82 LIGHT SCIENCE FOR LEISURE HOURS. 



that he had himself fallen into an error on the subject 

 of nebulse, prevented Galileo from speaking about the 

 great nebula in Orion, we should be compelled to form 

 but a low opinion of his honesty. It happens too 

 frequently that 



The man of science himself is fonder of glory, and vain 

 An eye well practised in nature, a spirit bounded and poor. 



That Hevelius, the star-cataloguer, should have 

 failed to detect the Orion nebula is far less remarkable; 

 for Hevelius objected to the use of telescopes in the 

 work of cataloguing stars. He determined the position 

 of each star by looking at the star through minute 

 holes or pinnules, at the ends of a long rod attached to 

 an instrument resembling the quadrant. 



The actual discoverer of the great nebula was Huy- 

 ghens, in 1656. The description he gives of the dis 

 covery is so animated and interesting, that we shall 

 translate it at length. He says : 



6 While I was observing the variable belts of Jupiter, 

 a dark band across the centre of Mars, and some indis 

 tinct phenomena on his disc, I detected among the 

 fixed stars an appearance resembling nothing which 

 had ever been seen before, so far as I am aware. 

 This phenomenon can only be seen with large tele 

 scopes such as I myself make use of. Astronomers 

 reckon that there are three stars in the sword of Orion, 

 which lie very close to each other. But as I was look 

 ing, in the year 1656, through my 23-feet telescope, at 

 the middle of the sword, I saw, in place of one star, 

 no less than twelve stars which indeed is no unusual 



