Babinet’s most unceremonious and very unhandsome statement respecting the extreme “flimsiness” of our material structure, I am yet bound to confess that there is, unfortunately, a great deal of truth in it. Leaving altogether out of the question the physical constitution of what is termed our tail, which truly immeasurably exceeds in tenuity the atmosphere surrounding your earth, I must even “plead guilty” to the charge of extreme “light-headedness” brought against us. I would deny it if I could, but I know it would be of no use; as you are but too well aware that even the faintest stars can often be distinctly seen, without any perceptible diminution of their lustre, through the very centre of our heads, which, considering the enormous bulk, for instance, of my brother’s head of 1811—exceeding that of your earth in the proportion of 4,000,000 to 1—most clearly shows that the matter composing it must possess an extreme degree of tenuity. If additional proof were required of this patent fact, it might be found in the almost imperceptible power of attraction which we, even of the largest magnitudes, exercise upon Jupiter and other planets, or even upon their satellites, and those still smaller atomic mites, the planetoids, when we accidentally cross them in their orbits. Jupiter more especially, who seems to have a peculiar knack of being always, somehow or other, in the way of some of us, is not in the least affected by pretty near contact with our immense bulk, and actually
