TO KNOW THE STARRY HEAVENS 



339 



lujt help but suggest the various sea- 

 sons. 'I'he very brilliant, bluish Sirius 

 recalls at once to his mind the long, 

 cold nights of winter, while the beauti- 

 ful Scorpio, with its surrounding 

 groups of Ophiuchus, the Eagle and 

 the Archer, bring to his memory many 

 long and pleasant summer evenings of 

 observation. Especially does he wel- 

 come the \er\- hrst appearance of the 

 beautiful autumn star, Vega, and the 

 entrance into the evenincf heavens of 



ies indicate that it is of an overwhelm- 

 ing and inconceivable magnitude,, 

 hitherto wholly unsuspected. It is 

 estimated that its distance from us is 

 so great that the light by which we may 

 view it to-night must have started on 

 its journey toward us no less than one 

 thousand centuries ago. This distant 

 cloud is made up of more than sixty 

 thousands suns. If the recent conclu- 

 sions are correct, so vast a portion of 

 s])ace does it occu])y that light would. 



South 



EAST 



1838 



1840 



NORTH 



Fig. 2--()i-l)it of the Double Star at E, Fig 



the head of the Serpent, for when, as 

 now, these both emerge from belov/ the 

 easterii horizon they tell him that the 

 end of winter has come and that many 

 months of mild summer evenings are 

 to follow. 



The April Stars. 



The possessor of a small telescope 

 should not fail to examine the diffused 

 cluster of stars at A, Fig. i, nor the 

 more difficult cloud at B, nor, above all, 

 the very brilliant cloud of suns at C, 

 Vvdiich last is the most wonderful star 

 cluster visible to northern observers. 

 Of this last object, recent detailed stud- 



require ten centuries to pass through 

 the cloud from one side to the other. 

 Thus the radius of this great assem- 

 blage of suns (which seems to have a 

 nearly spherical form) is more than 

 two million times as great as the dis- 

 tance from our sun to the planet Nep- 

 tune, which lies at the outermost boun- 

 dary of the Solar System. 



The possessor of a small telescope 

 will find beautiful double stars (among 

 others) at the points D, E and F, Fig. 

 I. The colors of the first are described 

 as yellow and green, of the second as 

 both yellow, and of the third as orange 

 and green. The second double (that in 



