146 COSMOS. 



Herschel, a twenty-feet instrument penetrates 900, and a 

 forty-feet one 2800 distances of Sirius), the Milky Way ap- 

 pears as diversified in its sidereal contents as it is irregular 

 and indefinite in its outlines and limits when seen by. the 

 unaided eye. While in some parts the Milky Way exhibits, 

 throughout a large space, the greatest uniformity in the light 

 and apparent magnitudes of the stars, in others the most 

 brilliant patches of closely-crowded luminous points are in- 

 terrupted by granular or reticular darker* intervals contain- 

 ing but few stars ; and in some of these intervals in the in- 

 terior of the Galaxy not the smallest star (of the 18m. or 

 20m.) is to be discovered. It almost seems as though, in 

 these regions, we actually saw through the whole starry 

 stratum of the Milky Way. In gauging with a field of view 

 of 15' diameter, fields presenting on an average forty or fifty 

 stars are almost immediately succeeded by others exhibiting 

 from 400 to 500. Stars of the higher magnitudes often oc- 

 cur in the midst of the most minute telescopic stars, while 

 aU the intermediate classes are absent. Perhaps those stars 

 which Ave regard as belonging to the lowest order of mag:- 



COO O 



nitudes do not always appear as such, solely on account of 

 their enormous distance, but also because they actually have 

 a smaller volume and less considerable development of light. 

 In order rightly to comprehend the contrast presented by 

 the greater brilliancy, abundance, or paucity of stars, it will 

 be necessary to compare regions most widely separated from 

 each other. The maximum of the accumulation and the 

 greatest luster of stars are to be found between the prow of 

 Argo and Sagittarius, or, to speak more exactly, between the 

 Altar, the tail of the Scorpion, the hand and bow of Sagit- 

 tarius, and the right foot of Ophiuchus. "No region of the 

 heavens is fuller of objects, beautiful and remarkable in 

 themselves, and rendered still more so by their mode of as- 

 sociation" and grouping.! Next in brightness to this por- 



* *' Intervals absolutely dark ayid completely void of any star of the 

 smallest telescopic magnitude." — Outlines, p. 536. 



t " No region of the heavens is fuller of objects, beautiful and re- 

 markable in themselves, and rendered still more so by their mode of 

 fi.ssociation, and by the peculiar features assumed by the IMilky Way, 

 which are without a parallel in any other part of its course." — Observ- 

 ati-o7is at the Cape, p. 386. This vivid description of Sir John Herschel 

 entirely coincides with the impressions I have myself experienced. 

 Capt. Jacob, of the Bombay Engineers, in speaking of the intensity of 

 light in the Milky Way, in the vicinity of the Southern Cross, remarks 

 with .'Striking truth, " Such is the general blaze of starlight near the 

 Cross from that part of the sky. that a [>erson is iinmediaioly made 



