Incidentally, I may be able to adduce evidence of a more or less weighty character, which seems to negative the possibility of any high form of animal life on Mars, and, _a fortiori_, the development of such life as might culminate in a being equal or superior to ourselves.

As most popular works on Astronomy for the last ten years at least, as well as many scientific periodicals and popular magazines, have reproduced some of the maps of Mars by Schiaparelli, Lowell, and others, the general appearance of its surface will be familiar to most readers, who will thus be fully able to appreciate Mr.Lowell's account of his own further discoveries which I may have to quote.

One of the _best_ of these maps I am able to give as a frontispiece to this volume, and to this I shall mainly refer.
[Footnote 2: _Man's Place in the Universe_ p.

267 (1903).] _The Canals as described by Mr.Lowell._ In the clear atmosphere of Arizona, Mr.Lowell has been able on various favourable occasions to detect a network of straight lines, meeting or crossing each other at various angles, and often extending to a thousand or even over two thousand miles in length.

They are seen to cross both the light and the dark regions of the planet's surface, often extending up to or starting from the polar snow-caps.