The Birmingham age-herald., 1904-09-04

cle of matter, even in the most remote star, attracts every other particle In ex- act accordance with this law.
 There are many thousand clouds of nebulous matter in space, all of them which are visible to us being many mil lions of miles in diameter Each of these nehulas is certainly slowly condensing or shrinking together under it's own grayi- tation, and as 1t condenses 1t grows hot ter and hotter and also begins to rotate about an axis. It may condense into single sun or, if the velocity of it's rota- ton Is great enough, it may break into 1 a double nebula. In the latter case each rart will separately form a star and the nebula will have become a double-star system.
 At first the two stars are intensely hot and in a plastic condition so that their mutual attractions raise enormous bodi- ly tides on each of them. The effect of these Is to rapidly push the two suns farther and farther apart and also to change the form of the paths which they pursue about one another. At last the contracting suns become solid and cold; the tidal action ceases and there remain but two dark bodies revolving slowly about one another a great distance apart. stages of this development are vis- lbe to us in the sky from the double nebulas to the old systems which are just dying out. In this manner also the earth and moon were originally developed from a single nebuIous mass.
 The stars of the map marked H and k are double; H cannot be seen with a small glass; 1t is composed of two stars revolving about one another in twenty six years. K can be seen with a good field glass, and so also can the pairs marked l. and R. The former of these is made up of two stars, one of which is golden and the other azure, presenting perhaps the most striking effect of color in the heavens. The latter is a quadruple star, visible as a double star to a keen eye even with out telescope. The star marked l is a triple star presenting an extraordinarily fine contrast of colors. '. Fomalhaut (marked FD, has recently | been discovered to have a faint compan- ion, but this is only visible in the largest | telescopes.
 The Planets.
 Saturn and Jupiter are both in better | position for observing than last month. | Saturn is in the constellation Capricorn us at the point marked S, while Jupiter ! in the early evening Is low down in the east at J. Toward midnight this planet 1 has mounted high up in the heavens and | 1t is then the most brilliant star in the sky.
 | The position of Uranus Is as shown in Sagittarius, while Neptune is In the constellation Gernini, nearly midway be- tween the stars Nu and Epsilon.
 The other planets are not in favorable position for observation.
 Total Solar Eclipse. | On September there will occur a total eclipse of the sun, but 1t will only be vis- ible to observers situated in a narrow strip of the earth's surface extending from the west coast of South America across the vast wastes of the Pacific. The ! eclipse will begin at seven minutes, forty eight seconds after D. m., Greenwich | time; Its duration Is only two minutes. | The next solar eclipse visible in the
 United States will not occur until June s. 1918; this can be seen along a narrow
 strip of ground extending from Oregon to Florida. On January 24, 1925, the light
 of the sun will be plotted out to observers
 in Maine and Canada.