TEE INTELLECTUAL OBSERVER. 



JANUARY, 1865. 



CELESTIAL CHEMISTRY, AND THE PHYSICAL 

 CONSTITUTION OF THE STARS AND NEBULA. 



BY THOMAS W. BUBE, E.R.A.S., P.C.S. 

 [With a Coloured Plate.) 



Few things are more remarkable in the present aspect of 

 science than the manner in which its various departments come 

 into contact one with another, thus aiding the student in a 

 way quite unlooked for, and throwing light upon the subject 

 of research from a quarter whence it was least expected. 

 As when stones are thrown into water, so the circle of each 

 science at first seems to be totally distinct from all the others, 

 but gradually these separate circles enlarge and widen, until 

 they intersect and produce larger circles and wider generaliza- 

 tions in the increasing domain of human knowledge. Thus, 

 chemistry was, in the time of Davy, furnished with a new and 

 powerful analytical agent in the shape of voltaic electricity, and 

 the same agency, which is itself evoked by chemical action, has 

 given us the long series of discoveries in electro magnetism, 

 culminating in the splendid practical application of the electric 

 telegraph. So, too, photography, which is essentially chemical in 

 its nature, has been of the greatest service to the physicist in 

 furnishing him with a constant and unerring record of the 

 indications of his barometer, thermometer, and magnetic instru- 

 ments, and has even come to the assistance of the astronomer 

 and depicted for him the changing appearances of the moon's 

 surface, the spots on the sun, and the fleeting phenomena of a 

 solar eclipse. 



Quite recently the application of some of the phenomena 

 of light to the discrimination of the chemical constitution of 

 bodies, or spectrum analysis as it is called, is a discovery of the 

 highest order and most extraordinary utility to the chemist, 

 while its extension to the discovery of the cause of the dark lines 

 VOL. vi. — NO. vi. c c 



