Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1900-09-01
Der STARS.
The Milky Way is a Striking Fea-
ture at Present.
THE GRAND ENIGMA OF THE SKIES
The BorrelIi-Brooks Comet Still
Visible.
AUTUMN BEGINS ON THE 23D

! The most striking feature of the heavens
OH a clear September evening is the Milky
| Way, which at about o o'clock, in the
| early part of the month, passes directly
| overhead. In it along it are the con-
stelations Scorpio, Sagittarius, Ophiuchus
! and the Serpent, which he holds, the Eagle,
| the Dolphin, the Swan, Copheus, Cassiopeia
and Perseus.
| The Scorpion, known also as the Kite,
can be located by means of its bright,
| rudy star Antares, now nearing the hor-
| izon Cat o'clock in the southwest. Sag
| ittarius, which adjoinS the Scorpion on the
| east, is nearly south. Its most striking
! portion is a group of eight or ten stars.
| of about the third magnitude, in which
! lively imagination can discern the crude
! figure of a horse with a rider upon his
| back The five more eastery of these
stars form the short-handIed Milk Dip
per-" so called, apparently, because 1t is
! in a position to scoop up a portion Of the
| Milky Way. The Eagle is marked by the
star Affair, of the first magnitude, which
has just crossed the meridian at two-thirds
! of the distance from the horizon to the
| zenith. The Dolphin, which bears also the
dismal name, Jobs Coffin, is little clus
! ter of six or seven small stars at the left
altitude as it. The Swan tCygnus), better
known to modern star gazers as the North
! ern Cross. is directly overhead. Cassiopeia.
strongly marked by the W-shaped figure
of its five brighter stars, is in mid-heav-
ems in the northeast. The triangular re-
gion between the head of the Cross, the
Pole Star and Cassiopeia is occupied by
Cepheus not a conspicuous constellation,
but rich in telescope stars. The second
| magnitude star midway between Cassie
peia and the horizon is Alpha Persei, at
the center of an elongated group of stars,
which form the body Of Perseus. Some
ten degrees to the right of this star and
lower than it is Beta Persei, also of the
second magnitude, better known as Algol
al Ghul-the Demon, one of the most
famous of the variable stars. This star
is in the head of Medusa, which Perseus
is supposed to- hold by it's snaky locks
in his left hand.
Facing the west, we have before us the
constellation Hercules, the "kneeler." of
which the most easily recognized portions
are a trapezium of third-magnitude stars,
which forms the lower part of the body Of
the constellation-below the belt-and line
of five or six fourth-magnitude stars, which
forms the left arm. 1t was in this con-
Stellation, near the star Lambda in the
left shoulder, that Sir William Herschel
located the point toward which the sun,
with it's family of planets, comets and
meteors, is travelling through space. Re
cent determinations, however, render it
more probable that this point, the APEX
or the sun way, as II IS calleQ, Is Sltu-
ated at about the center of the Lyre which
lies midway between Hercules and the
Northern Cross.
Directly beneath Hercules is the Northern
Crown. Between Hercules and the Pole
Star is Draco, the Dragon, the general
shape of whose many-coiled body is that of
the letter S reversed. The head, marked by
the two flaming eyes Beta and Gamma
Draconis. of between the second and third
magnitude, is now situated at the right of
the right foot of Hercules. The Great Dip
per, the well-known landmark of the north
skies, is at nearly its least altitude, di-
rectly beneath the Dragon, between north
and northwest
In midheavens in the east stands the
great Square of Pegasus. and between it
and PerSeus reclfneS Andromeda, her head
marked by the star Alpharat. which forms
the northeastern corner of the Square.
The brilliant star seen nearly overhead is
Vega, in the Tyre. Near the horizon, be-
tween west and northwest. is the equally
brilliant Arcturus The bright star seen
low in the southeast, conspicuous from its
loneliness, is Fomanaut in the Southern
Fish. The bright star seen in SagittariuS,
at the right of the Milk Dipper, is the
planet Saturn. At the right of Antares, in
the Scorpion. is the still more brilliant
Jupiter.
Millions of Stars.
Among the many services rendered as
tronomy by photography not the least i'm
portant is the shedding of new light upon
that remarkable tract Of the night sky
known as the Milky Way. This Milky Way
has been and still is one Of the grand enig-
mas of the heavens. One of the earliest
revelations Of the telescope was that the
milky wilderness to which it owes its name
is due to millions of stars which are too
faint to be seen separately with the naked
eye. and are visible only through their
blended light. OF the hundred or more
million stars brought into view by our larg-
est telescopes probably nine-tenths lie
within belt of the heavens about sixty
degrees broad, along the center of which |
runs this irregular zone of the Milky Way. !
But are these stars comparable in size with |
the brighter stars, visible to the naked eye |
SO that to account for the faintness of their |
light we must suppose that they lie at dis |
tances from us inconceivably great and |
in brightness, at greatly unequal distances |
or may they not be really luminaries of |
relatively small size, perhaps at no great .
distance from us. as star distances go?
The appearance of the Milky Way can |
be accounted for upon either of these sup |
positions. The latter, namely, that the |
Milky Way stars are really the small |
bodies that they seem to be, was that |
which seemed the more probable to Calico |
and others of the earlier telescopists. |
Herschel, with more exalted notions of the |
vastness of creation, preferred the former. |
Assuming that the stars, telescope as we'll |
as lucid, are on an average of about the !
same stZe-are comparable In this respect
with the sun, our star-and that they arc |
distributed through space at about equal |
the Milky Way by supposing that these |
millions Of suns are not arranged in the |
globular form. which the sidereal heavens |
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