The Londonderry sifter. (South Londonderry, Vt.) 1883-19??, 1892-05-13
Astronomical Progress.

1--WE have but entered the vestibule of
our acquaintance with the universe"
says Camille Flammarion. "May there
not exist among the planetary races
psychic bonds whereof we are as yet ig-
norant?"
Well, we will give it up, that last part
of the problem. But the latest achieve
ments in astronomy give reason to hope
that many things now seemingly impos-
sible may become as easy as making an
egg stand on end was to Columbus, when
we once know how it is done. The best
that has been accomplished by astrono-
mers in many year is the finding out
how to get the physical constitution of
star. Photography has come to the
aid of astronomy in accomplishing mar
wells. A star is viewed through tele-
scope. Its light is made to fall upon a
prism. This prism separates the rays.
They fall as colored ribbon upon a
screen beyond and the ribbon is photo
graphed.
Optical chemistry discovered some
years ago that each substance known to
man makes, when it burns and its blaze
is passed through prism, ribbon of
light peculiar to itself, which never va
ries. If at times other rays are mingled
with those of this ribbon or spectrum it
shows that other substances have been
mixed with the first one. By compar-
ing the ribbons or spectra formed on the
screen by the different substances known
on our earth with the spectrum formed
by the light of a given star astronomers
can determine the constituent clements
of that star.
Some time ago it was found at the
Harvard observatory that the rays of
the spectra were double in case of GER
tain stars. This led to the wonderful
discovery that certain stars in the far
off universe have other stars revolving
about them with rapidity that is al
most inconceivable to US. Sometimes
the twin star is so far away that its
light cannot be seen by us through any
telescope yet invented, but we know the
star is there from its spectrum. AS
tronOmers have even been able to cal
culate how long it takes these stars to
revolve about one another Sometimes
star visible through the telescope dis
appears altogether at regular intervals
and appears serenely in the heavens
again. In this case the star goes into
eclipse behind dark star. Algol, the
fiery orb in Medusa, has been found to
be a double star of immense size. the
twins being composed of one white sun
and one totally dark one. The two fly
about each other in days, 20 hours, 4S
minutes, SO seconds.
Another great double star is the one
called Menkalinan, near the White Ca
pella. These twins waltz around each
other at the dizzy rate of $3.50 miles
minute. This double sun is 800 900 times
as heavy as our earth. 1t travels well
for large body. In many cases both
stars are light, as with Mizar in the con-
Btellation of the Dipper. These revolve
more slowly, performing their journey
in 104 days.
The above discovery in regard to the
spectra of double stars may be consid-
cred perhaps the most important one
made in astronomy in years. Another,
however, is almost equal to it. That is,
that by the same two boons to astrono-
mers, spectral analysis and astro-pho-
Biography, it is possible to ascertain
whether star is approaching earth or
receding from it. These two achieve
ments, together with the fact that we
are constantly obtaining more and more
powerful telescopes, constitute the most
important results of astronomical work
in the past few years.