300 Double Stars. — Occultations. 



stars 100 and 71 (a result very nearly agreeing with Laugier's), 

 Arcturus and Capella standing at 84 and 83 of the same scale. 

 We seem to be here reduced to the conclusion that either the 

 methods hifcherto employed of investigating relative brightness 

 are worthy of little confidence, or the results are vitiated by 

 variation of light. Difference of colour, as referred to in our 

 p. 435, may not be without its influence, and possibly other un- 

 known peculiarities may be concerned, since Humboldt has 

 remarked that from some such cause Wega scintillates less than 

 Arcturus and Procyon. From the probability that so splendid 

 an object must be within measurable distance from our eyes, 

 the attention of observers has been much directed to its parallax, 

 but with no great success. W. Struve's later observations gave 

 its amount 0"*2613, inferring a distance 771,400 times greater 

 than that of the Sun ; so that if our solar distance were repre- 

 sented by 1 foot, that of Wega would be 146 miles ; and its 

 light would take 12 years in reaching us. Peters, however, 

 finds less than half this parallax ; Otto Struve, combining both, 

 prefers 0"'1549, widening in proportion that already amazing' 

 interval; while Airy considers all these results as problematical, 

 and the parallax so small — that is, the distance so enormous, — 

 as to be unmeasurable by our present instruments. With these 

 data before him, who can view that glorious object without the 

 impression that he is gazing upon a sun far greater in dimen- 

 sions, or at any rate in splendour, than our own, and bearing a 

 yet more impressive testimony to the majesty of its Creator ? 

 Wega is so situated, that in consequence of that slow motion 

 called " the precession of the equinoxes " — the result of the 

 attraction of the Sun and Moon upon our protuberant equator — 

 by which the axis of the Earth is continually changing its posi- 

 tion with respect to the stars, it might ultimately take the 

 place of the Pole Star, but only after /3 and a CepJwi and 8 

 Gygni had successively gained and relinquished that distinc- 

 tion ; and after a computed period of 12,000 years. 



Thirty-five companions to Wega have been counted (of 

 course with some low power) in the field of the great achro- 

 matic, of 14 - 95 inches aperture, at Harvard University, Cam- 

 bridge, United States. Of these one is much closer than the 

 rest, and we must now try to find it ; but if we succeed, we 

 shall only perceive a very minute speck, barely distinguishable 

 so near the vivid blaze of its overpowering neighbour. Yet 

 who shall say what, in its uncomputed and incalculable and 

 incomprehensible distance, may be the intrinsic splendour and 

 magnitude of that minute speck, so insignificant in our eyes ; 

 upon any estimate, doubtless very far exceeding the bulk of 

 our eight-thousand-mile globe ? Independently, however, of 

 this consideration, which is common to it with hundreds and 



