NEW STAR IN THE CONSTELLATION SWAN. 59 



THE NEW STAK IN THE CONSTELLATION OF 



THE SWAN/ 



By AMEDEE GUILLEMIN. 



THE phenomenon of a new star appearing in the heavens is suf- 

 ficiently rare to strike the imagination of the public, as well as to 

 attract the attention of scientific men. On the one side, it possesses 

 all the interest which attaches to the unexpected, to the mysterious 

 unknown ; and, on the other, it raises some very important questions 

 as to the physical and chemical constitution of the stars, and as to the 

 likeness between those distant suns and our own. But now more 

 than ever before, more even than in the first moiety of the nineteenth 

 century, is such curiosity justified, inasmuch as the new means of 

 investigation in the hands of astronomers give promise of revealing, 

 at least in a great measure, the nature of the strange transformations 

 which give rise to these apparitions. 



Before we consider the quite recent discovery made by Julius 

 Schmidt, diraotor of the observatory at Athens, let us make a brief 

 review of the apparitions which preceded it. 



Every one has seen in works on astronomy the account of the 

 famous temporary star of 1572, which appeared during the month of 

 November in the constellation of Cassiopeia, all of whose phases were 

 observed by Tycho Brahe. Its extraordinary scintillation ; its bright- 

 ness, equaling and surpassing Vega, Jupiter, Sirius, and even Venus 

 when in quadrature, so that it was visible at high noon ; finally, its 

 sudden diminution and disappearance after seventeen months of visi- 

 bility, all conspired to give to this star an extraordinary celebrity. 



In 1600 a new star appeared in the Swan, and was studied by 

 Kepler; then it disappeared in 1621, was again visible in 1655, and 

 at sundry times afterward ; it is still visible. 



Thirty years after the disappearance of the new star in Cassiopeia 

 appeared the star in Serpentarius discovered by Brunowski in October, 

 1604, and which had for its observer and historian the great Kepler. 

 It was visible for eighteen months, and, while it did not equal in 

 brightness the star of 1572, it surpassed the stars of first magnitude, 

 and even Jupiter itself. 



In 1670 a third temporary star was discovered by the Carthusian 

 Anthehne, in that part of the constellation of the Fox which is nearest 

 to /3 of the Swan. At the time of its apparition, or rather of its dis- 

 covery, June 20th, it was of the third magnitude. About August 10th 

 it was only of the fifth magnitude, and three months later it disap- 

 peared, reappearing on March 17, 1671, with the lustre of a star of 



' Translated from the French by J. Fitzgerald, A. M. 



