76S 



STAR, DOUBLE STAR. 



STAR-CHAMBER, 



786 



fectly round well-defined planetary disc, surrounded by two, three, or 

 more alternately dark and bright rings, which, if examined attentively, 

 are seen to be slightly coloured at their borders. They succeed each 

 other nearly at equal intervals round the central disc, and are usually 

 much better seen, and more regularly and perfectly formed, in 

 refracting than in reflecting telescopes. The central disc too is much 

 larger in the former than in the latter description of telescope. These 

 discs were first noticed by Sir William Herschel, who first applied 

 sufficiently high magnifying powers to telescopes to render them 

 visible. They are not the real bodies of the stars, which are infinitely 

 too remote to be ever visible with any magnifiers we can apply; but 

 jpurioiu or unreal images, resulting from optical causes, which are 

 still to a certain degree obscure." The various appearances of stars,as 

 seen in telescopes, particularly the resolution of stars which appear 

 single into two or more, render them excellent objects, when classified, 

 for the examination of the power and goodness of these instruments. 

 Such a classification was made by Sir J. Herschel (' Mem. Astron. 

 Soc.') ; and the paper is reprinted at the end of the explanation (pub- 

 lished separately) of the maps of the stars published by the Society 

 for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge. 



The magnitude of a star is a notion formed by observers as to the 

 apparent quantity of light which comes from them, on which they are 

 divided into classes. Those which are visible to the naked eye are 

 usually divided Into six magnitudes, which, According to W. Herschel, 

 emit quantities of light which are (roughly) in about the proportions of 

 the numbers 100, 25, 12, 6, 2, and 1. But though practical astronomers 

 are tolerably well agreed as to the mode of naming most of the prin- 

 cipal stars in respect of magnitude, there are many about which they 

 differ, and some as to which it is tolerably well known that the order 

 of magnitude which adherence to old catalogues still procures for them, 

 is not that which would have been given had they been new stars 

 named in our day. The magnitudes of stars are in fact rather inde- 

 terminate after the first and second. An astronomer would hardly say 

 that an appearance was like a star of the " first or second " magnitude; 

 the difference of the two is too well established, though as to the 

 fainter stars of the first magnitude, and the brighter ones of the 

 second, there may be little to choose between them. But it is very 

 common to speak of an appearance as being of the " second or third," 

 " third or fourth," Ac., magnitude, showing that the distinction between 

 one magnitude and the next is not then very prominent. Sir John 

 Herschel and Professor Struve, the two most assiduous observers of 

 small magnitudes, usually differ (' Mem. Astron. Soc.,' vol. iii. p. 180) 

 about a magnitude in their estimation of one star with another, from 

 and below Struve's fourth or Herschel's fifth magnitude, down to 

 Struve's twelfth or Herschel's thirteenth. When therefore the reader, 

 who it no astronomer, hears of the constant reference to stars of all 

 magnitudes down to the sixteenth, he must look upon it as a rough 

 mode of estimating the relative brilliancies of the stars, in which a 

 numerical nomenclature is far from being held to imply numerical 

 accuracy. 



Some stars (perhaps all) are variable in their magnitudes, and with 

 periodical regularity, which is perhaps to be attributed to the effect of 

 revolution round their axes ; it being imaginable that different parts 

 of a star should give different kinds or quantities of light, either or 

 both. [VARIABLE STARS.] 



There are a few instances in which a sudden appearance of a new 

 star is recorded, followed, after a time, by its disappearance. Such a 

 phenomenon made an astronomer, it is said, of Hipparchus ; and 

 certainly the star which .appeared in Cassiopeia in 1572 was the intro- 

 duction of Tycho Brahi! to the character of a public astronomer. 

 [Bn.uifi, TYCHO, in Bioa. Div.] Tycho Brah<5 himself thought, from 

 historical evidence, that a star had appeared in Cassiopeia in 945 and 

 1264, that of his own time being in 1572, from which, if the historical 

 t.ce be correct, a new star might be expected to appear in that 

 constellation in 1872 or thereabouts. But, on examining his evidence, 

 we find it exceedingly vague and deficient in antiquity. (' Comp. to 

 Maps of the Stars,' p. 88.) 



It has been reasonably supposed that those stars which have most 

 motion are comparatively near to the earth, and when it was requisite to 

 choose a double star for the determination of the question of PARALLAX, 

 61 Cygni was selected, as being a star with a large proper motion ; in 

 fact, its right ascension alters yearly 5" "46, and its declination 3" '19. 

 The experiment turned out favourably, and the parallax was discovered, 

 and with it (roughly) the distance of the star from the solar system. 

 And though light takes more than ten years to travel from this star 

 to the earth, at the rate of two hundred thousand miles a second ; yet, 

 to far from this being anything enormous, it rather cuts down the 

 idea which wag entertained of the distance of these bodies. The 

 absence of all parallax, in spite of repeated efforts to obtain it, made 

 many speculations upon the possibility of the nearest starlight being 

 hundred! of years in reaching us. Among other stars which have a 

 decided proper motion, we may notice Sirius, Procyon, 61 Yirginis, 

 a Booti*, A Ophiuchi, p Ophiuchi, and / Cassiopeia;. 



The particular objects which are seen in the heavens are slars, 

 simple points of light, and ncbuhp, patches of an appearance of cloudy 

 light. Single stars, under the telescope, very frequently become 

 double, triple, quadruple, or even a large cluster ; nebula; are in some 

 case* found to consist entirely of stars, but many remain which either 



are not composed of stars, or will not show themselves as such to the 

 power of our present telescopes. It is necessary to say, in speaking of 

 double stars, that they have been long known to exist, and that scores 

 of observers have been diligently employed upon them during the last 

 century and a half. 



When two atars are so close together that the naked eye shows them 

 only as one, it is possible that the coincidence may be merely optical ; 

 that is, that the lines of their directions may be so close as to make an 

 apparent coincidence, such as takes place between the sun and moon 

 in an eclipse of the former, though the real distances may be very 

 great. Such optical coincidence is suspected in various double stars, 

 but only a long course of observation can settle the suspicion in either 

 way. But it is now found that many double stars are connected with 

 each other by the law of gravitation, each revolving in an ellipse about 

 their common centre of gravity, and showing every evidence of each 

 being retained by the other, according to the Newtonian law of gravi- 

 tation. The following stars, y Leonis, e Bootis, Herculis, ! Serpentis, 

 and y Virginia, were made out to be revolving double stara, by W. 

 Herschel, in 1803. He had been examining these pairs under the 

 idea of detecting the parallax from them, and in so doing he recognised 

 their changes of relative poaition. Since that time, Castor, ( Ursa}, 

 70 Ophiuchi, a Coronse, TJ Coronse, { Bootis, 17 Cassiopeia;, 8 Cygni, 

 H Bootis, f (4) and e (5) Lyrse, \ Ophiuci, n Draconia, ( Aquarii, 

 f Cancri, and others, have been added to the list. The periods of 

 revolution of several have been determined, ranging from 43 to 1200 

 years, and the other elements of several orbits have been established. 

 The atar jj Corona) has completed a revolution since it was first 

 observed. 



The most interesting of double atars is y Virginia. When obaerved 

 by Herschel in 1780, the distance betweeu the two constituent atara 

 amounted to 5"'66. Henceforward it continued gradually to decrease, 

 until at length, in 1836, the two atars had approached so close as to 

 appear like one star even when obaerved in the best telescopes. From 

 that time the two stars have been slowly opening out from each other, 

 until they are now nearly 4" apart. The orbit of this double star has 

 been computed by several astronomers, including among these Sir 

 John Herschel, who has found the period of revolution to be 182 years. 

 The orbits of a considerable number of double stars have been com- 

 puted in recent years, a list of which will be found in Herschel's 

 ' Outlines of Astronomy ' and other similar works. The moat dis- 

 tinguished observers of double stara besides the elder Herschel have 

 been Sir John Herschel, Sir James South, the Rev. Mr. Dawes, and 

 Admiral Smyth, in this country ; and on the continent the elder 

 Struve, Bessel, Professor Mitdler, Otto Struve and Profesaor Secchi. 

 The labours of the elder Struve in this field of astronomical observa- 

 tion exceed in magnitude and importance those of any other 

 astronomer. 



STAR-CHAMBER. The Star-Chamber is said to have been in 

 early times one of the 'apartments of the king's palace at West- 

 minster allotted for the despatch of public business. The Painted 

 Chamber, the White Chamber, and the Chambre Markolph, were 

 occupied by the triers and receivers of petitions, and the king'a council 

 held its sittings in the Camera Stellata, or Chambre des Estoylles, 

 which was so called probably from some remarkable feature in its 

 architecture or embellishment. According to Sir Thomaa Smith's 

 conjecture " either because it was full of windows, or becauae at the 

 first all the roofe thereof was decked with images or starres gilded." 

 (' Commonwealth of England,' book iii. cap. 4.) Sir William Black- 

 stone proposes a conjecture that the chamber received its name from 

 its having been a place of deposit for the contracts of the Jews, called 

 " Itarrs," under an ordinance of Richard I. (Blackstone's ' Commenta- 

 ries,' vol. iv. p. 266, note.) Whatever may be the etymology of the 

 term, there can be little doubt that the court of Star-Charnber derived 

 its name from the place in which it was holden. " The lords sittirg in 

 the Star-Chamber " ia used as a well-known phrase in records of tho 

 time of Edward III., and the name became permanently attached to 

 the jurisdiction, and continued long after the local situation of tho 

 court was changed. 



The judicature of the court of Star-Chamber appears to have origi- 

 nated in the exercise of a criminal and civil jurisdiction by the king'a 

 council, or by that section of it which Lord Hale calls the Ckmsiliwn 

 Ordinarium, in. order to distinguish it from the Privy Council, who 

 were the deliberative advisers of the crown. (Bale's ' Jurisdiction of 

 the Lords' House,' chap. v. ; Palgrave's ' Essay on the Original Autho- 

 rity of the King's Council.') This exercise of jurisdiction by the 

 king'a council was considered as an encroachment upon the common 

 law, and being the subject of frequent complaint by the Commons, 

 was greatly abridged bv several acts of parliament in the reign of 

 Edward III. It was discouraged also by the common-law judges, 

 although they were usually membera of the council ; and from the joint 

 operation of these and some other causes the power of the Cousiliuui 

 Regia as a court of justice had materially declined previously to the 

 reign of Henry VII., although, as Lord Hale obaerves, there remain 

 " some straggling footsteps of their proceeding " till near that time. 

 The statute of the 3 Henry VII. c. 1, empowered the chancellor, trea- 

 surer, and keeper of the privy-seal, or any two of them, calling to 

 them a (bishop and temporal lord of the council and the two chief 

 justices, or two other justices in their absence (to whom the president 



