Recreations in Astronomy Part 20

Vulcan? Distance from sun. Periodic time. Mercury: Elements; shapes, as seen from earth; transits. Venus: Elements; seen by day; how near earth? how far from? phases; Galileo. Earth: Elements; in s.p.a.ce; Aurora; balance of forces. Tides: Main and subsidiary causes; eastern sh.o.r.es; Mediterranean Sea. Moon: Elements; hoax; moves east; see one side; three causes help to see more than half. Revolution: Why twenty-nine and a half days: heat--cold; how much light? Craters and peaks lighted; measured. Eclipses--Why not every new and full moon? Periodicity. Mars: Elements; how near earth? How far from?

Apparent size; ice-fields; which end most? Satellites--Asteroids: How found? When? By whom? How many? Jupiter: Elements; trade-winds; how much light received? Own heat. Satellites: How many? Colors.

Saturn: Elements; habitability; rings; flux; satellites. Ura.n.u.s: Elements; discoverer; seen by; moon's motion. Neptune: Elements; discovered by; how? Review system.

IX. _The Nebular Hypothesis._--State it; facts confirmatory.

Objections--1. Heat; 2. Rotation; 3. Retrograde; 4. Martial moons; 5. Star of 1876. Evolution: Gaps in; conclusion.

X. _The Stellar System._-Motto. Man among stars; open page; starry poem; stars located; named. Thuban. Etanin. Constellations: Know them; number of stars; double; e Lyrae, Sirius, Procyon, Castor, 61 Cygni, g Virginis. Colored stars; change color. Cl.u.s.ters: Two theories. Nebulae: Two visible; composed of; shapes; where? Variable stars. Sun. b Lyrae, Mira, Betelguese, Algol; cause. Temporary; 1572. New star of 1866: Two theories. Star of 1876. Movements of stars; Sirius; sun; 1830 Groombridge. Stars near Pleiades: Orion, Great Dipper, Southern Cross. Centre of gravity.

XI. _The Worlds and the Word._--Rich. Number. Erroneous allusions.

Truth before discovery: 1. A beginning; 2. Creation before arrangement; 3. Light before sun; 4. Mountains under water; 5. Order of development; [Page 278] 6. Sphere of earth; 7. How upheld; 8. Number of stars; 9. Weight of air; 10. Meteorology; 11. Queries to Job; 12.

Sun to end of heaven; 13. View of Mitch.e.l.l; 14. Herschel. What is matter? Force? End of earth. Way to knowledge. Work of light.

Transfiguration of matter. Uniformitarianism. A whisper of Him. Man for mastery. Each a type of higher. Survival of fittest. Ura.n.u.s.

Worlds and Word one language.

XII. _The Ultimate Force._--Universe shows power: 1. Rain; Niagara; 2. Vegetable growth; 3. Worlds carried; 4. Sun; fill dome with worlds; 5. Double suns; 6. Galaxies. Correlation. What ultimate? Mind and will. What continuous relation? Watch. Theories of gravitation: Newton's, Le Sage's, Bible's. High-cla.s.s energy deteriorates. Search for atoms: 1. Microscope; 2. Gold; 3. Infusoria; 4. Musk. Properties of atoms: 1. Impenetrable; 2. Indivisible; 3. Shape; 4. Quality; 5.

Crystallization; 6. Not touch each other; 7. Active; 8. Attractive; 9. Intelligent. Whose? Relation of matter to G.o.d; rock to soil.

Push upward. Highest has mastery. Man advances by highest. Matter recapacitated. Refined habitations. Inhabitants. All force leads back to mind. Personal and infinite.

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GLOSSARY OF ASTRONOMICAL TERMS AND INDEX.

ABBREVIATIONS used in astronomies, 275.

ABERRATION OF LIGHT (_a wandering away_), an apparent displacement of a star, owing to the progressive motion of light combined with that of the earth and its...o...b..t, 199.

AEROLITE (_air-stone_), 122.

AIR, refraction of the, 40.

ALGOL, the variable star, 222.

ALMANAC, Nautical, 71; explanation of signs used, 275.

ALPHABET, Greek, 275.

ALt.i.tUDE, angular elevation of a body above the horizon.

ANGLE, difference in directions of two straight lines that meet.

ANNULAR (_ring-shaped_) ECLIPSES, 158; nebulae, 218, 220.

APHELION, the point in an orbit farthest from the sun.

APOGEE, the point of an orbit which is farthest from the earth.

APSIS, plural _apsides_, the line joining the aphelion and perihelion points; or the major axis of elliptical orbits.

ARC, a part of a circle.

ASCENSION, RIGHT, the angular distance of a heavenly body from the first point of Aries, measured on the equator.

ASTEROIDS (_star-like_), 162; orbits of interlaced, 74.

ASTRONOMICAL INSTRUMENTS, 43.

ASTRONOMY, use of, 57.

ATOM, size of, 255; power of, 256.

AURORA BOREALIS, 143.

AXIS, the line about which a body rotates.

AZIMUTH, the angular distance of any point or body in the horizon from the north or south points.

BAILEY'S BEADS, dots of light on the edge of the moon seen in a solar eclipse, caused by the moon's inequalities of surface.

BASE LINE, 68.

BIELA'S COMET, 129.

BINARY SYSTEM, a double star, the component parts of which revolve around their centre of gravity.

BODE'S LAW of planetary distances is no law at all, but a study of coincidences.

BOLIDES, small ma.s.ses of matter in s.p.a.ce. They are usually called meteors when luminous by contact with air, 120.

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CELESTIAL SPHERE, the apparent dome in which the heavenly bodies seem to be set; appears to revolve, 3.

CENTRE OF GRAVITY, the point on which a body, or two or more related bodies, balances.

CENTRIFUGAL FORCE (_centre fleeing_).

CHROMOLITHIC PLATE of spectra of metals, to face 50.

CIRc.u.mPOLAR STARS, map of north, 201.

COLORS OF STARS, 214.

COLURES, the four princ.i.p.al meridians of the celestial sphere pa.s.sing from the pole, one through each equinox, and one through each solstice.

COMETS, 126; Halley's, 128; Biela's lost, 129; Encke's, 130; const.i.tution of, 131; will they strike the earth? 133.

CONJUNCTION. Two or more bodies are in conjunction when they are in a straight line (disregarding inclination of orbit) with the sun. Planets nearer the sun than the earth are in inferior conjunction when they are between the earth and the sun; superior conjunction when they are beyond the sun.

CONSTELLATION, a group of stars supposed to represent some figure: circ.u.mpolar, 201; equatorial, for December, 202; for January, 203; April, 204; June, 205; September, 206; November, 207; southern circ.u.mpolar, 208.

CULMINATION, the pa.s.sage of a heavenly body across the meridian or south point of a place; it is the highest point reached in its path.

CUSP, the extremities of the crescent form of the moon or an interior planet.

DECLINATION, the angular distance of a celestial body north or south from the celestial equator.

DEGREE, the 1/360 part of a circle.

DIRECT MOTION, a motion from west to east among stars.

DISK, the visible surface of sun, moon, or planets.

DISTANCE OF STARS, 70.

DOUBLE STARS, 210.

EARTH, revolution of, 109; in s.p.a.ce, 142; irregular figure, 145.

ECCENTRICITY OF AN ELLIPSE, the distance of either focus from centre divided by half the major axis.

ECLIPSE (_a disappearance_), 157.

ECLIPTIC, the apparent annual path of the sun among the stars; plane of, 106.

EGRESS, the pa.s.sing of one body off the disk of another.

ELEMENTS, the quant.i.ties which determine the motion of a planet: data for predicting astronomical phenomena; table of solar, 274.

ELEMENTS, chemical, present in the sun, 270.

ELONGATION, the angular distance of a planet from the sun.

EMERSION, the reappearance of a body after it has been eclipsed or occulted by another.

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EQUATOR, terrestrial, the great circle half-way between the poles of the earth. When the plane of this is extended to the heavens, the line of contact is called the celestial equator.

EQUINOX, either of the points in which the sun, in its apparent annual course among the stars, crosses the equator, making days and nights of equal length.

EVOLUTION, materialistic, 182; insufficient, 189.

FIZEAU determines the velocity of light, 23.

FORCES, delicate balance of, 144.

GALILEO, construction of his telescope, 43.

GEOCENTRIC, a position of a heavenly body as seen or measured from the earth's centre.

GEODESY, the art of measuring the earth without reference to the heavenly bodies.

G.o.d, relation of, to the universe, 258.

GRAVITATION, laws of, 6; extends to the stars, 13; theories of, 253.

GRAVITY on different bodies, 6, 274.

HELICAL, rising or setting of a star, as near to sunrise or sunset as it can be seen.

HELIOCENTRIC, as seen from the centre of the sun.

HOOSAC TUNNEL, example of accuracy, 62.

HORIZONTAL PENDULUM, 272.

IMMERSION, the disappearance of one body behind another, or in its shadow.

INCLINATION OF AN ORBIT, the angle between its plane and the plane of the ecliptic.

INFERIOR CONJUNCTION, when an interior planet is between the earth and the sun.