THE SUN'S DESTINATION. 195 



of course, always points to the north; and as the train turns upon its 

 curve, the needle will make a complete revolution. But the passenger 

 could not know without the compass that the train was not moving 

 in a perfectly straight line. Just so we passengers on the earth are 

 unaware of the kind of path we are traversing, until, like the compass, 

 the astronomer's instruments shall reveal to us the truth. 



But as we have seen, astronomical observations of precision have 

 not as yet extended through a period of time corresponding to the 

 few minutes during which the St. Gothard traveler watches the com- 

 pass. We are still in the dark, and do not know as yet whether man- 

 kind shall last long enough upon the earth to see the compass needle 

 make its revolution. We are compelled to believe that the motion in 

 space of our sun is progressing upon a curved path; but so far as 

 precise observations allow us to speak, we can but say that we have 

 as yet moved through an infinitesimal element only of that mighty 

 curve. However, we know the point upon the sky towards which this 

 tiny element of our path is directed, and we have an approximate 

 knowledge of the speed at which we move. 



More than a century ago Sir William Herschel was able to fix 

 roughly what we call the Apex of the sun's way in space, or the point 

 among the stars towards which that way is for the moment directed. 

 We say for the moment, but we mean that moment of which Bradley 

 saw the beginning in 1750, and upon whose end no man of those now 

 living shall ever look. Herschel found that a comparison of old stellar 

 observations seemed to indicate that the stars in a certain part of the 

 sky were opening out, as it were, and that the constellations in the 

 opposite part of the heavens seemed to be drawing in, or becoming 

 smaller. There can be but one reasonable explanation of this. We 

 must be moving towards that part of the sky where the stars arc 

 separating. Just so a man watching a regiment of soldiers approach- 

 ing, will see at first only a confused body of men. But as they come 

 nearer the individual soldiers will seem to separate, until at length 

 each one is seen distinct from all the others. 



Herschel fixed the position of the apex at a point in the constellation 

 Hercules. The most recent investigations of Newcomb, published only 

 a few months ago, have, on the whole, verified Herschel's conclusions. 

 With the intuitive power of rare genius, Herschel had been able to^ 

 sift truth out of error. The observational data at his disposal would 

 now be called rude, but they disclosed to the scrutiny of his acute 

 understanding the germ of truth that was in them. Later investiga- 

 tors have increased the precision of our knowledge, until we can now 

 say that the present direction of the solar motion is known within 

 very narrow limits. A tiny circle might be drawn on the sky, to which 

 an astronomer might point his hand and say: Yonder little circle 



