: GAUGING Till 111 \VENS 14$ 



continents and inlands of start, which he 



1 nebula?, clusters, or group* The Milky \ 



with iU many million* of sliining sum, is one of these 



ly peopled islands, separated from many others as 



>r perhaps richer of worlds, in tl.ii infinite ocean. 



Of these nebulas or clusters, or star islands, he had, 



counted "more than 900, many of 



: all probability, are equally extensive with 



that which wo inhabit ; and yet they are all separated 



from eac)> i>y very considerable intervals. Some 



there are that seem to be double and treble; and 



though with most of these it may be that they are 



at a very great distance from each ot : we allow 



that some such conjunctions really are to be found. 



' hen these compound or double nebulas still make a 



detached link in the great chain." He fell from some 



!*e views at a later period, wholly or in part 

 Herechel delighted in these attractive speculations. 

 In a paper on tii-- power of telescopes to penetrate 

 space, one of the conclusions he came to was 



his 20- feet reflector "might possibly have 



reached to some distance beyond the apparent bounds 



of the Milky Way his 40-feet would reach stars 



which light would take about two millions of 



yean to reach our earth. A ray of light revealing to 



us the history of stars as it was two millions of years 



ago! If such things are dreams or miscalculations, 



> the sublimest regions of mortal thought. 



More amenable to arithmetic is his calculation, that it 



will require not less than 598 years, of 100 work in- 



hours each, to take a census of the stars by looking 



40-feet "only one single moment into each 



part of space, and, even then, so much of the southern 



10 



