The Daily bulletin. [volume] (Honolulu [Hawaii]) 1882-1895, 1885-04-04
Ths 9aitB Bnltstin.
SATURDAY, APRIL A, 1885.
THE MILKY WAY.


On dark nights, when clear and
cloudless sky draws our attention to
the heavens and throws into relief
the myriad shining points which stud
the armament, how frequently, more
especially when no companion is
near to disturb our reverie, we stop
to gaze at the beautiful and brilliant
spectacle, and try with mind and
eye to penetrate the marvels and
mysteries of the universe!
From the brightest star to the
faintcst the eye slowly wandcrs, and
we feel at each succeeding moment
that we arc looking farther and yet
farther into the fathomless depths
of space. Here and there appears
some little spot or patch of light,
fainter than the stars, dim and un-
defined as wreath of smoke from
some distant homestead.
But right across one part of the
heavens is broad stream Of light,
of u faint milky whitcness, against
which the stars stand like golden
beads upon film of gossamer.
1t is wide and uniform for q por-
ton of its extent, then divides into
two wavy streams, which ultimately
coalesce; it is also uniform in bright
ness in some parts, irregular in other
portions, with here and there dark
gap, relieved sometimes with few
bright stars that render the black
ness only the more striking.
When Sir William Herschel di-
rected his telescope towards the
Milky Way, he found that its nebu-
lous appearance was due to an in
Vulnerable number of stars-so faint,
but so thickly scattered, as to pre-
sent simply hazy appearance when
viewed by the naked eye.
Taking only a small portion of it,
simply the narrow strip that would
pass the eye-piece of his instrument,
during only one hour of the earth's
revolution, he counted no less than
10000 stars. And yet many patch
es which still appeared nebulous
to him have appeared, in more
powerful telescopes than his, as
clusters of stars also. ....
The more powerful the telescope
that has been used, the more stars
have appeared, and yet there are
many parts of this remarkable por-
ton of the heavens that still appear
nebulous, or hazy. Many parts of
the Milky Way may forever appear
beyond the power of our telescopes,
however efficient we make them.
What this means is beyond the
grasp of the human intellect. AS
tronomcrs have reason to believe,
even if their knowledge does not
amount to certainty, that many of
the stars are suns that are larger
than the orb that lights our world.
They know, too, that many, if not
most, of the fainter stars only ap-
pear faint, on account of their dis
lance.
How many suns are there visible
to every watcher on a clear night !!
How many more must there be in
the immense region Of the Milky
Way! Countless as the grains of
sand by the sea-shore, Unreasonable
rs the drops of water in the ocean! !
We have reason to believe that all
the stars we see, including our sun,
are but the small part of great
clustsr-the more distant part of
which appears as the Milky Way.
Our own sun has bodies revolving
round it, one of which at least-our
worlds inhabited. Some of the
stars, it is believed, have bodies
revolving round them, as We hope to
explain in some future article.
Is it not probable that this is the
case with the many, and not simply
the few, in which the evidence is
most apparent? Apart from the
Milky Way are distant star clusters
how remote we know not-which,
it has been suggested, may rival in
magnitude even the Milky Way-ol
our own universe.
Well might the inspired poet ex.
claim
Lord, what is man that Thou art mind
ful Of him!"
IT
Or Tnou TUE nAUc