408 POPULAR LECTURES AND ADDRESSES. 



of the original fall of the globes becomes trans- 

 formed in the first collision, takes probably about 

 three-fifths of the whole amount of that energy. 

 The time of flying out would probably be less 

 than half a year, when the fluid mass must begin 

 to fall in again towards the axis. In something 

 less than a year after the first collision the fluid 

 will again be in a state of maximum crowding 

 round the centre, and this time probably even 

 more violently agitated than it was immediately 

 after the first collision ; and it will again fly out- 

 ward, but this time axially towards the places 

 whence the two globes fell. It will again fall 

 inwards, and after a rapidly subsiding series of 

 quicker and quicker oscillations it will subside, 

 probably in the course of two or three years, into 

 a globular star of about the same mass, heat, 

 and brightness, as our present sun, but differ- 

 ing from him in this, that it will have no 

 rotation. 



We supposed the two globes to have been at 

 rest when they were let fall from a mutual distance 

 equal to the diameter of the earth's orbit. Sup- 



