A Curious Fact

The Popular Science News calis atten tiou to a most rcmarkable account of tha position of certain plaucts as loeated is "Gulliver's Travels. " This book, written soinewhore about 1726, contains the followiug worcls: "They spend the greater part of their lives in observing the celestial bodies, which they do by the assistanee of glasses far excellin ours in goodness. Thoy have likewise discovered two lesser stars, or satellites, which revolve about Mars, whereof the innerniost is distant from the center ol tho primsry planet exactly three of hia diameters and the outermost five. The f orruer revoives in the space of 10 hours, and the latter iu 21 }4, so that the squares of their periodical timos are very near in the saine proportiou with tho cubes of their distanoe from the center of Mars. ' ' One hundred and lifty years before it was known that Mars had a satellite, when the theory that it had one would have been niet with ridicule, or at least disbelief , the author of this remarkable book described the exact nuniber of satellites that Mars possessed, told their location and unusual speed ; also a peculiarity in the relation of the speed to the central orb, a peculiarity based upon no principies with whieh astronomers are familiar. A careful study cf the statements made by many writers of mai-ked ability will almost inevitably lead tis to the conclusión that certain imaginative minds have the gift of prophecy, or, at all events, there rnay be flashes of divination possibly unsuspected by the writers theuifielves.