DOUBLE STARS 20l 



dation of this important branch of astrono;ny. In 1820, 

 StiTive published his first Dorpat Table of doubb stars, 796 

 in number. This was followed in 1824 by a second, con* 

 taining 3112 double stars, down to the ninth magnitude, in 

 distances under 32", of which only about one sixth had been 

 before observed. To accomplish this work, nearly 120,000 

 fixed stars wore examined by raieans of the great Fraun* 

 hofer refractor. Struve's third table of multiple stars ap- 

 peared in the year 1837, and forms the important Avork Stel- 

 laniTTi cojnpositarwn Mensurce Micrometricoi.'^ It contains 

 2787 double stars, several imperfectly observed objects being 

 carefully excluded. 



Sir John Herschel's unwearied diligence, during his four 

 years' residence in Feldhausen, at the Cape of Good Hope, 

 which, by contributing to an accurate topographical knowl- 

 edge of the southern hemisphere, constitutes an epoch in 

 astronomy,! has been the means of enriching this numbei 

 by the addition of more than 2100 double stars (which, with 

 few exceptions, had never before been observed). All these 

 African observations were taken by a twenty-feet reflecting 

 telescope ; they were reduced for the year 1830, and are 

 included in the six catalogues which contain 3346 double 

 stars, and were transmitted by Sir John Herschel to the As- 

 tronomical Society for the sixth and ninth parts of their val- 

 uable Memoirs.X In these European catalogues are laid 

 down the 380 double stars which the above celebrated as- 

 tronomer had observed in 1825, conjointly with Sir James 

 South. 



"VVe trace in this historical sketch the gradual advance 

 made by the science of astronomy toward a thorough knowl- 

 edge ofjJCirtial, and especially of binary systems. The num- 

 ber of double stars (those both optically and physically double) 

 may at present be estimated with some certainty at about 

 6000, if we include in our calculation those observed by Bes- 

 sel with the excellent Fraunhofer heliometer, by Argelan- 

 der§ at Abo (1827-1835), by Encke and Galle' at Berlin 



* Strnve, Mensurcs Micrnm., p. 40 and 234-248. On the whole. 

 2641-|-146, i. e., 2787 double stars have been observed. (Madler, ia 

 Schum., Jahrb., 1839, s. 64.) 



+ Sir John Herschel, Astron. Observ. at the Cape of Good Hope, p. 

 165-303. X Ibid., p. 167 and 242. 



$ Argelander, in order carefully to investigate their proper motion^ 

 examined a great number of fixed stars. See his essay, entitled "-DLX. 

 Stellarmn fixariim posltiones mcdiiP, ineunte anno 1830, ex observ. Aboa 

 habiUs {Ifelsingfarsi?, 1825)." Mad'er {Astr., s. 625) estimates th» 



