time a trick of the kind could hardly be expected to succeed so
well, even if as cleverly devised and as well executed. The facts of
popular astronomy and of general popular science have been more widely
disseminated. America, too, more than any other great nation, has
advanced in the interval. It was about two years after this pamphlet had
appeared, that J. Quincy Adams used the following significant language
in advocating the erection of an astronomical observatory at Washington:
'It is with no feeling of pride as an American that the remark may be
made, that on the comparatively small territorial surface of Europe
there are existing more than 130 of these lighthouses of the skies;
while throughout the whole American hemisphere there is but one.' At
present, some of the finest observatories in the world belong to
American cities, or are attached to American colleges; and much of the
most interesting astronomical work of this country has been achieved by
American observers.

Yet we still hear from time to time of the attempted publication of
hoaxes of greater or less ingenuity. It is singular (and I think
significant) how often these relate to the moon. There would seem to be
some charm about our satellite for the minds of paradoxists and hoaxers
generally. Nor are these tricks invariably detected at once by the
general public, or even by persons of some culture. I remember being
gravely asked (in January 1874) whether an account given in the 'New
York World,' purporting to describe how the moon's frame was gradually
cracking, threatening eventually to fall into several separate
fragments, was in reality based on fact. In the far West, at Lincoln,
Nebraska, a lawyer asked me, not long since, why I had not described the
great discoveries recently made by means of a powerful reflector erected
near Paris. According to the 'Chicago Times,' this powerful instrument
had shown buildings in the moon, and bands of workers could be seen with
it who manifestly were undergoing some kind of penal servitude, for they
were chained together. It was clear, from the presence of these and the
absence of other inhabitants, that the side of the moon turned
earthwards is a dreary and unpleasant place of abode, the real 'happy
hunting grounds' of the moon lying on her remote and unseen hemisphere.

As gauges of general knowledge, scientific hoaxes have their uses, just
as paradoxical works have. No one, certainly no student of science, can