102 COSMOS. 



period of thirty-seven years. Throughout this examination 1 

 have kept in view the Chinese observations oi extraordinary 

 stars, most of which, according to the opinion of the most 

 eminent astronomers, are deserving of our confidence. Why 

 it is that of the ncM^ stars seen in Europe, that of Kepler in 

 Ophiuchus (1604) is in all probability recorded in the rec- 

 ords of Ma-tuan-lin, while that of Tycho in Cassiopeia (1572) 

 is not noticed, I, for my part, am as little able to explain as 

 I am to account for the fact that no mention was made in 

 the sixteenth century, among European astronomers, of the 

 great luminous phenomenon which was observed in China 

 in February, 1578. The difference of longitude (114°) could 

 only, i-n a few instances, account for their not being visible. 

 Whoever has been engaged in such investigations, must be 

 well aware that the want of record either of political events 

 or natural phenomena, either upon the earth or in the heav- 

 ens, is not invariably a proof of their never having taken 

 place ; and on comparing together the three different cata- 

 logues which are given in Ma-tuan-lin, we actually find com- 

 ets (those, for instance, of 1385 and 1495) mentioned in one 

 but omitted in the others. 



Even the earlier astronomers (Tycho Brahe and Kepler), 

 as well as the more modern (Sir John Herschel and Hind), 

 have called attention to the fact that the great majority (four 

 fifths, I make it) of all the new stars described both in Eu- 

 rope and China have appeared in the neighborhood of or 

 wdthin the Milky ^Yay. If that which gives so mild and 

 nebulous a light to the annular starry strata of the Milky 

 Way is, as is more than probable, a mere aggregation of 

 small telescopic stars, Tycho Brahe's hypothesis, which we 

 have already mentioned, of the formation of new, suddenly- 

 shining fixed stars, by the globular condensation of celestial 

 vapor, falls at once to the ground. What the influence of 

 gravitation may be among the crowded strata and clusters 

 of stars, supposing them to revolve round certain central nu- 

 clei, is a question not to be here determined, and belongs to 

 the mythical part of Astrognosy. Of the twenty-one new 

 stars enumerated in the above list, five (those of 134, 393, 

 827, 1203, and 15^1) appeared in Scorpio, three in Cassi- 

 opeia and Cepheus (y45, 1264, 1572), and four in Ophiu- 

 chus (123, 1230, 1604, 1848). Once, however (1012), one 

 was seen in Aries at a great distance from the Milky Way 

 (th3 star seen by the monk of St. Gall). Kepler himself, 

 who, however, considers as a new star that described by Fa- 



