The Evansville daily journal. [volume] (Evansville, Ia. [i.e. Ind.]) 1848-1862, 1858-09-30


sun in few days. Its brilliancy will in
crease rapidly up to the close of the first
week in October, when it will put on its
most splendid appearance, and will then
! rival in grandeur the famous comet Of Hal
ley, at its last return in 1885.
1t is by far the most imposing object of
the kind which has visited our system since
the erection of the Cincinnati Observatory.
Owing to the fact that the direction of its
motion is, or has been, so nearly in line
toward the earth,s the elements of its orbit
have not been very accurately determined.
The plane in which it moves is inclined to
that part of our earth's orbit, under an
angle of about sixty-five degrees.
Its observed positions are for the present
better represented by an orbit in the form
of a parabola, than by any ono of an eliI-
tic figure. The comet will soon commence
to change direction, at first slowly, after
ward more rapidly, as seen from the earth,
when sweeping swiftly round the sun it
will regain those distant regions of space
wherein vast proportion of its orbit lies
far beyond the reach of telescope vision.
On the evening Of the 18th OF September,
the appearance of the comet, in the great
refractor of the Cincinnati Observatory, was
especially interesting. The central portion,
or nucleus was examined with powers vary
ing from one hundred to five hundred, with
out presenting any evidence of well de-
fined planetary disc. IT was a brilliant
glow of light, darting and flashing forward
in the direction of the motion toward the
sun, and leaving the region behind in COM
parative obScurity. But the most wonder
/ ful physical feature presented was a por-
! ton of a nearly circular, ncbulous ring,
with its vertex directed towards Tie sun, the
bright nucleus being in the centre. This
nebulous ring resembled those which some
| times escape from a steanl-ppe, but did not
exhibit any appearance which ought to he
presented by a hollow heiT1ispberical envei-
! op OF nebulous matter. There was an evil
| dent concentration of light IN the central
! portions of the ring, while, in the case of .
hollow envelope, the brightest portion
should be at the outer edgo. By micromet-
rical measurement, the distance from the
! central point to the circumference of the
: ring was found to be about nine thousand
miles. This would give diameter of
. eighteen thousand miles, in case the ring
was entire. Similar measurements, made
on the evening Of the 26th of September,
/ indicate decided increase in the radius of
/ the ring which was now not less than
! twelve thousand miles in length. On the
| same evening ! noticed the fact that the lu-
lninous envelop did not blend itself into the
head portion of the tail, but appeared some
! what to penetrate into this rcbulous mass
! especially ON the upper part, presenting the
! appearance of about 200 degrees of spiral
The tail, on the 25th, was decidedly brighter
anI better defined on the upper than on the
lower portion, while on the evening Of the
26th there was much nearer appoach to
equality in brightness, especially near The
head uf The comet. Through the telescope,
and near the head, the tail presented the ap-
! pearance of 4 hollow ncbulouS envelop
under the form of a parabalod Of revolution,
| the edges being brightest and we'll defined
! while there was a manifest fading away Of
light toward the central region. Through
the vast depths of nebulous matter compos-
ing this wonderful appendage the flintest
telescope stars shone with undiminished
brightness.
No one can gaze on this gigantic object,
III all its misty :plendor, without deep i'm
preston that the eye is resting on q mass
of nebulogs matter precisely such rs the
ncbulor theory of La Place supposes to have
been the primordial condition of our sun
and all its attendant planets, from which
chaotic condition this beautiful system Of
revolving worlds has been evoked by the
action of single law.
The only comet which has presented an
appearance resembling the one now visible.
is the one known Is IIalley's Comet as seen
by Sir William ITerschcl and others, in its
return in 1896. There is q marked differ
ence between the two: That while the en-
velop of Halley's Comet is described as a
hemispherical hollow enreiop, this shows
more the shape of nebulous ring; there
is faint, misty light, Ct irregular outline,
but not to be mistaken by even a casual OBJ
server.