A VOYAGE TO THE SUN. 47 



During the next ten million miles of our progress 

 we passed the neighbourhood of several meteor systems, 

 actually traversing three, whereof two were far more 

 important, so far as we could judge, than the one 

 already described. It was worthy of notice also that 

 the members of all these systems travelled much more 

 swiftly than the meteors formerly seen. 



But what appeared to us a most remarkable circum- 

 stance was this, that as we drew nearer towards the sun, 

 these meteor systems became more numerous and more 

 important, while we could recognize many objects 

 resembling comets in their general structure (only 

 they had no tails), but much smaller, insomuch that 

 many of them appeared to be only a few hundred 

 miles in diameter. They were in a general sense 

 round, and became more numerous as we proceeded ; 

 while in several instances we observed that they ap- 

 peared in groups. It would seem from this that 

 multitudes of comets, too small to be discerned by 

 any telescopes yet made, exist within the confines of 

 the solar system ; but whether these are the remains of 

 larger comets, or have an independent cosmical ex- 

 istence, it is difficult to determine. Before we reached 

 the orbit of Venus (now shining very brilliantly on 

 the left of the sun, and through our own motion 

 passing rapidly from Aquarius to Pisces) these objects 

 began to appear in countless numbers, with obvious 

 signs of an increased condensation in the sun's neigh- 

 bourhood. We could perceive that for the most part 

 they were followed by flights of meteors, individually 



