Читать книгу The Story of the Sun: New York, 1833-1918 онлайн

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Probably Locke was glad that the suspense was over. He is said to have told a friend that he had not intended the story as a hoax, but as satire.

“It is quite evident,” he said, as he saw the whole country take the marvellous narrative seriously, “that it is an abortive satire; and I am the best self-hoaxed man in the whole community.”

But while the Sun’s rivals denounced the hoax, the Sun was not quick to admit that it had gulled not only its own readers but almost all the scientific world. Barring the casual conversation between Locke and Finn, there was no evidence plain enough to convince the layman that it was a hoax. The Sun fenced lightly and skilfully with all controverters. On September 16, more than two weeks after the conclusion of the story, it printed a long editorial article on the subject of the authenticity of the discoveries, mentioning the wide-spread interest that had been displayed in them:

Most of those who incredulously regard the whole narrative as a hoax are generously enthusiastic in panegyrizing not only what they are pleased to denominate its ingenuity and talent, but also its useful effect in diverting the public mind, for a while, from that bitter apple of discord, the abolition of slavery, which still unhappily threatens to turn the milk of human kindness into rancorous gall. That the astronomical discoveries have had this effect is obvious from our exchange papers. Who knows, therefore, whether these discoveries in the moon, with the visions of the blissful harmony of her inhabitants which they have revealed, may not have had the effect of reproving the discords of a country which might be happy as a paradise, which has valleys not less lovely than those of the Ruby Colosseum, of the Unicorn, or of the Triads; and which has not inferior facilities for social intercourse to those possessed by the vespertiliones-homines, or any other homines whatever?