236 Notices respectitig New Booh. 



200 on the preceding side— to 65, 103, 108, on the following; 68 

 on the south, and 90 on the north. The contrast is enhanced by 

 the suddenness of the transition." — P. 384. 



"It is about this region, or perhaps somewhat earlier, in the in- 

 terval between rj Argus and a Crucis, that the galactic circle, or 

 medial line of the Milky Way, may be considered as crossed by that 

 of the zone of large stars which is marked out by the brilliant con- 

 stellation of Orion, the bright stars of Canis Major, and almost all 

 the more conspicuous stars of Argo, the Cross, the Centaur, Lupus, 

 and Scorpio. A great circle passing through s Orionis and a Crucis 

 will mark out the axis of the zone in question, whose inclination to 

 the galactic circle is therefore about 20°, and whose appearance 

 would lead us to suspect that our nearest neighbours in the sidereal 

 system (if really such), form part of a subordinate sheet or stratum 

 deviating to that extent from parallelism to the general mass which, 

 seen projected on the heavens, forms the Milky Way." — P. 385. 



" Bode's, and most other celestial charts, make the Milky Way 

 bifurcate, in Cygnus and the tail of Scorpio, into two great streams, 

 both of which, the preceding and the following, preserve their conti- 

 nuity, from point to point, unbroken. This, however, is the case 

 only with the following, or main stream, whose course we have just 

 traced. The preceding is discontinuous. Its northern portion (from 

 Cygnus southwards) terminates precisely at the equator, just beyond 

 the bisection of a line »/ Serpentis and /3 Ophiuchi ; and from this 

 to the nearest point of its southern continuation (if it can be so con- 

 sidered) there is a break of 14° in extent to the star o Serpentis, 

 totally devoid of all appearance of it." 



" If we now consider the telescopic structure of the region spread 

 over by, and inclosed between the effusions of the Milky Way in the 

 body and tail of Scorpio, the hand and bow of Sagittarius, and the 

 following leg of Ophiuchus, we shall find it, in the highest degree, 

 interesting and complex. No region of the heavens, in fact, is fuller 

 of objects beautiful and remarkable in themselves, and rendered still 

 more so by their mode of association, and by the peculiar features 

 assumed by the Milky Way, which are without a parallel in any 

 other part of its course." — P. 386. 



The description is wound up with the following remarks : — 



" From the foregoing analysis of the telescopic aspect of the Milky 

 Way in this interesting region, I think it can hardly be doubted that 

 it consists of portions differing exceedingly in distance, but brought 

 by the effect of projection into the same or nearly the same visual 

 line ; in particular, that at the anterior edge of what we have called 

 the main stream, we see, foreshortened, a vast and illimitable area 

 scattered over with discontinuous masses and aggregates of stars in 

 the manner of the cumuli of a mackerel sky, rather than of a stratum 

 of regular thickness and homogeneous formation ; and that in the 

 inclosed spaces insulated from the rest of the heavens by the prece- 

 ding and following streams, and the ' bridges ' above spoken of as 

 connecting them (as, for instance, in that which includes XScorpii), 

 we are, in fact, looking out into space through vast chimney-form 



