The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1901-12-01
[ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
Fairy Tales of Science
THE SECRET OF THE STARS
BY EDWARD CLODD
(Author of The Childhood the World "Stor,

when viewed Through the telescope, APP |
pears a pofnt. The broadening out of |
this point wa. essential for securing the |
stars spectrum; hence the devising of |
an apparatus sor the dispersion of star
light through / series of prisms whereby, |
in Sir William Hugginss words there
was given TO ;She spectrum a breadth suf-
ficient for Distinguishing any lines by
which it may be crossed" The famous
Tulse Hill Observatory thus became. as
Sir William tefs us, in the recently issued
superb monograph recording long years of
loving toll, al meeting place where ter
restral chemist Try was brought into direct
touch with celestial chemistry. The light
rays from ea.,thly hydrogen shone side
by side with {he corresponding radiations
from starry hydrogen, or else fell upon
the dark lines blue to the absorption of hy
drogen in SiriIs or Vega. Iron from our
mines was lilse-matched, light for dark,
with stellar iIpn from opposite points of
the celestial sljhere. In brief, the new and
important factfwas established, that all the
stars belong II the same order of bodies
as our sun (his1self star of humble mag
nitude compartd to the giant Sirius to
the lesser Cap}lla and Arcturus), and that
every star consists of matter which is
identical, at least in great part, with the
chemical substances which form the ma
terial of the solar system. Is not that a
more wonderf,k tale than any that held us
spellbound in q childhood?
But more, of which only part can here
be indicated, remains to be told. Thus far
we have dealt only with the visible part of
the solar spectrum which, as has been
shown, comprites the light between the ex-
IRENE red and the extreme violet But
science has revealed the invisible. For
there are waves extending beyond both red
and violet whiih brings no sensation to our
| eyes, but the existence of which has been
| demonstrated. and the equally important
| and cO-operatifg work played by which has
| been proved. Beyond the red there are
| dark heat rays and beyond the violet there
| are rays With electrical and Photographic
| properties, ami which, moreover, produce
| certain effectst on living things. When we
speak of wavfs radating light or heat or
electricity, be; it always remembered that
these several modes of motion pass into
| one another, and that, throughout the
energies of the universe, there is no iso-
lated activity: among them. The photo
| graphic@amerh has now been long used for
registering tht spectra of all the heavenly
bodies, and before the present century is
out of it's tee1s there Will have been COM
pleted Photographic chart which, includ
ing stars down to the fourteenth magni-
tude, will COZ tain about twenty millions.
And very marvellous results have been Sc
cured in celestial photography by the in
vention of gei:ltine dry plates, which can be
exposed for {: long time, and thus left to
register, as with eye that cannot weary
the stars that appear in the field from re-
hottest depths, recording, moreover, the
lines which cross the ultraviolet parts of
their spectra..
Among the achievements of the astron-
omer is the classification of stars accord
ing to their Plors, basing on these an as
sumption as Ito whether they are virile
niddle-aged, or decaying. Sir William
Higgins ands the late Padre Secchi, an
eminent Italian observer, are in agreement
that the Whit or Sirian stars represent an
early adult Stage of stellar life; that yell
low stars, asst our sun, Arcturus and Cap
ella, represent the stage of maturity and
incipient old dye; and that orange stars, as
Alpha Orionis and Mira Ceti, and, finally,
red stars, represented by those of the fifth
magnitude, ptesage the approach of old
age, and of ''Ilackness Of darkness" Hence
the inference lis warranted that the differ
ent spectra of the stars are not due to any
original differences in the relative proper
tions of the elements of which they are
alike built-ur but to their relative ages,
since, like in origin and mode of develop
ment, they all, wax old as doth a gar
Eent."
| THE ONENESS OF THE UNIVERSE.
Briefly noting that to his many brilliant
discoveries Sit William Higgins has added
that whereby the approach of a star
towards or It's recession from the earth
is ascertained through observing the dis
| placement of the lines in its spectrum in
their relation: to terrestrial lines, the fore
going observations on star development
have the DEEPEST interest for us in their
bearing on thu celebrated "nebular hypoth-
esis of Kant and Laplace. The philoso-
pher formulated and the mathematician
strengthened the theory that the universe
was once an Infinitely extended expanse of
formless, GASEOUS matter, which, in obedi-
ence to the law of gravitation, slowly con-
densed into suns with their systems-plan-
cts, satellites and vagrant bodies. as COM
cts and metedrs. This theory has received
support from the doctrine of the indie
structbility both of matter and of motion.
but perhapsi its stronger confirmation
comes from the revelation of the spectre
scope concerning the constitution of what.
as noted above, Sir William Herschel called
"a shining fluid" For the spectrum of a
nebula shows dts source of light to be glow
ing gas one Of the bright lines being due
to the presence of hydrogen, thus indicat-
ing an early stage of sidereal life Look
ing. for example. at the great nebula in
| l, 80
us some stage of cosmical evolution on a
gigantic scale" Thus do the heavens add,
literally, their "cloud of witnesses to the
unity of the cosmos That unity. as every
student of natures book testifies, is mani