half-finished, and the next year, it was three-quarters finished; and then we took breath for two years, after our superhuman exertions; and in the autumn of the fifth year, it was all completed. And the peasants from all the region round about, and many from Penzlin and Stargard, came to Bramborg to see the affair, and they brought money into the city; so people really began to regard his Serene Highness as a public benefactor. made the acquaintance in Paris of the At the end of the year, the palace was most fashionable tailor of the day, and had given him a commission to keep him supplied with the latest fashions. The friendly man did so; but he had the audacity to expect ready money in payment, and his Highness, in his velvet and silken necessities, was compelled to pawn his crown jewels for nine thousand thalers to a Jew in Hamburg. The war was over to be sure, but the distress was worse than ever; the war had brought a little life into trade, but now everything was perfectly flat. Farmers and shopkeepers and mechanics, nobody could earn a groschen. Why? Because there were no groschens to be earned, and the crown-jewels were pawned to a Hamburg Jew. This sad state of things prevailed through all Mecklenburg-Strelitz, with the exception of Nigen-Bramborg. There, of course, everything was lively; his Highness sent his master carpenter, to build the new palace; a skilful man, who, merely out of the remnants of the timber and hewn-stone, built the "Bellmandür " in the Broda wood; and it was a great advantage to Bramborg. And the twelve masons, and the twelve journeymen carpenters, who got five groschen a day, used to go through the streets, in the evening, with their hats cocked gayly on their heads, singing: "Were it ever, were it ever, were it ever so!" and the old policeman, Bendsnider, who was the ancestor of all the Police Bendsnider race, would say: "Let them sing! They bring money into the place." The Bramborgers, as faithful subjects, recognized the fact, and when the Grand Duke moved into his new palace the next spring, they bestirred themselves to give him a festive reception. The city treasury gave fifty thalers, in the old well-known Münz groschens, and altogether it came to a hundred and five thalers, three groschens, seven pfennigs, it should properly have been seven groschens, seven pfennigs; for the Rathsherr, above mentioned, also gave four groschens, but his gift was returned to him, for fear that his Serene Highness, if he should know of it, might not be pleased to receive a contribution from so democratic a quarter. So his Highness lived in his new palace; Nigen-Bramborg had a smaller marketplace, but a great princely Residence; and Princess Christel, waiting patiently for her wing, took up meanwhile with the first floor of Buttermann the shop-keeper. And now the people of Nigen-Bramborg could realize the great advantage of a "princely Residence.” A WRITER in the current number of the Revue des Deux Mondes draws attention to the change in the relations between employers and workmen in Alsace which has been brought about through its annexation to Germany. Some months before the war Mulhouse and Bischwiller were the scenes of frequent strikes. The claims of the workmen, acting under the influence of the secret societies, were a source of continual disputes. Sometimes it was the amount of wages and at others the hours of labour that brought about these dissensions, in which the employers always came off best, and which were often ended by conflicts with the police and the imprisonment of some of the more riotous of the men. The war necessarily interrupted these disputes; part of the workmen took up arms and the rest remained for a time without employment. When peace was restored and industry revived, masters and men forgot their old grievances in a common reconciliation. It seemed," says M. Reybaud, who writes as an eye-witness, "as if there were but one soul in that population lately given over to so many dissensions, only one interest in place of so many that appeared irreconcilable. Mourning over defeat and the pressure of the foreigner had wrought this miracle. During more than two years this miracle continues, and it may be said that its effects are not diminished. There is not a single recrimination or complaint, never has the workshop been more frequented nor public places more tranquil. All are united, both great and small, in suffering the same sorrows and sharing the same fortune.” Pall Mall Gazette. From Saint Pauls. A MISSING COMET AND A COMING METEOR-SHOWER. that the coming comet must be expected to extend far beyond the 20,000 miles separating its track from the earth's. The terrible head of the comet would therefore envelop the earth, and either the earth would be dissolved with fervent heat, or else, perhaps, drowned by a second flood. Even if the earth escaped either form of destruction, the shock of the collision would destroy every living creature on her surface. Nay, granting even though many were too frightened to admit the possibility that a comet is but a thin luminous vapour, was it not all but certain that this vapour, permeating our atmosphere, would asphyxiate men and animals? MANY persons were alarmed last August lest it should be true (as reported) that Plantamour, the Swiss astronomer, had predicted the earth's destruction by a comet on the twelfth of that month. When once a prediction of this sort has been announced, it is almost impossible to remove the impression produced by it. The reputed author of the prediction may deny flatly that he had ever announced even the approach of a comet; every astronomer of repute may add his testimony to the effect that no comet is due at the time indicated for the earth's destruction; the way in which the mistake arose may be explained, and every effort made to spread the explanation as widely as possible: yet the impression will nevertheless remain that there must have been some ground for the prediction, or-if it be insisted but they had said nothing about the earth's that no prediction was made then there must have been some ground for the story of the prediction. Confidence is not completely restored until the day and hour announced for the earth's destruction have passed without mishap.* A striking illustration of the proneness of men to believe in astronomical predictions of the earth's destruction was afforded by a circumstance in the history of a comet, which is at the present time giving trouble to astronomers in another way. The "missing comet," about which I now propose to speak, has been in its day a source of terror to the nations. About forty years ago, it was widely announced that astronomers were on the watch for a comet whose path approaches very closely to the earth's-in fact, within the astronomically minute distance of 20,000 miles, or thereabouts. Immediately the news spread that the earth was to be destroyed. A comet must be small indeed which has not a head more than forty or fifty thousand miles in diameter SO Being at Sheffield last October, I was told an excellent story about the comet. The story has the advantage over most others of the kind, of being strictly true:- In a certain house, in Sheffield, Monday, August 12, had been appointed a great washing-day. On the morning of the day, the housekeeper asked for an interview with her master on the subject of the comet. She begged to know if it were really true that the world was to be destroyed on that day. Receiving assurances to the contrary, she expressed some degree of satisfaction: but, sir," she said, "though what you say may be very true, might it not be just as well to put off the washing til to-morrow?" Whether she thought a washing-day unsuitable for the comet's visit, or that a good cleaning-up would be desirable on the day after the visit, deponent sayeth not. Astronomers were rather surprised at the interpretation put upon their prediction. They were tolerably well assured that the comet would cross the earth's track very nearly at the time indicated; encountering the comet. In fact, they had announced that the comet would at the end of October cross the path of the earth's track which she traverses at the end of November. The fears of a collision were as absurd as would be the fears of passengers by a certain train, who should be in terror of their lives because another train was to cross their line at a certain point an hour before they reached that point. But it was useless for astronomers to point out that the intersection of two paths did not imply the collision of bodies following those paths.* The alarm having once been sounded, no. It is rather singular that mistakes should be made in a matter seemingly so obvious, and not only by the ignorant, but by well educated persons. Thus, in one of Cooper's novels (I forget which at the moment, but have an impression that it is the Pathfinder,”-it is one of those in which Leatherstocking, alias Hawkeye, appears as a young man), a shooting contest is elaborately described, in which the great feat of all depends on precisely such a mistake as was made about the comet of 1832. The young marksman (not yet called Hawkeye) succeeds in all the trials of skill, until only he and a rival in the heroine's affections are left in the contest. Then the great trial is made. Two persons, standing some distance apart, throw each a potato, in such a way that the two paths (as seen by the marksman), intersect, and the marksman is to fire so as to hit both potatoes. The favoured lover succeeds, but the future Hawkeye generously misses. Afterwards, however, to show the heroine that he also could have accomplished the impossible feat, he accomplishes another. He invites her attention to two birds high overhead, and travelling on converging paths; and offers to kill the two with a single bullet. The birds obligingly consent to this ar rangement, and when their dead bodies fall at the feet of the maiden she recognizes the generosity of the young rifleman. But not a word is said about the self-sacrificing ingenuity of the birds, and the amazing skill which the potato-throwers must have acquired to render the rifleman's feat a possibility. reasoning would allay the fears of the general public. Nay, some, who understood that the earth herself would not come into collision with the comet, were in dread lest the earth's orbit should suffer! "Even among those," says Guillemin, "who placed confidence in the precision of astronomical calculations there were some who at least feared a derangement of our orbit. Doubtless to them an orbit was something material,― a metallic circle, for example; 6 as if,' says Arago, in relating this curious notion, the form of the path in which a bomb after leaving a mortar traverses space was dependent on the number and positions of the paths which other bombs had formerly described in the same region.'" It is rather singular that the very comet which thus inspired an altogether groundless fear, shonld have supplied the most striking evidence astronomers have ever obtained respecting the insignificance of the effects which may be expected to follow from the collision of a planet with a comet. Biela's comet - or Gambart's, as the French astronomers call it has not merely been broken up under the very eyes of astronomers, and in a region of space where no masses of any importance can have encountered it, but since that time it has been so far dissipated,― no one knows how,- that the most powerful telescopes have failed to show the comet, even when its calculated place was such that had it retained its former appearance it would have been visible to the naked eye. The history of Biela's comet has been singularly interesting throughout. The comet may be said to have been discovered when Biela, in February, 1826, first observed it in Aries; for it was then only that the true nature of this comet's path was recognized. It was found that it travels in an orbit of moderate dimensions, carrying it when farthest from the sun to a distance somewhat exceeding that of the planet Jupiter. It belongs, indeed, to a family or group of planets distinguished by the peculiarity that their paths pass very close to that of Jupiter, insomuch that the notion has been suggested that either these comets have all been forced to take up their present paths through the tremendous attractive influence of the giant planet, or else that every one of them has been expelled from Jupiter's interior at some far-distant epoch! in 1826, that it was found possible to trace back the comet's course through former revolutions with sufficient accuracy to determine whether the comet had been before observed. When this was done, it was found that the comet had been seen on March 8, 1772, by Montaigne, at Limoges; and later, up to April 3, by Messier, the great comet-hunter. The comet had also been seen (having returned four times in the inteval) by Pons, on November 10, 1805. On this occasion it presented a somewhat remarkable appearance, its head having an apparent diameter equal to about a fourth of the moon's. On December 8, the astronomer Olbers saw it without a telescope. From calculations made on that occasion, some astronomers were led to suspect that this comet might be the same which Montaigne had seen in 1772; but the art of calculating cometic orbits had not then been so thoroughly mastered as to enable any mathematicians to speak confidently on this point. Indeed, at that time the idea was very gengenerally entertained that comets travel for the most part in orbits having enormous dimensions. Only one instance Lexell's comet had hitherto been known to the contrary, and there were excellent reasons for regarding that instance as altogether exceptional. In 1826, however, the comet was too carefully observed for any doubts to be further entertained. It was shown by several eminent mathematicians that the comet has a period of about six years and nine months. Santini and Damoiseau assigned November 27, 1832, as the date of this comet's return to its point of nearest approach to the sun. Olbers confirmed this result, showing, moreover, that the comet's course would bring it within 20,000 miles of the earth's path. Remarking on this, Sir John Hershel wrote, in 1866, "The orbit of this comet very nearly indeed intersects that of the earth on the place which the earth occupies on or about the 30th of November. If ever the earth is to be swallowed up by a comet, or to swallow up one, it will be on or about So thoroughly had Messier identified himself with the work of comet-seeking, that all sublunary events seemed insignificant to him by comparison. It is related of him that he was less troubled at his wife's death than at the circumstance that, owing to the interruption to his labours which her illness had occasioned, he failed to discover a comet, a rival comet-seeker gaining that distinction. A friend met the distracted widower a day or two after Mme. Messier's death, and expressed sympathy with him. "Ah," replied Messier, it was hard-was it not! that after all my watching I was obliged to leave So carefully was Biela's comet observed my telescope just when the comet came." and comfortably, when, behold! suddenly, on the 13th of January, the comet split into two distinct comets! each with a head and coma and a little nucleus of its own. There is some little contradiction about the exact date. Lieutenant Maury, of the United States Observatory of Wash that day of the year. In the year 1832 we missed it by a month. The head of the comet enveloped that point of our orbit; but this happened on the 29th of October, so that we escaped that time. Had a meeting taken place, from what we know of comets, it is probable that no harm would have happened, and that no-ington, reported officially on the 15th haviny body would have known anything about it." seen it double on the 13th; but Professor Wichmann, who saw it double on the 15th, It is important to notice how closely the avers that he had a good view of it on the 14th, calculations of astronomers agreed with and remarked nothing remarkable in its the observed event on this, the first occa- appearance. Be that as it may, the comet sion of the comet's return after its orbit from a single became a double one. What had been calculated. If it be remembered domestic troubles caused the secession it that after 1826 the comet was out of sight is impossible to conjecture; but the two for nearly six years, during all which time receded farther and farther from each it was more or less exposed to disturbing other up to a certain moderate distance, attractions, it will be admitted that astron- | with some degree of mutual communicaomy would have had no reason to be tion, and a very odd interchange of light, ashamed if the comet had returned to its point of nearest approach to the sun, within a week, or even a month, of the appointed time. But the actual difference between the observed and calculated time was less than twelve hours. To illustrate this by a terrestrial instance, the case is much as though an express train from Edinburgh should arrive in London within a second of the appointed time—a degree of accuracy not invariably attained, though the terrestrial engineer has the power, which the comet has not, of making up for lost time. It is also to be noticed, that at each return of a comet its course can be predicted with greater accuracy; since the error noticed at any particular return affords the means of rectifying former calculations, and providing against similar error at future returns. The reader will presently see why this point is insisted upon it is essential to notice the degree of mastery which astronomers had acquired, even so far back as 1832, over the motions of this particular comet. -one day one head being brighter, and another the other,- till they seem to have agreed finally to part company. The oddest part of the story, however, is yet to come. The year 1865 brought round the time for their re-appearance, and behold! there they both were, at about the same distance from each other, and both visible in one telescope." The oddest part of the story had not yet come, however, when Herschel wrote the above lines. But, before passing on to relate the fate of this comet, it may be well to correct a few of the statements in the above passage (presented just as it stands in the original, because it is a good specimen of Sir John Herschel's more familiar style of science-writing). In the first place, the two companion comets had each a tail, as well as a head, coma, and nucleus. Then, as the object was passing out of view in 1846, the two comets seemed to approach each other. The greatest distance between them was attained on or about March 3, 1846, and amounted to about 157,000 miles. On the return of the double comet, in 1852, the distance had by no means remained unchanged, as Herschel states, but had increased to about 1,250,000 miles. It is worthy of notice, in passing, that Plantamour, of Genoa, the same astronomer to At the next return the comet was de- whom the prediction of the world's detected very early for whereas it passed struction by a comet on August 12 last, the point of its orbit nearest to the sun on was mistakenly assigned, calculated the February 11, 1846, it was recognized, pre-paths of both the components, and the cisely in its calculated place, on November motions of the comets were found to agree 28, 1845. very closely with his results during the whole time that the comets continued visible. In 1839 the comet returned, but was not seen, owing to the position of the sun at the time when the comet was in our neighbourhood. Throughout its passage near us, in fact, the comet was lost to sight in the splendour of the sun's beams. And now one of the most singular events recorded in the history of comets took place. In 1846, "all seemed" says Sir In 1858, the comet probably returned; John Herschel," to be going on quietly but, as in 1839, the part of the heavens traversed by it was too close to the sun's excuse as in the case of Lexeil's, viz., the place to permit the comet to be seen. I preponderant attraction of some great say that the comet probably returned; planet. Can it have come into contact or because we know that in 1852 it safely exceedingly close approach to some astertraversed the part of space where it had oid as yet undiscovered; or, peradventure, formerly divided, and passed from the plunged into, and got bewildered among sun's neighbourhood towards the outer the ring of meteorolites, which astronoparts of its orbit, apparently unscathed. mers more than suspect?" But what happened to the comet during Both these explanations seem at a first its passage past the sun in 1859 is not view available. Biela's comet had a course known. It will presently be seen that in carrying it though the outskirts of the zone all probability the comet was then de- of minor planets; and there was nothing stroyed or dissipated in some way. In whatever to prevent the comet from comfact, it is manifest that the same reason ing into collision with one of these bodies, which leads us to believe that the comet or else approaching so nearly as to be returned in 1859, would lead us to believe, greatly disturbed, and so travel thereafter that, if it passed away again uninjured, it on a different orbit. But an objection exwould have been seen at the next return ists which Sir J. Herschel does not seem to or in 1866. But 1866 came; the path of have noticed. When the comet retired in the comet was assigned; astronomers 1852 it consisted of two distinct comets, looked forward with interest to its reap- separated by an intervening space of about pearance, eager to see how far the two 1,250,000 miles. Now it would be a singucomponent comets had separated from lar chance which should bring one of these each other; and no comet appeared! comets into collision with a minor planet, Telescopes of great power and of exquisite or so near as to occasion an important disdefining qualities swept the whole track turbance. But supposing this to happen, on which the comet was to have travelled; then the fellow-comet, not travelling in nor were the neighbouring regions of the the wake of the first, but side by side, heavens left unexplored; but not a trace would certainly have escaped. For it must of the comet could anywhere be seen. be remembered, that although 1,250,000 There was not the slightest room for miles is a very small distance indeed by questioning the accuracy of the calcula- comparison with the dimensions of the tions by which the path had been predict- solar system, it is an enormous distance ed. Astronomers were certain that if un- compared with the dimensions of the minor destroyed or undissipated the comet would planets, some of which have a surface follow the assigned path,- as certain as a not much greater than that of an English station-master would be that a train would county. The minor planet occasioning the enter a station along the line of rails as- comet's disturbance would presumably be signed to it, unless some accident or mis- one of the smallest, since it has not yet take should occur. Now comets do not been detected, and the newly discovered make mistakes; but, as we now see, they minor planets are on the average much are not free from the risk of accidents. smaller than those first detected. Now, This comet had already met with an ac- the earth herself would have no very cident, being broken by some mischance marked influence on a comet or meteor into two parts under the very eyes of as-passing her at a distance of 1,250,000 miles; tronomers. Probably in 1859 it met with for it is to be remembered, that the comets further misfortunes, visible mayhap to as- as well as the earth have an enormously tronomers in Venus or Mercury. At any rate, something had happened to the comet since its retreat in 1852. "It is now," wrote Sir J. Herschel at the time (Feb. 1866), “overdue! Its orbit has been recomputed, and an ephemeris" (that is, an account of its motion from hour to hour) "calculated. Astronomers have been eagerly looking out for its reappearance for the last two months when, according to all former experience, it ought to have been conspiciously visible-but without success! giving rise to the strangest theories. At all events, it seems to have fairly disappeared, and that without any such even rapid motion, and the disturbing power of It is probable that the largest of the minor planets-Vesta-has a diameter of rather more than 200 miles, or at the outside say 260 miles-the thirVesta to have the same density as the earth (wheretieth part of the earth's diameter. Then, assuming as, being smaller, she probably is very much less compressed), we get for her mass (or, which is the same thing, her attractive power) the 27,000th part of the earth's, obtaining the number 27,000 by multiplying 30 twice into itself. |