220 COSMOS. 



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 

 Europe and China, have appeared in the neighbourhood of 

 or within the Milky Way. 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 vapour, 

 falls at once to the ground. What the influence of gravi- 

 tation may be among the crowded strata and clusters of 

 stars, supposing them to revolve round certain central 

 nuclei, 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 1584) appeared in Scorpio, three in 

 Cassiopeia and Cepheus (945, 1264, 1572), and four in 

 Ophiuchus (123, 1230, 1604, 1848). Once, however (1012), 

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

 Way (the star seen by the monk of St. Gall). Kepler 

 himself, who however considers as a new star that de- 

 scribed by Fabricius, as suddenly shining in the neck of 

 Cetus in the year 1596, and as disappearing in October of 

 the same year, likewise advances this position as a proof to 

 the contrary. (Kepler, De Stella Nova Serp., p. 112.) Is it 

 allowable to infer, from the frequent lighting up of such stars 

 in the same constellations, that in certain regions of space 

 those, namely, where Cassiopeia and Scorpio are to be seen- 

 the conditions of their illuminations are favoured by certain 

 local relations? Do such stars as are peculiarly fitted for 

 the explosive temporary processes of light, especially lie in 

 (hose directions ? 



