GAL 



GAL 



that neighbourhood, he found 63 stars ; 

 other six fields contained 110, 60, 70, 90, 

 70, and 74 stars ; a mean of all which gave 

 79 for the number of stars to each field ; 

 and thus he found, that by allowing 15 

 minutes for the diameter of his field of 

 view, a belt of 15 degress long and two 

 broad, which he had often seen pass be- 

 fore his telescope in an hour's time, could 

 not contain less than 50,000 stars, large 

 enough to be distinctly numbered ; be- 

 sides which, he suspected twice as many 

 more, which could be seen only now and 

 then by faint glimpses, for want of suffi- 

 cient light. The success he had within 

 the milky-way soon induced him to turn 

 his telescope to the nebulous parts of the 

 heavens, of with an accurate list had 

 been published in the " Connoisance des 

 Temps, for 1783 and 1784." Most of 

 these yielded to a Newtonian reflector, 

 of 20 feet focal distance, and 12 inches 

 aperture , which plainly discovered them 

 to be composed of stars, or at least to 

 contain stars, and to show every other 

 indication of its consisting of them en- 

 tirely. 



" The nebulae (says he) are arranged 

 in strata, and run on to a great length, 

 and some of them I have been able to 

 pursue, and to guess pretty well at their 

 form and direction. It is probable enough 

 that they may surround the whole starry 

 sphere of the heavens, not unlike the 

 milky-way, which undoubtedly is nothing 

 but a stratum of fixed stars: and as this 

 latter immense starry bed is not of equal 

 breadth or lustre in every part, nor runs 

 on in one straight direction, but is curv- 

 ed, and even divided into two streams 

 along a very considerable portion of it, 

 v we may likewise expect the greatest va- 

 riety in the strata of the cluster of stars 

 and nebulae. One of these nebulous beds 

 is so rich, that in passing through a sec- 

 tion of it in the time of only 36 minutes, 

 I have detected no less than 31 nebulae, 

 all distinctly visible upon a fine blue sky. 

 Their situation and shape, as well as con- 

 dition, seem to denote the greatest va- 

 riety imaginable. In another stratum, or 

 perhaps a different branch of the former, 

 I have often seen double and treble ne- 

 bulae variously arranged ; large ones, with 

 small seeming attendants; narrow, but 

 much extended lucid nebulae or bright 

 dashes ; some of the shape of a fan, re- 

 sembling an electric brush issuing from a 

 lucid point ; others of the cometic shape, 

 with a seeming nucleus in the centre, or 

 like cloudy stars, surrounded with a ne- 

 bulous atmosphere: a different sort, 

 again, contain a nebulosity of the milky 





kind, like that wonderful inexplicable 

 phenomenon about Orion is ; while others 

 shine with a fainter mottled kind of light, 

 which denotes their being resolvable into 

 stars. 



" It is very probable that the great 

 stratum, called the milky -way, is that in 

 which the sun is placed, though perhaps 

 not in the very centre of its thickness. 

 We gather this from the appearance of 

 the galaxy, which seems to encompass 

 the whole heavens, as it certainly must 

 do, if the sun is within the same ; for, sup- 

 pose a number of stars arranged between 

 two parallel planes, indefinitely extended 

 every way, but at a given considerable 

 distance from one another, and calling 

 this a sideral stratum, an eye placed 

 somewhere within it will see all the stars 

 in the direction of the planes of the stra- 

 tum projected into a great circle, which 

 will appear lucid, on account of the accu- 

 mulation of the stars, while the rest of 

 the heavens, at the sides, will only seem 

 to be scattered over with constellations, 

 more or less crowded, according to the 

 distance of the planes, or number of stars, 

 contained in the thickness or sides of the 

 stratum." 



GALBANUM, in pharmacy, is obtain- 

 ed from the bubon galbanum, a plant 

 found in Africa. By cutting the plant 

 across, a milky juice flows out, which 

 soon hardens, and constitutes galbanum. 

 It is brought here from the Levant, in 

 small pieces, agglutinated together ; its 

 taste is acrid, and its smell strong ; the 

 specific gravity is 1.2. It is partly solu- 

 ble in water and alcohol, and when dis- 

 tilled, it yields about half its weight of 

 volatile oil, which is of a bluish co- 

 lour. 



GALBULA, the jacamar, in natural 

 history, a genus of birds of the order 

 Picae. Generic character: bill strait, 

 very long, quadrangular, and pointed ; 

 nostrils situated near the base of the bill, 

 and oval ; tongue pointed and short ; 

 legs feathered before, down to the toes ; 

 feet formed for climbing. There are four 

 species. 



G. alcedo, is about the size of a lark, 

 and is of a most elegant and brilliant plu- 

 mage. It is found in the damp places of 

 the woods of Guiana and Brazil, feeding 

 on insects, and is of very solitary and se- 

 questered habits, continuing motionless 

 on its perch during the whole night, and 

 often also a considerable part of the day, 

 and but rarely seen otherwise than alone. 

 Naturalists are but imperfectly acquaint- 

 ed with the jacamar genus, aud know no 

 thing of its nest and eggs. 



