118 SPECIAL RESULTS IN THE URANOLOGICAL PORTION 



but locally, in the southern hemisphere, from e Orionis to 

 a Crucis, rather crowded together in a superb zone in the 

 direction of a great circle. The disagreement in the judg- 

 ments pronounced by different travellers, as to the relative 

 beauty of the northern and southern hemispheres, has often 

 I believe, depended only on the circumstance, that some of 

 he observers had visited the southern regions at a time when 

 the finest constellations culminate in the day-time. Prom the 

 gaugings of the two Herschels in the northern and southern 

 celestial hemispheres, it follows that the fixed stars, from the 

 5th and 6th magnitudes down to the 10th and 15th mag- 

 nitudes, (particularly, therefore, telescopic stars), increase 

 regularly in density as the Milky Way (6 ya\atag KVK\OQ) is 

 approached ; and thus that there may be said to be poles of 

 abundance or richness, and poles of scarcity or poverty, 

 in respect to stars, the latter being at right angles to 

 the principal axis of the Milky "Way. The density of stars is 

 least at the poles of the galactic circle, and increases in all 

 directions, at first slowly, and then more and more rapidly 

 as the galactic polar distance increases. 



By an ingenious and careful consideration of the results 

 of the star-gaugings which we possess, Struve finds that, on 

 the average, there are, in the central pprts of the Milky Way, 

 29-4 times (almost 30 times) as many stars as in the 

 regions around the poles of the Milky Way ; and in northern 

 galactic polar distances of 0, 30, 60, 75, and 90, the 

 ratios of the numbers of stars in the field of view of 15 

 diameter are 4-15, 6-52, 17'68, 30'30, and 122*00. In 

 the comparison of opposite zones, notwithstanding the great 

 similarity in the law of increase in the number of stars, we 

 again find an absolute preponderance f 235 ) on the side of the 

 richer and more beautiful southern heavens. 



