1892.] Mr. William Huggins on the New Star in Auriga. G15 



WEEKLY EVENING MEETING, 

 Friday, May 13, 1892. 



Sir James Crichton-Browne, M.D. LL.D. F.R.S. Treasurer aud 

 Vice-President, in the Chair. 



William Huggins, Esq. D.C.L. LL.D. Fh.D. F.R.S. M.R.I. 



The New Star in Auriga. 



We depend so absolutely at every moment, and in every action, upon 

 the uniformity of Nature, that any event which even appears to break 

 in upon that uniformity cannot fail to interest us. Especially is this 

 the case if a strange star appears among those ancient heavenly 

 bodies by the motions of which our time and the daily routine 

 of life are regulated, aud which through all ages have been to man 

 the most august symbols of the unchanging. For, notwithstanding 

 small alterations due to the accumulated effects of changes of invisible 

 slowness which are everywhere in progress, the heavens, in their 

 broad features, remain as they were of old. If Hipparchus could 

 return to life, however changed the customs and the kingdoms of the 

 earth might appear to him, in the heavens and the hosts thereof, he 

 would find himself at home. 



Only some nineteen times in about as many centuries have we 

 any record that the eternal sameness of the midnight sky has been 

 broken in upon by even the temporary presence of an unknown star, 

 though there is no doubt that in the future, througli the closer watch 

 kept upon the sky by photography, a larger number of similar 

 phenomena will be discovered. 



According to Pliny it was the sudden outburst into splendour of 

 a new star in 130 B.C. which inspired Hipparchus to construct his 

 catalogue of stars. Passing at once to more modern times we come to 

 the famous new star of 1572 discovered by Tycho Brahe in the 

 Constelhition of Cassiopeia which outshone Venus, and could even be 

 seen as a bright object upon the sky by day. But its brilliancy, 

 like that of the new stars before and since, was transitory ; within a 

 few weeks its great glory had departed from it, and it then con- 

 tinued to wane until at last it had fallen back to its original low 

 estate, as a star invisible to the naked eye. 



The star of 1886 which, on May 2nd of that year, burst forth as 

 a star of the second magnitude in the Northern Crown, is memorable 

 as the first of those objects which was subjected to the searching 

 power of the spectroscope. Two temporary stars have appeared 

 since, one of the third magnitude in 1876 in Cygnus, and a small 

 star in the Great Nebula of Andromeda in 1885. 



It may be asked whether these temporary stars are in reality new 



