A STUDY OF THE UNIVERSE BY SIMON NEWCOMB RETIRED PROFESSOR U. S. NAVY "Hæc sunt fastigia mundi” NEW YORK G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS LONDON JOHN MURRAY PREFACE QB 801 N5 Astion. Lib. HEN the author accepted the flattering invita WHE tion of the editor to prepare a volume for the present "Science Series," he supposed that it would. be an easy task to sketch in simple language for the lay as well as the scientific reader the wonderful advances of our generation in the knowledge of the fixed stars. But, as the work went on, it became more evident at every step that such was not the case. The problem was, now to study whole chapters. of observations and researches on some minute branch of the subject, and condense their gist into a few sentences; now to search volumes of periodicals, perhaps in vain, to find who was first in some field, or what result some investigator had reached; now to do justice to the respective works of students of the same subject; now to recast or rewrite passages in the light of some newly published research. The author must say in all candour that he has failed to surmount the difficulties thus arising in a way satisfactory to himself, and that in consequence the professional reader, if any such shall take up the book, will find defects that may seem to him serious in nearly every M577237 |