GAUGING THK II ^S 141 



-ir coiiKt ruction." He admits, however 

 eoorae of time, M roany tilings muMt have been sug- 

 gested by tbe great the order, the rise, 

 compression of the stars as they presented 

 themselves t< w." As the number of stars he 

 is,-. 1. th, l.ri-htnomof the Milky Way 

 increased; as the number diminished, its apparent 

 brightness to the naked eye diminished also. The law 

 of gravit^ certain existed among that vast 



iiule of suns and systems, jost as it exists in 

 pulling a stone to the ground. At first thin was 

 mere suspicion. More than twenty years elapsed 

 before he could say it was an established fact 



He continued his review of the heavens, or 

 gauging of the stars. The results were so marvellous 

 that all the world men of science, the common 

 people, even children at school wondered. Some- 

 times he saw, in a small celestial space, as many 

 as 250, or 340, or 424, or 588 stars ; at other times 

 he counted only 3 or 4, 5 or 6. The star-wealth 

 of some of these regions was so vast that in one 

 only 5" in breadth a very small part of the whole 

 of the heavens there were about 330,000 

 shining suns or stars! The Chancellor of th- 

 <raity of Halle, who v llerschel shortly 



before his death, evidently got from the astronomer 

 hat he had " often known more than 50,000 

 pass before his sight within an hour," and he records 



\vn wonder, and the wonder of men generally, 

 while these discoveries were still fresh in their minds, 

 that " after the invention of his instruments, I. li. 

 Schroeter, the celebrated astronomer of Lilicn 

 might well compute the fixed stars in the southern 



