196 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



ished and decayed, while Rome rose and fell, while the scepter of civ- 

 ilization has passed from race to race, these starry creations of fancy 

 have shone on unchanged. The mind that would ignore them now 

 deserves compassion. 



The reader will observe a little circle in the map, and near it the 

 figures 1604. This indicates the spot where one of the most famous 

 temporary stars on record appeared in the year 1604. At first it was 

 far brighter than any other star in the heavens ; but it quickly faded, 

 and in a little over a year disappeared. It is particularly interesting, 

 because Kepler the quaintest, and not far from the greatest, figure 

 in astronomical history wrote a curious book about it. Some of the 

 philosophers of the day argued that the sudden outburst of the won- 

 derful star was caused by the chance meeting of atoms. Kepler's re- 

 ply was characteristic, as well as amusing : 



" I will tell those disputants, my opponents, not my own opinion, 

 but my wife's. Yesterday, when I was weary with writing, my mind 

 being quite dusty with considering these atoms, I was called to supper, 

 and a salad I had asked for was set before me. ' It seems, then,' said 

 I, aloud, ' that if pewter dishes, leaves of lettuce, grains of salt, drops 

 of water, vinegar and oil, and slices of egg, had been flying about in 

 the air from all eternity, it might at last happen by chance that there 

 would come a salad.' ' Yes,' says my wife, ' but not so nice and well- 

 dressed as this of mine is.' " 



While there are no objects of special interest for the observer with 

 an opera-glass in Ophiuchus, he will find it worth while to sweep over 

 it for what he may pick up, and, in particular, he should look at the 

 group of stars southeast of /3 and y. These stars have been shaped 

 into a little modern asterism called Taurus Poniatowskii, and it will 

 be noticed that five of them mark the outlines of a letter V, resembling 

 the well-known figure of the Hyades. 



Also look at the stars in the head of Serpens, several of which form 

 a figure like a letter X. A little west of Theta (6), in the tail of Ser- 

 pens, is a beautiful swarm of little stars, upon which a field-glass may 

 be used with advantage. The star $ is itself a beautiful double, just 

 within the separating power of a very powerful field-glass under favor- 

 able circumstances, the component stars being only about one third of 

 a minute apart. 



Do not fail to notice the remarkable subdivisions of the Milky-Way 

 in this neighborhood. Its current seems divided into numerous chan- 

 nels and bays, interspersed with gaps that might be likened to islands, 

 and the star 6 appears to be situated upon one of these islands of the 

 galaxy. This complicated structure of the Milky- Way extends down- 

 ward to the horizon, and upward through the constellation Cygnus, 

 and of its phenomenal appearance in that region we shall have more to 

 say farther on. 



Directly north of Ophiuchus is the constellation Hercules, interest- 



