Evening Republican, Volume 59, Number 96, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 14 May 1917 — Wonders of a Mirage. [ARTICLE]

Wonders of a Mirage.

The published statement of the explorer Donald B. McMillan that the Arctic land mass which Admiral Peary reported and named Croker Land was but a mirage Jias, stirred new interest, in this strange phenomenon, which can deceive an experienced observer into the belief that he.sees plains and mountains where there is nothing bqt a few clouds. The mirage is due to the appearance of small objects seen through layers of air at different temperatures, which bend the rays of light and distort the image, much as the Image of a pencil half submerged in water is distorted. A typical mirage is often seen in the deserts of the southwest, where it becomes quite cool at night, and the sun brings a sudden change in the morning, so that temperature layers are created. As a result small bushes appear as great trees, with their doubles below them, as though mirrored in still water. It was a similar phenomenon which magnified a cloud bunk to look like a continent.