The Kenosha telegraph. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1860-1888, 1870-09-22

machinery OF the solar system, Ii was still
thought bold speculation among astron-
omers to suppose that the same law ap.
plies to more distant bodies That It'll
could never be more than a speculation,
no one dared to hope; for although ages
OF observation and study had been given
to the visible heavens, yet, until within
the lifetime OF astronomers still at work, u
not a step had been made toward deter
mining the size, distance, grouping in
space or movement OF any OF the heav-
emily bodies not included in the empire
of eur sun; and many of the very lest
men best able to torn Judgment, re-
garded it as certain that all the myriadsl
of what are called { fixed stars " would
never be anything to human science but
indefinitely remote points of light
Stellar astronomy has, indeed, been
almost created since the philosopher
Compile declared that astronomy itself
was substantially finished science and
that henceforth nothing could be done
but to fill up and rectify its details. A
strange comment on this conclusion, the
wisest that could be formed forty wears
ago, is to be found in recent number of
Chambers Journal, in an Intelligent arti
Gle upon the star Algol," giving the
results of recent researches as applied to
this interesting body.
Algol is usually the brightest star of
the little constellation called Medussa'sl
Head, lying between Cass1opeia and the,
Pleiades :: and is then of the second mag
nituoe, that is, in brightness it is between
Aldebarian and Alcyone. But in every
sixty hours there are about seven during
which its brightness varies, diminishing
for three and half hours, and thenin.
creasing for as long time at the mid
die of this period being of the fourth
magnitude, or ofmuch less than half its
usual brilliancy
There is no reasonable doubt that these
changes are caused by the revolution of
an Opaque satellite, whose diameter is
four-ffths of that of the star This plan
ct reyolves around Algol in two and
half days, and by an application of ia.
miliar mechanical principle is therefore
at dis ;ance from him of nearly seven
times its own diameter: more exactly, the |
diameter of Algol, that of his sateflite,lI
and their distance apart, are proportion1I
al to the numbers 40, Al and 2803 I'VE |
have no means OF knowing the absolute
dimensions of any of these distances
but we know, for instance, that if the
satellite is as far from the sun, then AlgolJ
himself must be an enormous sun, sixteen
millions of miles in diameter, or with
volume eight thousand times as great as
that of the sun around which we move. I
1t seems impossible that he can be less
than five hundred times as large as our
sum- ~ at''+ - 2@a v4 II
Another fact clearly inferred by me-
chanical laws from the masses of these
bodies and their time of revolution is |
their average density and this Is found1
to be only one fifth as great as that of +
our sun. If we suppose the solar system
to have been formed as Laplace imagin.
ed, and as astronomers more and more in
cline to believe, by the gradual condens-
alton of mass which was at first diffused
vapor, then fiery liquid, and lastly
gradual cooling and contracting ball, be
coming solid in the lapse of ages, then
Algol may be taken as representing the
state of our system, ages ago; before the
first traces of the earth, as now known to
geology were formed. 1t seems probable,
indeed, that Algols satellite is scarcely
denser than cloud, and that its period
Of revolution is constantly shortened by
the resistance of the medium which APP
pears to fill all space, and which, In a III
still higher degree, diminishes the orbits
IF comets, and at last forces them to the
sun g} s0y ni ~
SO much, then, may be said to be I
known Of this inconceivably remote star,
md of the satellite which it certainly pos ,
sesses, although no human eye has ever
seen it. In astronomy, as in all true sci
snce, the mind sees much further than
,he eye, and constantly makes the most
brilliant discoveries, which the eye only
confirms afterwards, And, in this science
he insatiate thought of man ventures +
sven beyond all that his eyes, or those of
my of his race, have seen or ever can see,
depicting to himself, by inevitable infer
,nce from what is before him in the heav- !
ms, the state of the universe in which we !
low live, as it was in ages before the Z
arth itself had a being, and as it shall
'e, after this little globe, and all the sys- !
EN- of which it is part, shall have full
lied their end and passed away t
A train of cars going up steep Grade in :
icho canon, California, was brought to q
cad nal: by the grasshoppers. It seems
hat the iniquities of that region has brought /,
n Egyptian plague upon the people, and the =
round was literally covered with the de- !
curing insects. The car wheels crushed /
hem on the tracks, and their unctuous +
odies so fabricated the rails as to destroy all
rlctlon, and the train came to a stop. By
lint OF sand and brooms, it worked it's way I
hF0nOh