666 COSMOS. 



Nubecula major may be about 5 at Aden. The reason that 

 seamen usually first see the Magellanic clouds in much more 

 southern latitudes, as, for instance, near the equator, or 

 even far to the south of it, is probably to be ascribed to the 

 character of the atmosphere, and to the vapours near the 

 horizon, which reflect white light. In southern Arabia, 

 especially in the interior of the country, the deep azure of 

 the sky, and the great dryness of the atmosphere, must 

 favour the recognition of the Magellanic cloiids, as we see 

 exemplified by the visibility of comets' tails at daylight, be- 

 tween the tropics and in very southern latitudes. 



The arrangement of the stars near the antarctic pole into 

 new constellations was made in the seventeenth century. 

 The observations made with imperfect instruments by the 

 Dutch navigators, Petrus Theodori of Embden, and Fried- 

 rick Houtmann, who was a prisoner in Java and Sumatra to 

 the King of Bantam and Atschin (1596-1599), were incor- 

 porated in the celestial charts of Hondius Bleaw (Jansonius 

 Csesius,) and Bayer. 



The less regular distribution of masses of light gives to the 

 zone of the southern sky situated between the parallels of 

 50 and 80, which is so rich in crowded nebulous spots and 

 starry masses, a peculiar, and one might almost say pictu- 

 resque character, depending on the grouping of the stars of 

 the first and second magnitudes, and their separation by 

 intervals, which appear to the naked eye desert and devoid 

 of radiance. These singular contrasts, the milky way, which 

 presents numerous portions more brilliantly illumined than the 

 rest, and the insulated, revolving, rounded Magellanic clouds, 

 and the coalbags, the larger of which lies close upon a beautiful 

 constellation, all contribute to augment the diversity of the 

 picture of nature, and rivet the attention of the susceptible 

 mind to separate regions on the confines of the southern sky. 

 One of these, the constellation of the Southern Cross, has 

 acquired a peculiar character of importance from the begin- 

 ning of the sixteenth century, owing to the religious feelings of 

 Christian navigators and missionaries, who have visited the tro- 

 pical and southern seas, and both the Indies. The four principal 

 stars of which it is composed, are mentioned in the Almagest, 

 and, therefore, were regarded in the time of Adrian and Anto- 

 ninus Pius, as parts of the constellation of the Centaur.* It 

 * Compare the researches of Delambre and Encke with Ideler, 



