Cosmos by Alexander von Humboldt

COSMOS:

A SKETCH

of

A PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION OF THE UNIVERSE.

BY

ALEXANDER VON HUMBOLDT.

Translated from the German by

E. C. OTTÉ

In Four Volumes.

VOL. III

Alexander von Humboldt

New York:

HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS

1858.

This electronic edition prepared by Dr. David C. Bossard
from original documents in his personal library.

December, 2005.

CONTENTS.

INTRODUCTION.

Historical Review of the attempts made with the object of considering the Phenomena of the Universe as a Unity of Nature 5-25 005 006 007 008 009 010 011 012 013 014 015 016 017 018 019 020 021 022 023 024 025

SPECIAL RESULTS OF OBSERVATIONS
IN THE DOMAIN OF COSMICAL PHENOMENA

A. URANOLOGICAL PORTION of the physical description of the
world.--ASTROGNOSY    26-28 026 027 028

I. The realms of space, and conjectures regarding that which appears to occupy the space intervening between the heavenly bodies 29-41 029 030 031 032 033 034 035 036 037 038 039 040 041

II. Natural and telescopic vision, 41-73;   041 042 043 044 045 046 047 048 049 050 051 052 053 054 055 056 057 058 059 060 061 062 063 064 065 066 067 068 069 070 071 072 073
Scintillation of the stars, 73-83;   073 074 075 076 077 078 079 080 081 082 083
Velocity of light, 83-89;   083 084 085 086 087 088 089
Results of photometry, 89-102   089 090 091 092 093 094 095 096 097 098 099 100 101 102

III. Number, distribution, and color of the fixed stars, 103-139;   103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139
Stellar masses (stellar swarms), 139-143;   139 140 141 142 143
The Milky Way interspersed with a few nebulous spots, 143-151   143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150 151

IV. New stars, and stars that have vanished, 151-160;   151 152 153 154 155 156 157 158 159 160
Variable stars, whose recurring periods have been determined, 160-177;   160 161 162 163 164 165 166 167 168 169 170 171 172 173 174 175 176 177
Variations in the intensity of the light of stars whose periodicity is as yet uninvestigated, 177-182   177 178 179 180 181 182

V. Proper motion of the fixed stars, 182-185;   182 183 184 185
Problematical existence of dark cosmical bodies, 185-188;   185 186 187 188
Parallax-measured distances of some of the fixed stars, 188-194;   188 189 190 191 192 193 194
Doubts as to the assumption of a central body for the whole sidereal heavens, 194-199   194 195 196 197 198 199

VI. Multiple, or double stars--Their number and reciprocal distances.--Period of revolution of two stars round a common center of gravity    199-212   199 200 201 202 203 204 205 206 207 208 209 210 211 212

INDEX TO VOLUME III 215-219   215 216 217 218 219

TABLES

Photometric Tables of Stars 100-102   100 101 102

Clusters of Stars 141-143   141 142 143

New Stars 155-160   155 156 157 158 159 160

Variable Stars 172-177   172 173 174 175 176 177

Parallaxes 193   193

Elements of Orbits of double Stars 213   213