science in Short Chapters — The Fuel of the Sun, Part II

My present business, however, is to show how these vortices and eruptions—this down-rush in one part of the solar atmosphere and up-rush in another—contribute to the permanent maintenance of the solar light and heat.

It must be understood that these outbursts are only visible to us as luminous prominences during the period of their explosive outburst, and while still subject to great expansive tension.

Long after they have ceased to be visible to us their expansion must continue, until they finally and fully mingle with the medium into which they are flung, and attain a corresponding degree of rarefaction.

This must occur at tens and hundreds of thousands of miles above the photosphere, according to the magnitude of the ejection.

The spectroscopic researches of Frankland and Lockyer having shown that the atmospheric pressure at about the outer surface of the photosphere does not far exceed that of our atmosphere, I may safely regard all the upper portion of these solar ejections as having left the solar atmosphere proper, and become commingled with the general interstellar medium.

If the sun were stationary, or merely rotating, in the midst of this universal atmosphere, the same material that is ejected to-day would in the course of time return, and be whirled into the great sun-spot eddies; but such is not the case; the sun is driving through the ether with a velocity of about 450,000 miles per twenty four hours.

What must be the consequence of this motion?

The sun will carry its own special atmospheric matter with it; but it cannot thus carry the whole of the interstellar medium.

There must be a limit, graduated no doubt, but still a practical limit, at which its own atmosphere will leave behind, or pass through, the general atmospheric matter.

There must be a heaping or condensation of this matter in the front, a rarefaction or wake in the rear, and a continuous bow of newly encountered atmosphere around the boundaries in the opposite direction to that of the sun’s motion.

The result of this must be that a great portion of the ejected atmospheric matter of the prominences will be swept permanently to the rear, and its place supplied by the material occupying the space into which the sun is advancing.

We are thus presented with a mighty machinery of solar respiration; some of this newly arriving atmospheric matter must be stirred into the vortices, its quantity being exactly equivalent to that of the old material expired by the explosive eruptions, and left in the rear.

Now, the new atmospheric matter which is thus encountered and inspired, is the recipient of the everlasting radiations whose destination is the subject of Mr. Grove’s inquiry; and these, when thus encountered and compressed, will of necessity evolve more or less of the heat which, through millions of millions of centuries they have been gradually absorbing; while, on the other hand, the expired or ejected matter of the gaseous eruptions will, like the artificially compressed air above referred to, have lost all the heat which during its solar existence it had by compression, dissociation, and re-combination contributed to the solar radiations.

Therefore, when again fully expanded, it will be cooler than the general medium from which it was originally inspired by the advancing sun.

The daily supply of fresh atmospheric fuel will be a cylinder of ether of the same diameter as the sun, and 450,000 miles in length!

I have calculated the weight of this cylinder of ether on the assumption (which of course is purely arbitrary) that the density of the interstellar medium is one ten-thousandth part of that of our atmosphere.

It amounts to 14,313,915,000,000,000,000 tons, affording a supply of 165 millions of millions of tons per second; or, if we assume the interstellar medium to have a density of only one-millionth of that of our atmosphere, the supply would be rather more than one and a half millions of millions of tons per second.

The proportion of this which is effective in the manner above stated is that which becomes stirred into the lower regions of the sun in exchange for the ejected matter of the prominences.

I will not here dwell upon the bombardment hypothesis, beyond observing that my explanation of solar phenomena supplies a continuous bombardment of the above-stated magnitude without adding anything to the magnitude of the sun.

So far, then, I answer Mr. Grove’s question, by showing that the heat radiated into space by each of the solid orbs that people its profundities, is received by the universal atmospheric medium; is gathered again by the breathing of wandering suns, who inspire as they advance the breath of universal heat and light and life; then by impact, compression, and radiation, they concentrate and re-distribute its vitalizing power; and after its work is done, expire it in the broad wake of their retreat, leaving a track of cool exhausted ether—the ash-pits of the solar furnaces—to reabsorb the general radiations, and thus maintain the eternal round of life.

But ere this, a great difficulty has probably presented itself to the mind of the reader.

He will refer to the calculations that have been made in order to determine the actual temperature of the solar surface and the intensity of its luminosity.

Both of these are vastly in excess of those obtained in our laboratory experiments by the combustion of the elements of water.

Even taking into consideration the dissociated carbonic acid whose elements should be burning in the photosphere with those of water, and adding to these the volatile metals of the solar nucleus whose dissociated vapors must, under the circumstances stated, be commingled with those of the solar atmosphere, and therefore contribute to the luminosity by their combustion, still by burning here on the earth a jet of such mixed gases and vapors we should not obtain any approach to either the luminosity or the temperature which is usually attributed to the sun.

I have made a very few simple experiments, the results of which remove these difficulties.

They were conducted with the assistance of Mr. Jonathan Wilkinson, the official gas examiner to the Sheffield Corporation, using his photometric and gas-measuring apparatus.

We first determined the amount of light radiated by a single fish-tail gas-burner consuming a measured quantity of gas per hour.

We found when another was placed behind this, so that all the light of the second had to pass through the first, that the light of the two (measured by the illuminating intensity of their radiations upon a screen just as the solar luminosity has been measured) was just double that of one flame, three flames (still presenting to the photometric screen only the surface of one) gave it three times the amount of illumination, and so on with any number of flames we were able to test.

Mr. Wilkinson has since arranged 100 flames on the same, principle, _i.

e. _, so that the 99 hinder flames shall all radiate through the one presented to the screen, thus affording the same surface as a single flame, but having 100 times its _thickness_ or _depth_, and he finds that the law indicated by our first experiments is fully verified; that the 100 flames thus arranged illuminate the screen 100 times as intensely as the single flame.

Other modifications of these experiments, described in Chapter vii.

of “The Fuel of the Sun,” establish the principle that a common hydrocarbon gas flame is transparent to its own radiations, or, in other words, that the amount of light radiated from such a flame, and its apparent intensity of luminosity, is proportionate to its thickness; therefore the luminosity of the sun may be produced by a photosphere having no greater intrinsic brilliancy than the flame of a tallow candle, provided the flame is of sufficient depth or thickness.

I see good reasons for inferring that its intrinsic brilliancy is less than that of a candle—somewhere between that and a Bunsen’s burner.

A similar series of experiments upon the radiation of the _heat_ of flames through each other, indicated similar results; but my apparatus for these experiments was not so delicate and reliable as in the experiments on light, and, therefore, I cannot so decidedly affirm the absolute diathermancy of flame to its own radiations.

Within the limits of error of these experiments, I found that with the same radiant surface presented to the thermometer, every addition to the thickness of the flame produced a proportionate increase of radiation.

This important law, though hitherto unnoticed by philosophers, is practically understood and acted upon by workmen who are engaged in furnace operations.

Present space will not permit me to illustrate this by examples, but in passing I may mention the “mill furnaces,” where armor-plates and other large masses of iron are raised to a welding temperature by radiant heat, and the ordinary puddling furnace, where iron is melted by radiant heat.

In both of these special arrangements are made to obtain a “body” or thickness of radiant flame, while _intensity_ of combustion is neglected and even carefully avoided.

According to this there are two factors engaged in producing the radiant effect from a given surface, _intensity_ and _quantity_, _i.

e. _, _brilliancy_ and _thickness_ in the case of light, and _temperature_ and _thickness_ in the case of heat.

In the Bude light, for example, consisting of concentric rings of coal-gas, we have small intensity with great quantity, in the lime-light we have a mere surface of great brilliancy but no thickness.

If I am right, the surface of the moon maybe brighter than the luminous surface of the sun, the peculiarities of moonlight depending upon intensity, those of sunlight upon quantity of light.

The flame that roars from the mouth of a Bessemer converter has but small intrinsic brilliancy, far less than that of an ordinary gas flame, as may be seen by observing the thin waifs that sometimes project beyond the body of the flame.

Nevertheless, its radiations are so effective that it is a painfully dazzling object even in the midst of sunny daylight; but then we have here not a hollow flame fed only by outside oxygen, but a solid body of flame several feet in thickness.

Even the pallid carbonic acid flame which accompanies the pouring of the spiegeleisen has marvellous illuminating power.

The reader will now be able to understand my explanation of the sun-spots, of their nucleus, umbra, and penumbra.

From what I have stated respecting the planetary disturbances or the solar rotation, the photosphere should present all the appearances due to the movements of a fiery ocean, raging and seething in the maddest conceivable fury of perpetual tempest.

If the surface of a river flowing peacefully between its banks is perforated with conical eddies whenever it meets with a projecting rock or obstacle, or other agency which disturbs the regularity of its course, what must be the magnitude of the eddies in this ocean of flame and heated gases, when stirred to the lowest depths of its vast profundity by the irregular reeling of the solar nucleus within?

Obviously, nothing less than the sunspots; those mighty maelströms into which a world might be dropped like a pea into an egg-cup.

When the photosphere or shell of combining gases is thus ripped open, the telescopic observer looks down the vortex, which, if deep enough, reveals to him the inner regions of dissociated gases and vapors.

But these have the opposite property to that which I have shown to belong to flame; they are opaque to their own special radiations, while the flame is transparent to the light of the inner portions of itself.

Thus, the dissociated interior of the solar envelope, though absolutely white-hot, will be comparatively dark (direct experiment has proved that the darkness of the spots is only relative).

The sides of the vortex funnel will consist of a mixture of dissociated gases, flaming gases, and combined gases, and will thus present various thicknesses of flame, and thereby display the various shades of the penumbra.

Space will not permit me here to follow up the details of this subject, as I have done in the original work, where it is shown that if the telescope had not yet been invented, all the telescopic details of spot phenomena might have been described _à priori_ as necessary consequences of the constitution I have above ascribed to the sun.

Not merely the great spot phenomena, but all the minor irregularities of the photosphere follow with similarly demonstrable necessity.

Thus the many interfering solar tides must throw up great waves, literally mountainous in their magnitude, the summits and ridges of which, being raised into higher regions of the absorbing vaporous atmosphere that envelopes the photosphere, will radiate more freely, its dissociated matter will combine more abundantly, and will thicken the photosphere immediately below; this thicker flame will be more luminous than the normal surface, and thus produce the phenomena of the _faculæ_.

Besides these great ground-swells of the flaming ocean of the photosphere, there must be lesser billows, and ripples upon these, and mountain tongues of flame all over the surface.

The crests of these waves, and the summits of these flame-alps, presenting to the terrestrial observer a greater depth of flaming matter, must be brighter than the hollows and valleys between; and their splendor must be further increased by the fact, that such upper ridges and summits are less deeply immersed in the outer ocean of absorbing vapors, which limits the radiation of the light as well as the heat of the photosphere.

The effect of looking upon the surface of such a wild fury of troubled flame, with its confused intermingling of gradations of luminosity, must be very puzzling and difficult to describe; and hence the “willow leaves,” “rice grains,” “mottling,” “granules,” “things,” “flocculi,” “bits of white thread,” “cumuli of cotton wool,” “excessively minute fragments of porcelain,” “untidy circular masses,” “ridges,” “waves,” “hill knolls,” etc. , etc. , to which the luminous irregularities have been compared.

At the time I wrote, the means of examination of the edge of the sun by the spectroscope was but newly discovered, and the results then published referred chiefly to the prominences proper.

Since that, a new term has been introduced to solar technology, the “sierra,” and the observations of the actual appearances of this sierra precisely correspond to my theoretical description of the limiting surface of the photosphere, which was written before I was acquainted with these observed facts.

This will be seen by reference to Chapter x. , the subject of which is, “The Varying Splendor of Different Portions of the Photosphere.

”[4] But I must not linger any further upon this part of the subject, but proceed to another, where subsequent discoveries have strongly confirmed my speculations.

The mean specific gravity of the sun is not quite 1½ times that of water.

The vapors of nickel, cobalt, copper, iron, chromium, manganese, titanium, zinc, cadmium, aluminium, magnesium, barium, strontium, calcium, and sodium, have been shown by the spectroscope to be floating on the outer regions of the sun.

None of these could constitute the body of the sun in a solid or liquid state, and be subjected to the enormous pressure which such a mass must exert upon itself without raising the mean specific gravity vastly above this; nor is there any other kind of matter with which we are acquainted which could exist within so large a mass in a liquid or solid state, and retain so low a density.

I must confess that my faith in the logical acumen of mathematicians has been rudely shaken by the manner in which eminent astronomers have described the umbra or nucleus of the sun-spots as the solid body of the sun seen through his luminous atmosphere, and the solid surface of Jupiter seen through his belts, and have discussed the habitability of Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune always on the assumption of their solidity, while the specific-gravity of all of these renders this surface solidity a demonstrable physical impossibility.

If the sun (or either of these planets) has a solid or liquid nucleus, it must be a mere kernel in the centre of a huge orb of gaseous matter, and though I have spoken rather definitely of the solar atmosphere in order to avoid complication, I must not, therefore, be understood to suppose that there exists in the sun any such definite boundary to the base of the atmospheric matter as we find here on the earth.

The temperature, the density, and all we know of the chemistry of the sun justify the conclusion that in its outer regions, to a considerable depth below the photosphere, there must be a commingling of the atmospheric matter with the vapors of the metals whose existence the spectroscope has revealed.

Some of these must be upheaved together with the dissociated elements of water.

They are all combustible, and, with a few exceptions, the products of their combustion would solidify after they were projected beyond the photosphere.

Much of the iron, nickel, cobalt, and copper might pass through the fiery ordeal of such projection, and solidify without oxidation, especially when more or less enveloped in uncombined hydrogen.

It is obvious that, under these circumstances, there must occur a series of precipitations analogous to those from the aqueous vapor of our atmosphere.

These gaseous metals, or their oxides, must be condensed as clouds, rain, snow, and hail, according to their boiling and metal points, and the conditions of their ejection.

We know that sudden and violent atmospheric disturbance, accompanied with fierce electrical discharges, especially favor the formation of hailstones in our terrestrial atmosphere.

All such violence must be displayed on a hugely exaggerated scale in the solar outbursts, and therefore the hailstone formation should preponderate, especially as the metallic vapors condense more rapidly than those of water on account of the much smaller amount of their specific heat, and of the latent heat of their vapors.

What will become of these volleys of solid matter thus ejected with the furious and protracted explosions forming the solar prominences?

In order to answer this question, we must remember that the spectroscope, as recently applied, merely displays the gaseous, chiefly the hydrogen, ejections; that these great gaseous flames bear a similar relation to the solid projectiles that the flash of a gun does to the grape-shot or cannon-ball.

Mr. Lockyer says: “In one instance I saw a prominence 27,000 miles high change enormously in the space of ten minutes; and, lately, I have seen prominences much higher born and die in an hour.

” He has recently measured an actual velocity of 120 miles per second in the movements of this _gaseous_ matter of the solar eruptions, the initial velocity of which must have been much greater.

[5] If such is the velocity of the gaseous ejections, what must be that of the solid projectiles, and where must they go?

A cosmical cannonade is a necessary result of the conditions I have sketched, and as prominence-ejections are continually in progress, there must be a continual outpouring from the sun of solid fragments, which must be flung far beyond the limits of the gaseous prominences.

As the luminosity of these glowing particles must be very small compared with that of the photosphere, they will be invisible in the glare of ordinary sunshine; but if our eyes be protected from this, they may then be rendered visible, both by their own glow and the solar light they are capable of reflecting.

They should be seen during a total eclipse, and should exhibit radiant streams proceeding irregularly from different parts of the sun, but most abundantly from the neighborhood of the spot regions.

As these spot regions occupy the intermediate latitudes between the poles and the equator of the sun, the greatest extensions of the outstreamings should be N. E.

and S. W.

, and S. E.

and N. W.

, while to the N. , S.

, E.

, and W. —that is, opposite the poles and equator of the sun—there should be a lesser extension.

The result of this must be an approximation to a quadrilateral figure, the diagonals of which should extend in a N. E.

and S. W.

, and a S. E.

and N.

W.

direction, or thereabouts.

I say “thereabouts,” because the zone of greatest activity is not exactly intermediate between the poles and the equator, but lies nearer to the solar equator.

Examined with the polariscope, these radiant streams should display a mixture of reflected light and self-luminosity.

Examined with the spectroscope, a faint continuous spectrum due to such luminosity of solid particles should be exhibited, with possibly a few lines due to the small amount of vapor which, in their glowing condition, they might still give off.

Besides this, there should appear the spectroscope indications of violent electrical discharges, which must occur as a necessary concomitant of the furious ejections of aqueous vapor and solid particles.

All these metallic hailstones must be highly charged, like the particles of vesicular vapor ejected from the hydro-electric machine, or the vapors and projectiles of a terrestrial volcanic eruption.