Fixed Stars. 59 



der the name of nebulce ; and that light- 

 coloured irregular circle or band which 

 encompasses the heavens, and is distin- 

 guishable from the etherial blue by its 

 brilliancy ; that shining zone, which 

 owes its splendour to the innumerable 

 stars of which it is formed, and which 

 passes through many of the constellations 

 in its ample range, is called the Galaxy^ 

 the via lactea, or the milky way. 



The idea of classing the stars under 

 well known forms probably originated 

 with the Egyptian shepherds, who dur- 

 ing the silent watches of the night (as 

 they slept in the open air) had no other 

 objects to contemplate than those which 

 the starry heavens presented ; among 

 these, assisted by the powers of a fertile 

 imagination, they discovered a distant 

 resemblance of such things as they were 

 most familiar with. The shepherds thus 

 conceiving the figures of things in the 

 firmament, the poets embellished the il- 

 lusion with the fictions of mythology, 

 till the heavens were, as it were, filled 

 with these imaginary creatures, and these 

 were increased in after ages, and served 

 astronomers in their accounts of the star- 



