THE STELLAR UNIVERSE. 



naked eye being capable of perceiving stars until we attain to the twelfth or- 

 der of distance. The telescope then carries our view still further, and by the 

 highest powers to which it has hitherto attained, it brings within our view 

 stars which may be considered to lie at the 2,400th order of distance, and from 

 which light would therefore take 24,000 years to come. 



Armed with such powers, Sir William Herschel commenced the unparalleled 

 enterprise of a general survey of the stellar universe. It was easily rendered 

 apparent that our system is placed within a mass of suns of vast extent and 

 countless number. The few which immediately surround us appear by their 

 comparative proximity largest, or rather brightest, and are accordingly classed 

 as stars of the first magnitude. Those which lie immediately beyond them, 

 occupying a wider circle, and proportionally more numerous, are, by reason 

 of their greater distance, of inferior magnitude. Thus, the greater the dis- 

 tance we contemplate, and the wider the circle over which the stars are dis- 

 tributed, the greater they are found to be in number, and the less intense in 

 splendor. 



These observations are not applicable alone to the stars visible to the naked 

 eye. Direct the most ordinary telescope to any quarter of the heavens, and 

 move it slowly about so as to sweep a small portion of the firmament, and it 

 will be found that many stars will be visible in it which were before not ob- 

 servable. Such stars lie beyond the sphere of natural vision. 



But is the system to which the earth is attached surrounded by an equal 

 depth of stars in every direction ? Is it in the centre of a globular mass of 

 stars? and if so, what order of distance is to be assigned to the most remote 

 of these surrounding suns? If not, must we not expect to find stars smaller 

 and more thickly crowded together in those directions where they extend to 

 more remote distances than in those where they are more limited in their dis- 

 tance ? Just as we should find the appearance of the stems of the trees if we 

 stood in the middle of a wood which is narrow in one direction and long in 

 another ? These questions can be satisfactorily resolved only by a general 

 examination of the entire firmament, and by observing whether the stars are 

 more numerous, smaller, and more thickly crowded together in some regions 

 than in others. 



There is a remarkable band, or zone, which surrounds the firmament, form- 

 ing very nearly a great circle of the heavens, and presenting to the naked eye 

 the appearance of a cloudy or nebulous whiteness. This has been called the 

 Via Lactea or the Milky Way. Its course, which however is not regular, has 

 a direction nearly at right angles to the celestial equator, intersecting that 

 circle at two points, one of which is near the belt of Orion, and the other near 

 the constellation of Aquila, rendered conspicuous by the bright star Atair, just 

 on the verge of the Milky Way. If we take a general view of the heavens, 

 even without the aid of a telescope, we shall find that in those regions most 

 remote from this remarkable zone, the stars are thinly scattered, and as 

 we approach it in any direction they become smaller, more numerous, and 

 more crowded. This becomes still more strongly manifested when we resort 

 to telescopes, by which (when of sufficient space-penetrating power), the as- 

 tonishing fact is disclosed that this whitish zone consists entirely of small stars, 

 too minute to be individually distinguished without a telescope, and which are 

 scattered by countless millions, " like glittering dust on the black ground of 

 the general heavens." 



" A broad and ample road, -whose dust is gold, 

 And pavement stars, as stars to us appear ; 

 Seen in the galaxy that Milky Way, 

 Like to a circling zone powdered with stars." MILTOK. 



