FARE TO THE SUN

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 9, Issue 536, 1 June 1920, Page 2

FARE TO THE SUN

A mnn start'ng on a journey to the sun at the age of 20. and travelling (id miles nn hour, could not return to his terrestrial home until he had

reached thp age of ')7O yen rs, and at the usual railway rates his return ticket would cost a million pounds (said a Glasgow lecturer). What was railed a sun spot might hold 100 worlds like ours in size. A trip from the earth to the moon at a similar speed would he completed in five and a-half months. Venusi wis supposed to be in a condition resembling our earth ages ago, ami it n.ip.ht become suitable for habitation when the earth had declined to the m ion's present condition. Signalling to Mars which had been advocated, would require a flr.jr as large as Ireland in area. A jomn •> to \ T °ptii'ie. the farthest -known planet >f •fan' system, at express railway sliced, would occupy r,l(Hi years. Stellar distances were so stupendous that it would take a man

"00.000 years meiely to "ount tVe nuinber of urles in the distance of I lie nea'est slar. What was now seen in tic- vi.-iMe universe was nothing in what was unknown and unseen in ihe invisible universe. The man had not yet been born who could prescribe to this great s >c:ce of astroomy her boundaiies, or tell the perfection of knowledge yet in store for the inquiring curiosity of the human j race.