The Moon - A Full Description and Map of its Principal Physical Features by Thomas Gwyn Elger
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page 32 of 235 (13%)
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from S. lat. 70 deg. on the west to S. lat. 80 deg. on the east limb.
They include some giant peaks and plateaus, noteworthy objects in profile, some of which, according to Schroter and Madler, rise to 26,000 feet. The _Dorfel Mountains_, between S. lat. 80 deg. and 57 deg. on the eastern limb, include, if Schroter's estimate is correct, three peaks which exceed 26,000 feet. On the eastern limb, between S. lat. 35 deg. and 18 deg., extend the _Rook Mountains_, which have peaks, according to Schroter, as high as 25,000 feet. Next in order come the _Cordilleras_, which extend to S. lat. 8 deg., and the _D'Alembert Mountains_, lying east of Rocca and Grimaldi, closely associated with them, and probably part of the same system. Some of the peaks approach 20,000 feet. In addition to these mountain ranges there are others less prominent on the limb in the northern hemisphere, which have not been named. ISOLATED MOUNTAINS are very numerous in different parts of the moon, the most remarkable are referred to in the appendix. Many remain unnamed. CLEFTS OR RILLS.--Though Fontenelle, in his _Entretiens sur la Pluralite des Mondes_, informs his pupil, the Marchioness, that "M. Cassini discovered in the moon something which separates, then reunites, and finally loses itself in a cavity, which from its appearance seemed to be a river," it can hardly be supposed that what the French astronomer saw, or fancied he saw, with the imperfect telescopes of that day, was one of the remarkable and enigmatical furrows termed clefts or rills, first detected by the Hanoverian selenographer Schroter; who, on October 7, 1787, discovered the very curious serpentine cleft near Herodotus, having a few nights before noted for the first time the great Alpine valley west of Plato, once classed with the clefts, though it is an object of a very different kind. Between 1787 and 1797 Schroter found ten rills; but twenty years elapsed before an addition was made to this number by the |
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