Vermont watchman and State journal. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1836-1883, 1847-01-21

late spheroid, the equatorial being to the po-
lar diameter as IL to III. The surface of
his disc is diversified with belts parallel to
the equator. Sir W. Herschel observed five,
one of which was bright, uniform and broad,
and close to it was dark belt divided by two
narrow white streaks, so that he saw three
dark belts and two bright ones, occupying
wider space than the belts of Jupiter In
addition to these splendid rings, which must
furnish the planet with blaze of light, he
is illuminated by no fewer than seyen satel-
lites, placed at the distance of 100000,
l50, 900, 1907 900, $4,000, 10000, 1885,
600, and 1897 900 miles, and revolving in
23 hours, l day 8 hours, day 81 hours 2
days Is heVrs, days IL hours, Is days %
hours, and 70 days eight hours. The two
innermost were discovered by Sir w. Her
schel, the sixth by Huygens, and all the rest
by Cassini. Captain Smith states, that he
believes that " all the seven satellites were
visible in Sir James South's great refractor
in February, 1880"
Till the year 1881, Saturn was consider
ed the remotest planet of our system; but
Sir w. Herschel, on the 18th March ofthat
year, discovered new planet, now called
URANUS, situated far beyond the region of
Saturn. 1t revolves around the sun in "a
years, at the distance of 1900 millions of
miles. Sir w. Herschel discovered six sat-
elites, which revolve round the planet III 5
days 81 hours, s days II hours, 10 days %
hours, ID days ii hours, 80 days 2 hours,
and 107 days II hours, at the distance of
13, 100 miles, II ,022, 1885, 22,752, 49,
507, 81 ,00S miles respectively
Az the enormous distance from the SIN
which we have now reached, we believed, at
the commencement of this Article, that the
solar system terminated. The late M. Gao
ciatore the successor of Piazzi, had indeed
declared, as we have seen, that he had fol-
lowed for three days moving star, which,
from the slowness of its motion, he suspect
ed to be beyond Uranus but the conjecture
excited no other feeling but that of grief,
that he should not have continued his search
for so interesting body. AT the time we
are now writing, however, the discovery of
a new planet beyond Uranus has been an
nounced to the scientific world-a discove-
ry which will ever be regarded as one of the
grandest triumphs of astronomical science.
To discover planet by the ordinary process
of observation, is an act of no greater mer-
it than that of discovering comet, or any
other celestial object but to predict the ex-
istence of planet from phenomena which
indicated its existence, is one of the finest
achievements which philosophy has ever per-
formed. In comparing the calculated with
the observed places of Uranus, discrepan-
cy appeared which could not be explained
by any of the perturbations produced by the
other planets The devations in question
lsccmed to be owing to the disturbing action
of planet more distant than Uranus. NJ
LIE Verrier undertook the problem of COM
lputing the probable place of the supposed
planet, from the nature and amount of its
perturbations as affecting Uranus, and he
seems to have obtained correct solution of
it. The planet was actually discovered on
the Odd of Sept. 1916, at Berlin, by nj. Gale,
of the Royal Observatory, and has been
since seen at Mr.. Bishops Observatory in
Regents Park 1t resembles star of the
9th magnitude, having diameter of three
seconds, and volume $50 times that of the
Earth. In conformity with BODIES law, its
distance will be about 1853 millions of miles,
and its periodic time about 1928 years, and
if there should still be another planet, its
distance would be nearly 1000 millions of
miles. With a Newtonian rejecting tele-
scope 20 feet in focal, and with an aperture
of "a inches and powers of from 3l6 to 567,
Mr. Lassels of Liverpool has examined this
planet, and has announced Tin The Tines
the probability that it has a ring like Sat-
urn, and satellite. Con the Sd October, :"
he says, I" at about 8 "a hours, | observed
the planet to have apparently very oblique-
ly situated ring, the major axis being seven
or eight times the length of the minor, and
having direction nearly at right angles to
parallel of declnation. At the distance
of about three diameters of the disc of the
planet northwards, and not far from the plane
Of the ring but little following, there was
situate minute star, having every appear
ance of satellite. l observed the planet
again, about two hours later, and noticed the
same appearances With regard to the
existence of the ring, am not able abso-
lutely to declare it, but / received so many
impressions of it, always in the same form
and direction, and with all the different mag
nifying powers, that / feel very strong per-
suasion that nothing but purer state of at
mosphere is necessary to enable me to veri-
fly the discovery. OF the existence of star
having every aspect of a satellite, there is
not the shadow of doubt Afterwards turn
ed the telescope to the Georgium Sidas I u
ranus), and remarked that the brightest two
of his satellites were both obviously bright
er than this small star accompanying LIE YER
rier's planet"
The writer here goes on to state, that as
early as January, 1S43, Mr.. Adams, an
undergraduate of Cambridge University,
(England,) endeavored to account for the
anomalies in the motions of Uranus on the
hypothesis of more distant planet. He
continued his investigations until Sept
ember, 1915, when he communicated his
calculations to Professor Challis, of that
University, who commenced series OF
observations, and in Aug. '46 he twice dis
covered planet, which turns out to be
lie Verrier's-though Professor Challis
did not in fact perceive what his own OBJ
servations proved, until after the detection
of the planet at Berlin by M. Gale.
1t would be presumptuous to assert that
we have reached the limits of our system,
ILL, Al.