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FILIPINO STUDIES
Filipino Studies
Palimpsests of Nation and Diaspora

Edited by Martin F. Manalansan IV

and Augusto F. Espiritu
NEW YORK UNIVERSITY PRESS
New York
www.nyupress.org
© 2016 by New York University
All rights reserved
References to Internet websites (URLs) were accurate at the time of writing.
Neither the author nor New York University Press is responsible for URLs that may
have expired or changed since the manuscript was prepared.
ISBN: 978-1-4798-2905-7 (hardback)
ISBN: 978-1-4798-8435-3 (paperback)
For Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication data, please contact the Library
of Congress.
New York University Press books are printed on acid-free paper, and their binding
materials are chosen for strength and durability. We strive to use environmentally
responsible suppliers and materials to the greatest extent possible in publishing
our books.
Manufactured in the United States of America
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Also available as an ebook
CONTENTS

Acknowledgments
The Field: Dialogues, Visions, Tensions, and Aspirations
Martin F. Manalansan IV and Augusto F. Espiritu
PART I. WHERE FROM? WHERE TO? FILIPINO STUDIES: FIELDS AND AGENDAS
1. Challenges for Cultural Studies under the Rule of Global War
Neferti Tadiar
2. Toward a Critical Filipino Studies Approach to Philippine
Migration
Robyn Magalit Rodriguez
3. Oriental Enlightenment and the Colonial World: A Derivative
Discourse?
John D. Blanco
PART II. COLONIAL LAYERINGS, IMPERIAL CROSSINGS
4. Collaboration, Co-prosperity, and “Complete Independence”:
Across the Pacific (1942), across Philippine Palimpsests
Victor Bascara
5. A Wondrous World of Small Places: Childhood Education, US
Colonial Biopolitics, and the Global Filipino
Kimberly Alidio
6. Ilustrado Transnationalism: Cross-Colonial Fields and Filipino
Elites at the Turn of the Twentieth Century
Julian Go
7. “Not Classifiable as Orientals or Caucasians or Negroes”: Filipino
Racial Ontology and the Stalking Presence of the “Insane
 Filipino Soldier”
Dylan Rodriguez
PART III. NATIONALIST INSCRIPTIONS: BLURRINGS AND ERASURES
8. Transnationalizing the History of the Chinese in the Philippines
during the American Colonial Period: The Case of the Chinese
Exclusion Act
Richard T. Chu
9. Redressive Nationalisms, Queer Victimhood, and Japanese
Duress
Robert Diaz
10. Decolonizing Manila-Men and St. Maló, Louisiana: A Queer
Postcolonial Asian American Critique
Kale Bantigue Fajardo
PART IV. THE FILIPINO BODY IN TIME AND SPACE
11. Pinoy Posteriority
Martin Joseph Ponce
12. The Case of Felicidad Ocampo: A Palimpsest of Transpacific
Feminism
Denise Cruz
13. Hair Lines: Filipino American Art and the Uses of Abstraction
Sarita Echavez See
14. Eartha Kitt’s “Waray Waray”: The Filipina in Black Feminist
Performance Imaginary
Lucy Burns
PART V. PHILIPPINE CULTURES AT LARGE: HOMING IN ON GLOBAL FILIPINOS
AND THEIR DISCONTENTS
15. Diasporic and Liminal Subjectivities in the Age of Empire:
“Beyond Biculturalism” in the Case of the Two Ongs
Francisco Benitez
16. The Legacy of Undesirability: Filipino TNTs, “Irregular Migrants,”
and “Outlaws” in the US Cultural Imaginary
 Anna Romina Guevarra
17. “Home” and The Filipino Channel: Stabilizing Economic Security,
Migration Patterns, and Diaspora through New Technologies
Emily Noelle Ignacio
18. “Come Back Home Soon”: The Pleasures and Agonies of
“Homeland” Visits
Rick Bonus
About the Contributors
Index
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

This anthology began as a conference, “Philippine Palimpsests:

Filipino Studies in the 21st Century,” held on March 7–8, 2008, at the
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. The conference and this
anthology were fueled by the enthusiasm and support of many
individuals and institutions. To be clear, this collection is not a record
of the conference proceedings; instead it is composed of mostly
original essays that were written after the event. Initial seed money
was provided by the Department of Asian American Studies. The
conference’s main funding came from the Office of the Provost,
Center for Advanced Study, the CIC Big Ten Consortium in Asian
American Studies, and the State of the Art Conference grant from
the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences. Additional funding came
from the Asian American Cultural Center, the Center for East Asian
and Pacific Studies, the Center on Democracy in a Multiracial Society,
the Department of Gender and Women’s Studies, the Department of
Human and Community Development, International Students and
Scholars Services, the Illinois Program for Research in the
Humanities, and the Unit for Criticism and Interpretive Theory. This
anthology was made possible by research assistantship funding and
a publication subvention grant from the Research Board.
The Department of Asian American Studies at the UIUC was the
home for this project, and the faculty and staff have been pivotal in
helping shepherding it along. The editors acknowledge the
generosity of Kent Ono and Lisa Nakamura for their unequivocal
support. We especially thank Nancy Abelmann, Lisa Cacho, Jose B.
Capino, and David Coyoca for being part of the steering committee.
Former graduate students who are now colleagues, Aide Acosta,
Genevieve Clutario, and Stanley Thangaraj, offered their valuable
ideas, voices, and energies to the conference. We would like to
thank the departmental staff (both former and current), Mary
Ellerbe, Viveka Kudaligama, Christine Lykes, and Pia Sengsavanh for
their hard work. Special thanks go to Constancio Arnaldo, who was
the research assistant and the virtual backbone of this project. He
kept the project moving and prevented major pitfalls. Anna Gonzales
was the instigator of this project—she strongly suggested that the
energies and ideas around the conference be harnessed into a book.
The editors acknowledge the contributions of the fine scholars
and intellectual leaders from all over the United States (including
colleagues from our own campus) who graced our home in the
Midwest with their presence during the conference weekend,
including Deidre Agbayani, Kimberly Alidio, Nerissa Balce, Rick
Baldoz, Francisco Benitez, John D. Blanco, Rick Bonus, Lucy Burns,
Richard Chu, Denise Cruz, Robert Diaz, Kale Fajardo, Anna Guevarra,
Emily Ignacio, Julian Go, Theodore Gonzalves, Allan Isaac, Moon-kie
Jung, Soo Ah Kwon, Linda Maram, Dina Maramba, Cynthia
Marasigan, Joyce Mariano, Victor Mendoza, Mimi Nguyen, Jan
Padios, Joanna Poblete, Martin Joseph Ponce, Dylan Rodriguez,
Robyn Rodriguez, Jeffrey Santa Ana, Sarita See, Neferti Tadiar,
Antonio Tiongson, and Benito Vergara. The conference was buoyed
by the wonderful words and generous intellectual presence of our
keynote speaker, Professor Reynaldo Ileto. Professor Ileto is the
exemplary model of a Filipino scholar who the younger generation of
scholars at the conference aspire to become.
At NYU Press, gratitude is extended to Eric Zinner for believing in
the project and Alicia Nadkarni for guiding it. Vincenz Serrano
graciously gave permission to reprint Neferti Tadiar’s essay in Kritika
Kultura. Finally, here and elsewhere, we acknowledge the inspiration
from the works of several Filipino and Filipino American scholars
such as Eufracio Abaya, Patricio Abinales, Ponciano Bennagen, Oscar
Campomanes, Randolph David, Gary Devilles, Carol Hau, John
Labella, Ferdinand Lopez, Francisco Nemenzo, Vicente Rafael, Laura
Samson, Michael Tan, and many others in the transnational network
of Filipino scholars.
Augusto F. Espiritu: I thank Anna K. Gonzalez and Rafa, for helping
sustain and encourage me always. Last, but not least, I thank my
colleague, friend, and partner in this enterprise, Martin Manalansan,
whose vision, leadership, tremendous hard work, and devotion to
the scholarship of the Filipino diaspora and Filipino American studies,
American Studies, and Asian American Studies has been unstinting,
generous, and deeply moving. It has been a tremendous pleasure to
work with Martin through all the vicissitudes of this project, from its
inception in 2005 to the arrival of this book a decade later.

Martin F Manalansan IV: I extend my heartfelt gratitude to Augusto

Espiritu, my partner in crime, for helping me weather the ebbs and
flows of this project. Special thanks also go to the contributors for
their patience with a rather protracted process. I also want to
express my warm regards to all members of the “Filipino mafia”
(including but not limited to the Filipino caucus at the Association for
Asian American Studies), a wide-ranging web of friendships and
intellectual partnerships. Finally, I want to express my love to my
family, dispersed across thousands of miles like the typical family of
modern-day Philippines. My late father has been unable to see any
of my published work. As I get older, I realize that I bear the imprint
of his generous personality and gentle nature. I am forever grateful
and truly blessed.
The Field
Dialogues, Visions, Tensions, and Aspirations
MARTIN F. MANALANSAN IV AND AUGUSTO F. ESPIRITU

Filipino Studies: Palimpsests of Nation and Diaspora is a collection of

chapters that offers both critical commentaries on the state of
Philippine Studies as well as innovative works that offer novel
frameworks and alternative vantages for the study of the Philippines
and its diaspora. Written by a group of Philippine-, US-, and Canada-
based Filipino and Filipino American scholars, the chapters are also
critically aware of the positionalities, constraints, and opportunities
that make this work possible. After years of occupying a vexed and
ambivalent position in area studies and Asian American Studies,
Philippine, Filipino, and Filipino American Studies have emerged in
the past fifteen years as a trenchant and vibrant academic presence.
Proof of this ascendancy is a long list of notable works that have
become widely read not only in North America and Europe but also
in the Philippines where many of these works have been republished
by local university and private presses. The circulation of ideas in the
field has been transnational, though sometimes fraught and
problematic, as is reflective of the kinds of work presented in this
volume.
This anthology is the outcome of a series of conversations, shared
wishes, and fervent longings for an intellectual forum for the ideas of
several US-based Filipino, Filipino American and Filipino Canadian
scholars.
 Many contributors to this collection incidentally come from the Big
Ten or the group of land-grant universities mostly in the American
Midwest that hosted a wave of Filipino scholars in the early
twentieth century called pensionados. These pensionados were sent
by the American colonial government to study in US universities and
eventually assisted in the integration of the Philippines into American
imperial rule as part of its tutelary project. Ironically, they would also
become crucial to the rise of Filipino cultural nationalism and the
prelude to Philippine independence. The papers in this volume
struggle to engage and assess the legacies of imperial power and its
ideas, and redirect the trajectories of American empire by creating a
set of critical optics to frame ongoing intellectual engagements with
the exigencies of colonialism and postcolonialism, as well as the
contemporary challenges of transnationalism, globalization, and
diaspora.
Propelled by a pivotal semantic inspiration from the word
“palimpsest,” the chapters in this collection attempt to uncover the
mercurial “layerings” or shifting stratigraphy of power that obscure
or erase and at the same resurrect specific historical, cultural, and
political experiences. Like the palimpsest, these chapters are not
isolated reflections but rather emerge alongside, parallel to, against,
and despite other writings, thoughts, and ideas in other sites and
spaces. In her magisterial ethnography of Bicolano rural poor,
Fenella Cannell (1999) deployed the idea of the palimpsest to think
about subaltern practices that are part of structured and structuring
relationships between rural Bicolanos and more powerful “others,”
such as rich urban Filipinos, the Christian God, or America.
Therefore, under the sign of the palimpsest, this collection is a
moment in a continuing power struggle that forms a series of
stratigraphic shifts, movements of layers, of inscriptions, erasures,
and reinscriptions or overwritings. Whether addressing Filipino
coloniality, the contested memories of World War II, the “voyage” of
Filipino men and women into the US metropole, or the state of
migrant labor, the chapters assembled in Filipino Studies build over
old ones, never fully obliterating previous ideas, scratching away
obfuscating strata, and deciphering the links between the past and
present with a hopeful longing for various kinds of futures.

Time, History, Layers

To understand the rich variety of essays produced under in this
collection requires a historical contextualization albeit in very broad
and abbreviated strokes. Laying down such a context is admittedly a
difficult task given that each of the chapters seeks the revision of
that very history. It is easy enough to recount modern Philippine
history, if one means its history after the arrival of colonialism. For
four centuries, the archipelago was a Spanish colony, a Catholic
country, and a military outpost of Spain in the Far East. The
Philippine colonial economy was bound to the trans-Pacific Manila-
Acapulco galleon trade, administered by the Viceroyalty of New
Spain (Mexico) for two centuries, until the Latin American
independence movements ended the connection. In the mid to late
nineteenth century, as part of a reorganized and liberalized Spanish
empire, the Philippine economy developed and an economically
prosperous middle class made up of Spanish, Chinese mestizo, and
indio background emerged to challenge Spanish hegemony. The
children of this class studied in Spain, and their wider horizons
provided the basis for the emergence of Filipino nationalism and the
decolonization movement that culminated in the country’s first
declaration of independence on June 12, 1898, and the founding of
the Philippine Republic.
Philippine independence was short-lived, however, as the United
States invaded the country and made it a US colony through the
Spanish-American and Philippine-American Wars. The United States,
in the throes of its own Age of Progressivism, that is, of full-scale
movements of social and political reform, established a public
education system in which English became the official language, a
civil service system, a US-style system of political representation, in
addition to improvements in public health, transportation, and
communication. During the Commonwealth phase (1935–46), a
women’s suffrage law was passed and a ten-year timetable for
independence was established. At the same time, it cannot be
doubted that US colonial rule left a problematic legacy, creating
economic dependency, instilling colonial patronage politics, and
establishing racial hierarchies, as for instance, expanding the
Chinese Exclusion Laws to the Philippines. As before, Filipino elite
political leaders as much as the Filipino masses were extremely
engaged in independence agitation from the United States. Then
followed four years of Japanese occupation under the “East Asia Co-
Prosperity Sphere.” A Second Philippine Republic under Japan’s
protection was proclaimed. Despite the American departure, Filipinos
launched a guerrilla war against the Japanese, especially in response
to various atrocities committed by the Japanese military. One of
these was the forced enslavement of Filipino “comfort” women for
sex and recreation, which only came to be known several decades
later. After World War II, and American reoccupation, the Philippines
was granted independence, though with so many strings attached to
the United States as to make it a virtual neocolony.
The Philippine Republic has properly been a postcolonial nation
for close to seventy years, its existence punctuated by economic
prosperity alternating with economic crises, widespread poverty,
political corruption, and indebtedness. It has experienced a serious
peasant rebellion, nearly two decades of authoritarian rule, a long-
standing communist insurgency, and an even longer protracted
struggle with its Muslim minority. In the process, the Philippines has
developed strong traditions of dissent, mass mobilization, and a
national media unifying an extremely diverse population.
Globalization has, on the surface, helped lead to economic growth in
the twenty-first century, although the most powerful super storm in
all history, Typhoon Haiyan, has slowed down that progress.
Migration has always been a crucial element in the making of the
Philippines and of the Filipino overseas communities. In the Spanish
colonial period, this involved internal migrations that led to the
population of “frontier” areas in the Philippines, transoceanic
crossings to Mexico through the galleon trade, which led to
Discovering Diverse Content Through
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which Carl promptly paid her with interest.
Proceeding again, they moved swiftly northward over the level plain.
Here and there they came upon an isolated group of palm trees and
small bushes, partly burned up by the hot rays of the desert sun.
Otherwise, there was nothing but sand before them and a clear
cloudless sky overhead. But the sand and the heat mattered not to
the lovers, as riding side by side, they paved the road of their future
with bricks of shining gold!
At last it was time for them to turn back. Sana knew of a shorter
route home and suggested that they take it.
 Enjoying the freedom of the great desert, they paved
the road of their future with bricks of shining gold.

They trotted along for several hours, when Carl saw a dwelling in the
distance. As they drew nearer they heard strains of music and Sana
suggested going in and asking for refreshments.
At the gate a Berber woman asked them what they wanted. Sana
told her, whereupon she led them into a dimly lighted room. They
found places on the floor, apart from a group that sat near a small
platform, at the side of which lounged a fierce looking fellow, playing
a strange musical instrument.
Wine and cakes being served, they paused to watch a dancer who
had stepped on the platform. The dancer, a girl of hardly sixteen,
was very scantily clad and her dance consisted mainly of twistings of
the body, accompanied with meaningful flashes of the eyes. At first
she seemed rather timid, but at the shout “Cintani, put some life in
it,” she distorted her body until there was no doubt as to the
meaning of the emotions she was endeavoring to express—much to
the delight of the Arabs in the room.
The one whose command she had so eagerly obeyed was, as Sana
whispered to Carl, Amshied, a Berber chieftain, and the three husky
females at his side were known to be his consorts.
After the dancer had gone, the musician placed a snake on the
platform. He then commenced to charm it with the whistling of a
fife, to which the snake responded readily, much to the surprise of
Carl, who, not believing it would be noticed in the darkness, took
Sana’s hand and pressing it to his lips, said, “That is more than a
man can do to a woman.”
His act, however, was noticed by Amshied, who turning to his
women said, in a low voice, “Watch that pair. One of them is a
woman. If I am right, I know who she is and who wants her. At any
rate they shall not leave. I’ll take care of the woman, and you three
can share the man.”
Saying this, he arose from the floor and went into another room,
where he knew de Rochelle was waiting. Motioning de Rochelle to
the door, he nodded at Sana, asking, “Is that the one you spoke of
this morning?”
“Yes. Can you manage to secure her?”
“Have I not managed many things? It shall be done. But first the
gold.”
De Rochelle paid him his price and sat down to wait, believing that
at last Sana was in his hands. Little knew he, however, of the plans
lurking in Amshied’s skull.
When Amshied returned to his place, he spoke a few curt words to
the women, who now stepped to the platform and performed
amazing feats of strength, revealing the while their muscular limbs
and bodies.
Sana was astounded and turned to Carl, saying, “They are regular
amazons—desert amazons.”
This exhibition finished, Carl looked at his watch and seeing that it
was quite late, helped Sana up from the floor and prepared to leave.
Seeing this, Amshied stepped forward, as if to escort them to the
door.
Stepping on a small carpet, Sana and Carl felt the floor beneath
them give way. Carl made a vain effort to throw Sana to safety, but
failed when Amshied gave him a shove that sent man and woman
headlong into the pit beneath. Their fall was broken by a heap of
rugs beneath the trap, so that neither suffered any physical harm.
The room in which they found themselves was in total darkness.
Besides, it was filled with a suffocating smoke that crept into their
lungs, burning and stifling them. In vain they sought means of
escape, falling at last insensible to the ground.
Some minutes later, or so it seemed to him, Carl, who, although he
had recovered his senses was unable to move, owing to the effects
of the drugged smoke he had inhaled, saw a small door open,
through which entered Amshied and the three women. The chieftain
tossed Sana, who was still unconscious, over his shoulder, as if she
were a mere bundle of rugs and carried her off, whither Carl knew
not.
As for himself, he was left to the mercies of the three amazons.
Chatting gaily among themselves, in a language unknown to Carl,
they carried him upstairs to a small room. Here they threw him upon
a rough couch like bed, fastening his legs and arms with shackles
attached to the four legs.
Helpless, he lay there, thinking of what would happen to his
beloved. What fate was in store for her? Desperately he struggled to
free himself from his chains, but it was useless. He was as helpless
as a pig trussed for the butcher’s knife.
To his disgust, his own position was brought clearly home to him,
when the three women commenced pawing over his body, in the
same way as one would examine an animal on the auction block.
Resist he could not; he was forced to submit to their intimate
inspection, which, he thanked his stars, did not last long. Satisfied as
to his physical make-up, the women suddenly assumed various
poses about his couch, vying with each other for Carl’s attention.
Carl, however, rolled his head from side to side, closing his eyes to
convey to them as clearly as he could his desire to have nothing to
do with them.
Determined they were, however, to show their charms to their
captive. One by one they came over to his corner, each trying harder
than the other to arouse in him some indication of desire. Carl
managed to keep his eyes tightly closed for a time, but his thoughts
were too bewildered, his mind too much filled with Sana, to allow
him to do so long. Opening his eyes, he saw one of the women still
moving around before him. With a rage caused by disgust, Carl gave
vent to a string of oaths. These had the desired effect. Perhaps the
woman did not understand their meaning, but the meaning of his
voice was clear. At any rate she decided not to make him any angrier
and left through a small side door and bolted it.
He lay gazing around the room as best he could. Did that drapery in
the far corner move? He watched closely. Yes, it was moving. What
now? It was pushed aside, and through a small opening crept a
figure. A woman, he perceived, but who? Coming into the light he
recognized the dancer whom the Berber had called Cintani. Was he
to go through another ordeal of the kind he had just been subjected
to?
Maddened by his helplessness, he was about to scream out a curse,
when the girl whispered, in poor French, “Keep quiet—I will help
you.”
Tip-toe she crept towards him. To his relief, Carl saw that she had
other intentions than to charm him. From her girdle he saw her take
a key. With quick fingers the shackles were unlocked and Carl set
up, free!
He could but look his thanks—he had no time for words, for again,
with cautioning finger the slave-girl whispered, “The girl—the one
you came with, come!”
Taking Carl’s arms she led him across the room, stopping before a
great rug, suspended curtain-wise from the ceiling.
“In there,” she whispered, and was gone.
Carefully Carl moved the rug aside. It concealed a heavy wooden
door. And on the other side!
Peering through a small hole in the door Carl saw Sana lying on a
heap of cushions, while Amshied, back to Carl, knelt beside her,
caressing and fondling her. Sana was still happily insensible to her
predicament.
With an effort, Carl suppressed a cry. He felt for his revolver. He
recalled, then, that the women had taken it away from him. He
looked about the room. Not a thing that would serve as a weapon
was to be had.
He tried the door. To his relief it was unlocked. Slowly he slid it open.
A low growl, coming from somewhere at his side made him jump
back in alarm. No, there was nothing in the room with him. Again a
growl, accompanied with the sniffing of an animal. Desperate, Carl
pulled the rug aside. To his horror he saw an iron-barred door,
behind which, stretched full length on the floor, lay a huge Nubian
lion—the black lion of the deserts—the king of the lion tribe. Should
the lion roar or spring at the door, Carl realized with a flash, all was
lost. Amshied would be aroused from his sensual desires, and all
hope of rescue would disappear. To his amazement, the lion merely
yawned and blinked his eyes. Often had he seen just such a scared
human at the other side of his door. No need of hurrying, no need of
wasting breath. Sooner or later the feast would be his!
The two doors were connected at the top by an iron rod, so fixed
that when either door was slid open the other opened also. Carl saw
at a glance that he could slide the one door and get into the other
room before the lion had time to get out, for as soon as he was
through he could close the door against the lion. But, he reasoned,
suppose the lion did manage to squeeze through while he was
getting into the other room. Then if there was no other available exit
out of the other room, things would be worse than before. He would
be trapped.
What could he do? Once more his gaze roamed about the room. His
eyes rested on the couch. Yes, that might answer. His fears for Sana
gave him speed. It was but the work of a moment to get that couch
and prop it upright against the door of the den. Fortunately for Carl
the workmanship of the door was none too good. Near the floor the
masonry had fallen away, exposing the bars of the framework.
Unmindful of the sniffing lion, Carl forced the chains nearest the
door through the bars, secured the chains and brought them
through to his side of the cage. The suddenness of his movements
took the lion unawares, and it made no move at Carl, but drew
slightly back in fright. The locks were snapped and Carl stood up to
contemplate his work. It might do? But he had his doubts. What
would happen when he opened the door to get at Amshied?
As he pondered for a moment, a cry came to his ears. Sana had
awakened from her stupor to find the grinning face of Amshied close
to hers.
With a smothered cry, Carl slid the door aside sufficiently to squeeze
through and sprang into the room.
The lust-ridden Berber had partly torn Sana’s clothing from her, and
was forcing his attentions upon her. The girl, horrified with fear, tried
to free herself from his grip.
But a whirlwind was upon him. He had no time to get to his feet nor
make any attempt to defend himself. With a fierce lunge Carl literally
threw himself upon Amshied, forcing him to the floor.
Although taken by surprise as he was, Amshied was no weakling.
Carl soon found this out when with a violent twist of his body
Amshied rolled over and clutched at Carl’s throat. With a trick
learned at school Carl broke the hold, but Amshied was endowed
with brute strength and he seized Carl around the body with both
arms. Together they rolled across the floor, bringing up with a thud
against the door.
They lay in deathlike embrace for a moment, panting from their
exertions. Carl realized that Amshied was more than his match so far
as mere strength was concerned. To overcome his antagonist he
would have to resort to trickery. Heaving a deep sigh, as if utterly
exhausted and unable to continue, he let his body relax. To his
delight, Amshied was fooled completely. Believing Carl to be done
for, he released his hold for a moment. Brief though this respite was,
it was sufficient for Carl. Feeling the arms loosen ever so slightly, he
suddenly twisted around, and with a quick movement of his knees
had lifted Amshied, throwing him heavily on his side. At the same
time Carl pinned his opponent with a neck lock, and rolling him over,
placed his knee in the small of Amshied’s back and pressed.
The Berber struggled fiercely to free himself from the
 encircling arm that was slowly choking him to death.

Amshied struggled fiercely to free himself from the encircling arm

that was slowly choking him to death. His efforts, however, were
useless. Carl hung on with a desperate strength.
Slowly the other weakened, his breathing became more and more
strained under the pressure on his throat and back. At last his body
relaxed. Apparently he was unconscious. But Carl took no chances.
Still retaining his grip, he rose to his feet. Then with a mighty heave
he threw the senseless man to the further end of the small room,
where he fell in a huddled heap to the floor. Carl noted, then, that
Amshied’s head was grotesquely twisted to one side. He would
bother them no more!

Carl rushed to Sana, who had watched the struggle with bated
breath. He sought to take her in his arms to carry her to freedom.
But freedom was not to be theirs so soon. The three amazons were
upon them. With wild shrieks they attacked Carl, who, not caring
whether they were women or not, let them have the full force of his
blows. Sana was at his side, with scratching nails and kicking feet.
Another, too, came to their aid. Cintani coming through the door,
saw the struggle and with eager fists did her best to help.
The amazons soon had enough of fighting and with wild cries ran
from the room, followed by Carl, Sana in his arms. His thoughts,
now, were only to get away from that devilish place. Cintani, running
at his side, grasped his arm and led him through a door out into the
open. Smoke was pouring from the house. Someone had set it afire.
Their horses were still tied to a palm, nearby. Sana asked to be set
down, and doing so, Carl did not notice the half-naked savage who
crept up behind him, felling him senseless to the ground with a blow
of a club.
Before Sana or the slave-girl could make any attempt to escape the
savage, now joined by three others, was upon them. Struggle as
they would they were helpless in the hands of these men. Sana had
often heard stories of the cavemen who were said to live in the hills
of the desert. Could it be possible that these four savages were
such? Nothing seemed to fit them better than that name.
If they were men they surely did not look the part. They resembled
monkeys more than anything else. Squat, long armed and covered
with hair, they looked like giant denizens of a tropical forest. Their
protruding jaws displayed tusk-like teeth, while their receding
foreheads ran back to red wool-like hair that covered their heads,
shoulders and upper back.
Uttering growls, that sounded as unhuman as they looked, the larger
of the four men, evidently the leader, took Sana up in his arms and
started off. One of the others threw Cintani across his shoulders as if
she were but an animal that had fallen victim to the chase.
Like a gift from heaven, unconsciousness came to Sana.
Carl, lying unconscious for several hours, came to in the early hours
of the morning. Under the bright gleam of the desert stars he saw
nothing but a heap of ashes and charred timbers—the remains of
Amshied’s dwelling.
His head still reeling from the blow he had received, he crawled to
his feet and looked around for some sight of his beloved one. With a
shock, he discovered in the ruins, several charred skeletons, totally
beyond point of recognition. Carefully he studied them, going from
one to the other in an attempt to find something by which to identify
them.
Bewildered he stood up, kicking the ashes aside with the toe of his
boot. Good God, what was that? Sana’s necklace! He stooped to
examine his find. Yes, it was the necklace Sana had worn that
morning when she started out on the ride with him. He was positive
it was the same, for he had examined it closely then, commenting
upon its uniqueness. Was this then the end of Sana—the end of life
itself? Among those charred bones, he believed, lay all that was
earthly of the woman he loved!
Heart heavy with anguish, his body trembling as with the ague, he
knelt in prayer. The words came slowly—it was years since he had
prayed—but in his heart he knew what he wanted to say.
With shaking hands he scooped a shallow grave in the sand, and in
it placed the remains of the bodies. He must be sure that Sana’s
body found a grave. The tears streamed from his eyes as he
carefully filled that last resting-place. The heaviest timbers he could
find he laid across the grave, lest some prowling beast of the night
should disturb the bodies. Above the little mound he fashioned a
rude cross, from two smaller pieces of charred timber, and with a
pencil he printed a marker on a piece of paper and pinned it to the
cross.
Unmindful of the terrific heat of the desert sun which beat down
upon him, he stumbled on, in a direction he believed would take him
to the city. Luck was with him. Late that afternoon he reached
Sana’s home, wild-eyed and fever-tortured.
Sana’s mother saw at a glance that some terrible accident had
happened. But Carl’s parched lips craved water, and putting her fears
aside for the moment she wet his lips, bathed his dust-covered face
and let him drink.
Then he spoke. Slowly he told the story. The old mother seemed to
age before his eyes, as she moaned, “Sana, my child. Did I not warn
you?” between her tears, as she sat rocking to and fro on the floor.
The minutes grew into hours and the two still sat there in silence—a
silence broken only by the moans of the mother and a frequent sob
or sigh from the man.
At last Carl roused himself from his lethargy. The desert fever had
spent itself—his mind was once more clear, but his heart was heavy
laden.
“What should he do? Whither was he going?” ran through his mind
as he stood up from his chair.
As if reading this thought, the gypsy spoke, “You have your work to
do. It was willed that this should happen. It is also written that you
must do your duty. Your caravan leaves tomorrow. Join it and peace
be with you.”
“Yes, that is best. I could not stay here now.”
He bade her a sad farewell and going to his hotel finished his
preparations for the journey. This over with, he threw himself, fully
clad, upon the bed to while away those long dreadful hours before
the dawn.
Sana returned to consciousness to find that the cavemen had
camped for the night in a valley formed by the sand dunes. To her
great relief, they did not bother about her or Cintani, but sat apart
from them chattering in guttural tones, later to lie down to sleep.
Early next morning, the girls were again picked up and the savages
set out with them for their home in the hills. The very thought of
being clutched so tightly in the arms of the beast-like man, who held
her close to him robbed her of all consciousness and she knew
nothing of her travels until she came to with a start, lying on the
ground with bound feet, surrounded by a strange group of men,
women and children, in front of a large cave. The women and
children, like the men, of whom Sana saw five, wore little or no
clothing.
Physically, the women were better proportioned than the men, but
they too looked more like animals than human beings. The women,
however, had taken some pains to appear attractive to their men.
One had a green feather stuck in her hair, while another had chosen
a bunch of twigs for a headdress. All of them wore a chain of shells
around their necks.
She and Cintani were subjected to close inspection on the part of
the women, accompanied by guttural growls from the men, who
would shove the women aside, now and then, with sweeping blows
of the arm.
The curiosity of the band satisfied, the leader, who had evidently
chosen Sana for his own, picked her up and carried her into the
cave. This was quite large, one side of the floor being strewn with
the skins of wild animals. On these Sana was thrown. The savage
walked away, but returned and sat down at her side.
With leering eyes he contemplated her figure, growling in a fearful
manner. Sana could not understand his words, but shivered as she
realized the meaning of his gestures. He reached over to untie her
feet, but the touch of his rough hands on her limbs made her
desperate. Summoning her strength, she kicked him in the side.
With what might have been a chuckle, he rose to his feet and
walked to the other end of the cave. Returning with a club he shook
it at the girl and threw it down at her side. Fearing an attack, Sana,
covering her face with her hands, shrieked pitifully.
The caveman, however, made no attempt to touch her, but after
looking at her for a time, turned and left the cave.
Greatly relieved, Sana drew herself up to a sitting position and
looked around the cave. In the gloom she could see little, but she
noticed that on the walls behind her were drawings of animals, while
here and there were bows and arrows lying among the skins on the
floor.
A sound came to her ears, and looking in the direction from which it
came, she could distinguish in the gloom of the cavern, a young
woman tending a new-born babe.
The mother paid no attention to Sana, nor was she disturbed the
rest of the day.
With nightfall, however, the whole band entered the cave, bringing
Cintani with them. Cintani was thrown to the floor at Sana’s side,
while the others, men, women and children, lay down in huddled
heaps to sleep.
Sana’s first words to Cintani were, “Where did those brutes come
from?”
“About a week ago Amshied and his gang, who luckily were away,
when you were there, returned with them. What he wanted to do
with them, I do not know, but he kept them locked up in a room. I
believe he was afraid of them himself. They must have escaped in
the fire.”
“But what will become of us?”
“I believe I have a way. I had no love for Amshied. I was sold to him
as a slave. One day I stole a vial of poison, intending to kill myself.
My courage failed me, but ever since that day I have carried it with
me. I have it now. If I ever get the chance I shall poison them.”
“If you only could. But how could we get away from here? We would
never find our way.”
“But our horses are here. I saw them. They brought them along
too.”
Overjoyed with these words, Sana started to say something, but was
interrupted by the arrival of one of the men, who taking Cintani in
his arms, carried her to the darkness of the other side of the cave.
Shutting her eyes, Sana put her hands over her ears to keep out any
sound. Suddenly she was aware of someone at her side. Horrified,
she felt a pair of hands steal over her. Looking, she saw her captor
lying at her side. Without a word he reached down and released her
feet. Again those hands upon her! With a cry she rolled over on her
face, fearful of her fate. Much to her surprise the savage, after a few
attempts to fondle her, retied her feet and hitting her some glancing
blows, he shuffled off into the darkness.
Exhausted though she was, Sana lay awake the entire night. Fear
kept her from sleeping, fear of what might happen.
At daybreak the savages left the cave, taking Cintani with them.
Sana they did not bother about, although one of the men stopped to
stare at her on his way out.
Try as she would she could not keep awake any longer. Sleep came,
dreamless sleep!
Someone was shaking her gently. Rousing herself, Sana looked up.
Cintani was bending over her, smiling happily.
“We are safe now, dear. The poison has done its work.”
Sana, comforted, yet surprised, “How did you do it?”
Tears welled in the girl’s eyes as she brokenly whispered, “After what
happened last night I supposed the women considered me one of
them. They made me help with the food. That gave me my chance.”
Sana wanted to take the weeping girl in her arms, but Cintani would
not let her.
“There is no time to be lost,” she urged, “Come, let us get out of
this. I have food and water.”
Once out of the cave, Sana saw that Cintani was right. The cave
people were lying on the ground, apparently asleep, but theirs was
an eternal slumber.
With delighted eyes, Sana saw the two horses. Quickly the girls
mounted and rode off in the clear moonlight. Sana gave her horse
his head, knowing that his instinct would tell him the way.
All that night their swift mounts put the miles under their feet. The
desert stars, which had guided Sana, had disappeared and the sun,
coming up from behind the dunes, saw the two girls riding wildly
homeward, till night fell, then they rested for a few hours. Early in
the morning they started out again.
Suddenly Sana’s horse shied at something lying on the ground. A
man was lying in the sand, face upward, writhing in the fever of
thirst. Dismounting, Sana saw at a glance it was de Rochelle. He
pleaded for help. At first she was tempted to ride on and leave him
to his fate. But a kindlier thought prompted her to reach for her
canteen which still hung intact at the saddle.
After administering a little water to the suffering man, she and
Cintani managed to lift him across her horse and again they
resumed their way.
Late in the afternoon the following day they came upon the remains
of the Berber’s house.
Their swift mounts put the miles under feet, when they
came across a man lying in the sand, writhing in the
 fever of thirst.

Sana dismounted, looking about for some trace of Carl, whom she
had seen felled with the blow of the caveman’s club. No sign of him
was to be seen, but she presently became aware of a figure kneeling
before a cross of charred timbers.
She saw it was a woman, and walking quickly towards her gave
voice to the cry, “Mother!”
At the sound the woman took her hands from her face, and rising to
her feet, shrieked, “Sana, my Sana!”
Mother and daughter embraced each other, tears in their eyes,
murmuring words of endearment.
Sana, at last, eager for news of Carl, asked her mother whether she
had seen or heard of him. In response the mother pointed to the
cross—to which was pinned a note. Sana, stricken with fear that Carl
was beneath the ruins, rushed to the cross, and taking the paper in
her hand, read:
HERE LIES MY BELOVED
SANA VON SECKT
REST IN PEACE
CARL
“Then he is alive?” turning to her mother with eager eyes.
“Yes, beloved, he is alive. He is now on the great desert. He thought
you dead and came to tell me. Then he went away.”
De Rochelle, still weak and exhausted, had gotten from the horse,
and came over to Sana.
“Sana, I did not believe you would ever do me the kindness you did.
Please forgive me for what I have done. It was I who set fire to this
place. I realized that harm might come to you through Amshied, so I
set fire to the house, thinking I could help you in that way. I saw the
savages take you away, and tried to follow, but fell exhausted.
Please, forgive me, Sana, won’t you?”
Without a word Sana turned away. Plead he might, but her
forgiveness he would never have. The water she gave him on the
desert, she felt, repaid him well enough—had she refused it, he
would now have been claimed by the sun and the sand as their own.
And in her woman’s mind she knew that he had more to do with the
escapade at the home of Amshied than he cared to tell.
Safe at home that night she wrote Carl at his New York address,
telling him that she was alive.
 CHAPTER IX
ON CAMEL’S BACK THROUGH THE
SAHARA
MEANWHILE at sunrise on the day of his departure, Carl had gone to
the market place to join the caravan. Among the crowd that
gathered there, at the very time the caravan set out, he found
Sana’s mother, who had come to bid him goodbye.
From one of the tourists he learned that the caravan would lead over
Tandini and Tenduf to Mogador in Morocco. This, he recalled, was
the route followed by the crusaders of Islam, when they wandered
through the desert lands, to preach Mohammedism with fire and
sword.
The caravan itself consisted of some twenty-five racing camels, the
true ships of the desert, capable of making from sixty to eighty miles
a day. Besides these there were four freight camels, each loaded
with about four hundred pounds of food and water, the latter being
especially important, as for days they would not pass any wells.
Carl had noted with a smile that the tourists as well as the guides
were dressed in Berber outfits; wide skirts and the gaily striped
burnus, with its big collar. He saw, too, that there were several
French officers in uniform in the party.
Like himself, everyone in the party was well armed. The guides, as
well as some of the tourists, were provided with bandoliers of
cartridges and carried rifles, while he noticed several of the others,
not so visibly equipped, adjust cartridge belts and holsters. Taking
the hint, he saw to it that his own automatic was fully loaded and his
spare clips readily accessible.
Such precautions were necessary, of course, to enable them to
repulse the attacks of any wild animals that, through pangs of
hunger, might become daring enough to attack the travelers. To be
dreaded, too, were the attacks of the bandits roving the sand hills.
The chieftains of the larger bandit tribes had already received the
regular tribute from the famous sheik Tan Jajidani, who in turn
would be doubly paid by the wealthy merchant who furnished the
camel and ran the show. While these would be satisfied to let the
caravan in peace, there might be others not so inclined.
At last, with a great hullabaloo, the caravan was under way.
At first Carl experienced much discomfort, but he found that by
relaxing and allowing his body to sway with the jogging steps of the
camel, it wasn’t as bad as he had expected.
Far ahead of the caravan rode two guides, whose duty it was to lead
the way, and at the same time keep a sharp watch for unfriendly
visitors.
Long before the main body of travelers would reach a village or
camp, the inhabitants would swarm out to meet them, offering fruit
or drink for sale, while at friendly camps water was offered to
everyone. To refuse to drink was considered an unfriendly act, and
the guides cautioned all to be sure to partake of the hospitality.
Otherwise the journey that day was uneventful. There was nothing,
outside of a few tiny camps or villages, to greet the eye but sand,
desert sand.
Tents were pitched that night under the desert stars. The campfire
gave forth a grateful warmth, for the night air was bitter cold. Carl
was sorry that he was not outfitted with a woolen burnus, but
knowing he would have to be up at daybreak, was soon comfortable
between his blankets.
With the first rays of the sun peeping over the horizon, the caravan
broke camp. Carl was amazed at the speed with which the camels
were saddled or loaded, the tents folded away, and the caravan
gotten on its way, accompanied by the singing of the guides and the
jingle of the lead-camel’s bells.
Thinking of Sana, he recalled of the manuscript he had taken with
him.
He would have the whole day to himself, with nothing to do, so he
took it from his pocket to read. The manuscript, written in a careful
hand, was entitled, “The Conception of Our Universe.”

Two hundred years before Christ, the great mathematician

Archimedes said, “Give me a fulcrum and I will move the earth!”
Our earth is a huge ball, about eight thousand miles in diameter and
it weighs some six hundred trillion or sextillion tons. (To remember
this place twenty-one ciphers after the six—
6,000,000,000,000,000,000,000.) It is composed of rock, sand and
water. Seventy-three per cent., or about three-quarters, of the earth
is water—the balance, twenty-seven per cent., or about one-quarter,
is solid matter, that is, rock or sand.
The entire surface of the earth measures nearly two hundred million
square miles and in contents the earth is about two hundred and
sixty billion cubic miles.
The earth is covered with a thin envelope of air and clouds which
travels with the earth. If such was not the case, a balloon rising in
Europe could stay up three hours, and without moving from its
position, land in North America. Furthermore, if the air blanket did
not travel with the earth, it is probable that the earth would burn up,
since the friction between the earth’s surface and the air would
develop great heat, a heat in which nothing could live.
The earth traveling in a magnetic field like that of a huge dynamo,
speeds around its own imaginary axis, which lies at an angle of 23½
degrees, once in twenty-four hours. This is at a speed, when one
stands at the Equator, say in North Africa, of more than a thousand
miles per hour, whereas a few feet from the poles, the speed is not
more than nineteen feet in twenty-four hours.
As it whirls around itself, the earth rushes through space in orbital
motion, in an easterly direction around the sun, at a velocity of
eighteen and a half miles per second, or six hundred and sixty-six
thousand miles per hour, a speed that is about fifty times as great as
that of the swiftest cannon ball. We earth people are entirely
unconscious of this motion, since it is perfectly steady and without a
jar.
Once in a year, that is in a little more than three hundred and sixty-
five days, we travel around the sun, but remain away from that
planet at a distance of about ninety-two million miles.
As we look upward at the sky at night we see, in all directions, the
countless stars. Most pronounced among them and looking much the
same, though of a different nature, are the planets and once in a
while a comet. A few faintly shining clouds are seen—the Milky Way
and Nebulae.
The most striking, and yet the most insignificant of them all is the
moon.
During that period known as “day” to us the sun alone is visible,
flooding the air with its light and thereby hiding all other heavenly
bodies from the vision of the unaided eye—a few of them being
visible through a telescope.
These heavenly bodies, for the most part, are globes like the earth.
They whirl on their axes and move swiftly through space. They are
classified as the solar system, made up of the sun, the planets which
move round the sun and the satellites, which, in turn, attend the
planets in their motion around the sun. Thus the moon attends the
earth when the earth travels around the sun.
The sun, ninety-two million miles away from the earth, is a hot self-
luminous globe, with a diameter of eight hundred and sixty-six
thousand five hundred miles, or one hundred nine and one-half
times that of the earth. The temperature at the sun surface has
been calculated to range between ten and fifteen thousand degrees
Fahrenheit—a heat we cannot conceive.
Unlike the earth and the other planets, the sun, the center of our
universe, is stationary; but it rotates on its own axis, inclined at
seven and one-quarter degrees, once in twenty-seven and a half
days. This motion has been established by observing the sun spots.
These sun spots vary in size from five hundred to fifty thousand
miles in diameter and a group of such spots was found to be one
hundred and fifty thousand miles across. They are short-lived
phenomena, sometimes remaining only a few days but frequently a
month or two. They appear in their greatest magnitude at periods of
eleven years and are the cause of extreme drought on earth, with its
resultant destruction of crops and vegetation, and consequent
famines.
While until recently it was believed that the sun spots were eruptions
on the sun, some astronomers now claim that, as the sun spots are
cooler than the sun, they indicate the downpour of meteoric showers
thrown by Jupiter and Saturn into the sun, thereby increasing the
heat radiating from the sun.
The sun spots manifest themselves in world-wide heat waves,
earthquakes, tidal waves, cloud bursts, floods, waterspouts,
hailstorms and hurricanes in many widely separated parts of the
earth. History has never seen the equal of the destruction caused by
the last phenomena. A glance at a few of the recent disasters and
natural phenomena shows the following:
The volcanoes Villarion, Liaima and Lanin spouted flames more than
a thousand feet from their craters, while the activities of other
volcanoes killed thousands of people. Six new craters opened in
Mount Isalco, Salvador; the volcano Kilauea in Hawaii spouted
mountains of lava, which darkened the sky and earthquakes shook
many parts of the earth. During the last three thousand years
thirteen million people have met their deaths by volcano and
earthquake.
Cyclones, hailstorms and floods wiped out many towns in various
parts of the world; in Pueblo alone they caused damage aggregating
more than ten million dollars. Many lives were lost in waterspouts,
which destroyed part of Tangier, Morocco, and in the Maia-Doura
province in Spain.
Heat caused the glaciers of the Alps to melt and move at an
alarming speed, while lakes in Switzerland dried up, exposing their
bottoms and showing foundations of the homes of the lake-dwellers
living there thousands of years ago.
While the sun is the nearest of the stars, the moon is the nearest of
the heavenly bodies. It is about two hundred and forty thousand
miles from the earth and has a diameter of about twenty-two
hundred miles, or about one-quarter that of the earth. The moon,
accompanying the earth in its movement around the sun, rotates on
its axis once in twenty-nine and a half days and moves in a small
orbit, once in twenty-seven and a third days, around the earth at a
speed of nearly twenty-three hundred miles per hour. The moon
shines merely by reflected light from the sun, whose light is six
hundred thousand times brighter than that of the moon. The moon
has a temperature of two hundred degrees below zero, Fahrenheit.
The surface of the moon structure, for the most part, is extremely
broken. There are hills or mountains, but the surface is pitted all
over with great “craters,” ranging from fifty to one hundred miles in
diameter; there being a few with a diameter of more than one
thousand miles. A counterpart of this is hardly to be found on our
earth, yet it is believed that the moon was once part of this earth,
becoming separated from the parent body by the tremendous
centrifugal force of the earth; as it is likewise assumed that Jupiter
will in time throw off its “great red spot” thus forming a new moon
of Jupiter.
It is believed that the planet Mars, which has two moons, is
inhabited and that it has great irrigation canals, which engineers say
are far superior to any irrigation system on earth. During the last
sun spot period wireless signals were supposed to have been
received from Mars.
From time to time, bodies very different from the stars and planets
appear in the heavens, remaining visible for some weeks or months
and then vanish in the distance. These are the comets. The larger
ones are magnificent objects, sometimes as bright as Venus and
visible by day, with a head as large as the moon and having a train
or tail extending behind it from the horizon to the zenith and which
is in reality long enough to reach from the earth to the sun.
Such comets, however, are rare, and in ancient and medieval times
comets were always regarded with terror—as an evil omen—and at
times the people believed that they foretold the end of the world,
causing veritable panics, like the “comet scare” of France in 1832. As
a rule these comets reappear at intervals, such as do Halley’s, Euke’s
and Donati’s comets. They travel at a tremendous speed, coming at
times quite close to the earth. Quite often they cross the path of the
earth, causing fear that a collision might take place. There are a few
isolated cases of comets colliding with the earth and killing a few
people. Some of the comets have been lost, that is we do not know
what became of them. Such a lost wanderer of the skies is Biela’s
comet; a comet of some forty thousand miles diameter. In its
appearances, every sixth and sixteenth year, its course would come
within a few thousand miles of the earth’s orbit.
Besides the luminous clouds we see in the heavens and which,
under the telescope are shown to be but great groups of separate
stars, there are others which no telescopic power has as yet been
able to disclose individually. These are known as nebulae and are of
varying shape and form and very beautiful in appearance.
Once in a while the earth passes through such a nebulae. Some
years ago the Heidelberg Observatory reported that the earth was
passing through some such nebulae, which report was confirmed by
various other observatories. In that case there was no noticeable
effect on human life, but it is believed by astronomers that some of
these nebulae are composed of strong poisonous gases and that if
ever the earth passes through such a nebulae all life on this planet
will be destroyed.
Occasionally bodies fall upon the earth out of the sky. These are the
meteors. They are not noticeable until they come within our air
zone, when the friction between them and the air causes them to
become red hot, often being entirely consumed by the heat before
reaching the earth itself. They travel through the air zone at a speed
ranging from ten to forty miles per second, accompanied by a heavy
continuous roar, emphasized now and then by violent detonations.
These meteors are solid bodies; containing a large percentage of
iron and copper and single pieces have been found to weigh as
much as seventy-five thousand pounds.
It is believed that these meteors are fragments which, ages ago,
were shot out from now extinct volcanoes, with so great a velocity
that they were thrown out beyond the attraction of the earth, and so
becoming individual planets or heavenly bodies for the time being.
Such being the case, they have traveled in independent orbits, until
they at last encountered the earth at a point where her orbit crosses
theirs. It may also be possible that these meteors were thrown from
the planets or the stars, and as meteoric showers occur at intervals
of thirty-three to thirty-four years, it is often believed that they are
connected with comets and that therefore the comets, too, must be
solid bodies like our earth. The number of meteors falling upon the
earth adds continuously to the earth’s mass at a rate of about forty
thousand tons per year.
Our earth is older than five hundred million years, according to Prof.
Morean of Bourges Observatory, France, who holds that for half of
that time, two hundred and fifty million years, some form of life has
existed on its surface. Man, however, can boast of only some ten
thousand years of ancestry in direct lines. In other words, in the life
of this little globe he is, even in his most primitive form, a very
recent arrival.
The earth was once a hot gaseous mass like the sun. Gradually the
surface cooled, condensation took place forming the lakes and seas
and after a great period of time vegetation appeared.
Water, entering the bowels of the earth, through cracks or some
such opening in the surface, would evaporate into steam and under
high pressure break through the earth crust and create a volcano,
carrying with it great masses of molten rock. The hot geysers of
Yellowstone Park, in America, are similar examples of such internal
action.
In historic times there were lakes in the Sahara Desert and the so-
called “Hopeless Desert” lying in the Rocky Mountains of North
America, while in the Sierra Nevadas there was a time, not more
than a million years ago, when all of the territory was well watered
and vegetated. One of these lakes, in western Utah and extending
over into Nevada, was one hundred and seventy-five miles wide, two
hundred and fifty miles long and in places over a thousand feet in
depth. Other evidences of this phenomenon, of tremendous masses
of water entering into the bowels of the earth, are found particularly
in the many caves among the Pyrenees and in the Mammoth Cave of
Kentucky, the largest cavern in the world, in the upper galleries of
which can still be seen the perforations through which the waters
descended.
As we descend into the earth we observe an increase in temperature
of one degree Fahrenheit for every fifty feet. At a depth of ten or
twelve miles the earth is red hot. At a depth of a hundred miles the
temperature is so great that if at the surface of the earth it would
liquefy all solid matter.
Not only lakes and seas have disappeared, but whole continents, in
much more peculiar ways. Where the Atlantic Ocean now lies, there
was once, some four million years ago, a continent which we call
“Atlantis,” connecting America with Africa, and believed to have been
peopled with a race far more intelligent than any now existing upon
the earth. They were one-eyed and had conquered the laws of
nature; their airships flying by natural forces, such as do our
sailboats. Their animals could speak and had great destructive
powers. But this can be only hearsay, since now “Atlantis” lies at the
bottom of the ocean, gone forever, like many mountains which have
likewise gone down into the waters.
These surface changes, together with internal disturbances, created
a wandering polar system and bodily displacement of both poles
took place. With this came a great change in the climate of the
earth. The lands of the present equator, which, only some twenty
thousand years ago, were as cold as our present arctic zones,
became tropical in climate, while the flourishing lands at the north
and south poles grew desolate and cold, as they are today. The
pole-axis of the earth has since changed considerably—Europe, only
some twelve thousand years ago being covered with a great ice
sheet.
The highest peak of the earth is Mount Everest, twenty-nine
thousand feet above sea level, and the greatest depth of the sea is
more than twenty-five thousand feet. Some of the earth’s surface
lies below sea level, but it is not flooded on account of being
surrounded by mountain ranges. A great part of the Sahara, for
instance, is below sea level. The Sahara, less inhabited than any
other area of the earth, covers one-twelfth part of the land surface
of the earth, having an area of some four million square miles. It is
by no means all sand; there are some plateaus and oases. In the
days of Julius Caesar it was a fertile, well cultivated land, and was
known as the “Granary of the Roman Empire.” With the fall of the
old Roman Empire, however, the desert was neglected and the sands
swallowed up the fertile lands.
Scientists and explorers have dreamed for generations of schemes
not only to cultivate the desert, but to put such fertile lands within
the reach of industry. It is estimated that the Sahara could easily
support a population of two hundred million souls and in addition