NOTES. 1XV 



refractor (1656), he said (as I have already remarked in the 2nd Vol. of 

 Kosmos, S. 514, English edition, Note 503, p. cxviii): "viam lacteara per- 

 spicillis inspectara nullas habere nebulas "; and that the Milky Way, like all 

 that had been taken for nebulous stars, was a great cluster of stars. The 

 passage is printed in Hugenii Opera Varia, 1724, p. 593. 



( 252 ) p. 125. Cape Observations, 105, 107, and 328. On the annular 

 nebula, No. 3686, see p. 114. 



( 253 ) p. 126. "Intervals absolutely dark and completely void of any star 

 of the smallest telescopic magnitude." Outlines, p. 536. 



( 254 ) p. 127. "No region of the heavens is fuller of objects beautiful and 

 remarkable in themselves, and rendered still more so by their mode of asso- 

 ciation, and by the peculiar features assumed by the Milky Way, which are 

 without a parallel in any other part of its course" (Cape Observations, p. 386). 

 This animated expression of Sir John Herschel's agrees perfectly with the 

 impressions which I myself received. Captain Jacob (Bombay Engineers), in 

 speaking of the intensity of light of the Milky Way in the vicinity of the 

 Southern Cross, says, with striking truth, " such is the general blaze of star- 

 light near the Cross from that part of the sky, that a person is immediately 

 made aware of its having risen above the horizon, though he should not be at 

 the time looking at the heavens, by the increase of general illumination of 

 the atmosphere, resembling the effect of the young moon." See Piazzi 

 Smyth on the orbit of a Cent, in the Transactions of the Royal Society of 

 Edinburgh (Vol. xvi. p. 445). 



( 253 ) p. 127. Outlines 789 and 791 ; Cape Observations, 325. 



t 256 ) p. 127. Almagest, lib. viii. cap. 2 (T. ii. p. 84 and 90, Halma) 

 Ptolemy's description is in particular parts excellent, especially compared with 

 Aristotle's treatment of the subject of the Milky Way. (Meteor, lib. 1. 

 pp. 29 and 34, according to Ideler's Edition.) 



( 257 ) p. 129. Outlines, p. 531. Also between a and y Cassiopeia, a 

 strikingly dark spot or patch is ascribed to the contrast with the bright parts 

 by which it is surrounded. See Struve, Etudes stell. Note 58. 



( 258 ) p. 130. An extract from the exceedingly rare work of Thomas 

 Wright of Durham (Theory of the Universe, London 1750), has been given by 

 de Morgan in the Philosophical Magazine (Series iii. No. 32, p. 241). Thomas 

 Wright, to whose writings the attention of astronomers has been permanently 

 directed since the beginning of the present century, by the influence of the 

 ingenious speculations of Kant and William Herschel on the form of our 

 sidereal stratum, observed only with a reflector of 1 foot focal length. 



VOL. III. e 



