F. W. Very— A Cosmic Cycle. 57 



dred times that of our sun. Their masses may even now 

 exceed the limit demanded by the explosion hypothesis. 



From some of the stars, nebulous arms proceed on opposite 

 sides. Here the explosion has not been strong enough to blow 

 the star to pieces ; but more complex interlacing structures, 

 and clusters of stars come either from successive explosions, or 

 from a single one of such power as to produce disruption along 

 a multitude of diverging paths. A sufficiently powerful explo- 

 sion will give free wandering stars ; and globular clusters, in 

 this view, are relatively transient associations. The ultimate 

 fate of aggregations formed in such a manner must be to 

 break up. The star sprays and star drift noted by Mr. Proctor 

 in his " Universe of Stars" may have resulted from such dis- 

 persals. The government of the heavens is like that of a great 

 republic. No regal orb compels allegiance of a host of infe- 

 riors. The solar system is. a family, where the relations of 

 parent and child are recognized ; but the stellar universe is a 

 brotherhood, in which freedom and equality reign. 



This view distinctly traverses the conception which has pre- 

 vailed hitherto : that star-clusters are agglomerations con- 

 densed by the attraction of gravitation. If this were so, those 

 clusters in which the action has been going on longest should 

 be the most highly condensed. Instead of this, we find the 

 most open and least typical clusters, such as Coma Berenices, 

 to be those which include the greatest variety of stellar spectra 

 and the most advanced types. * 



The splitting of a star in two by a directed explosion at its 

 center should, in general, originate two equal motions in oppo- 

 site directions in the equatorial plane, for the reason that cen- 

 trifugal force diminishes the pressure in this plane of which 

 some particular diameter is liable to form a line of least 

 resistance. 



As the outer layers are not concerned in the explosion, they 

 remain at rest and constitute inert envelopes which will be 

 dragged along by the moving parts, retarding them and per- 

 haps at last destroying their motion by friction. The result 

 will be a pulling out of the material of the star into finger-like 

 extensions whose form, persistent through the partial or perhaps 

 complete destruction of relative motion, will depend upon the 

 relative velocities of the original rotation and proper motion, 

 combined with the varying velocity due to the explosion, as 

 the motion is gradually overcome by friction. 



Except in the rare case of a star without proper motion, or 

 of one whose proper motion is in the equatorial plane, the 



* Compare E. C. Pickering aided by M. Fleming, " Miscellaneous Investigations 

 of the Henry Draper Memorial," Ann. Harvard Coll. Obs., vol. xxxvi, part 2, Table 

 29. p. 283, 1897. 



