NEBULAE. 301 



figuration; he also was the first to undertake, though with 

 little result, the difficult task of analysing the heterogeneous 

 contents of the Magellanic Clouds (nubecula major et minor]. 

 If we subtract the 14 n'ebulse, which, even with instruments 

 of low powers, were perfectly resolved into true clusters of 

 stars, from the other 42 isolated nebulous spots which La- 

 caille observed in the southern heavens, there remain only 28, 

 whilst Sir John Herschel, by the aid of more powerful instru- 

 ments, as well as greater skill and superior powers of obser- 

 vation, succeeded in discovering under the same zone, and 

 also independently of clusters, as many as 1,500 nebulous 

 spots. 



Devoid of personal knowledge or experience of the subject, 

 and originally ignorant of each other's attempts, although 

 both had very similar aims in view, 17 Lambert (from 1749) 

 and Kant (from 1755) speculated with admirable sagacity 

 on nebulous spots, detached galaxies and sporadic nebu- 

 lous and stellar islands scattered singly through the realms 

 of space. Both inclined to the nebular hypothesis, and to 

 the idea of a perpetual development in the regions of space, 

 and even of a star-formation from cosmical vapour. The 

 great traveller, Le Gentil (1760-1 7G9), long before his 

 voyages, and his unsuccessful observations of the transit of 

 Venus, had imparted animation to the study of nebula3 by his 



17 On the community and difference of ideas between Kant 

 and Lambert, as well as in reference to the period of their 

 publications, see Struve, Etudes cCAstr. stellaire, pp. 11, 13, 

 21, notes 7, 15, and 33. Kant's Allgemeine Natur-Geschichte 

 und Theorie des Himmels appeared anonymously, and was 

 dedicated to Frederick the Great, 1755. Lambert's Photo- 

 metria* as already remarked, appeared in 1760; and his 

 Sammlung kosmologischer Briefe uber die Einrichtung des 

 Weltbaues.m 1761. 



