Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 32.djvu/545

 Between the stars Delta (δ) and ο1 and ο2 there is a remarkable array of minute stars, as shown in the accompanying cut. One never sees stars arranged in streams or rows, like these, without an irresistible impression that the arrangement can not be accidental; that some law must have been in operation which associated them together in the forms which we see. Yet, when we reflect that these are all suns, how far do we seem to be from understanding the meaning of the universe.

The extraordinary size and brilliancy of Sirius might naturally enough lead one to suppose that it is the nearest of the stars, and such it was once believed to be. Observations of stellar parallax, however, show that this was a mistake. The distance of Sirius is so great that no satisfactory determination of it has yet been made. We may safely say, though, that that distance is, at the least calculation, 50,000,000,000,000 miles. In other words, Sirius is about 537,000 times as far from the earth as the sun is. Then since light diminishes as the square of the distance increases, the sun, if placed as far from us as Sirius is, would send us, in round numbers, 288,000,000,000 times less light than we now receive from it. But Sirius actually sends us only about 4,000,000,000 times less light than the sun does; consequently Sinus must shine $288,000,000,000⁄4,000,000,000$ = times as brilliantly as the sun. If we adopt Wollaston's estimate of the light of Sirius, as compared with that of the sun's, viz., $1⁄20,000,000,000$, we shall still find that the actual brilliancy of that grand star is more than fourteen times as great as that of our sun. But as observations on the companion of Sirius show that Sirius's mass is fully twenty times the sun's, and since the character of Sirius's spectrum indicates that its intrinsic brightness, surface for surface, is much superior to the sun's, it is probable that our estimate of the star's actual brilliancy, as compared with what the sun would possess at the same distance, viz., seventy-two times, is much nearer the truth. It is evident that life would be insupportable upon the earth if it were placed as near to Sirius as it is to the sun. If the earth were a planet belonging to the system of Sirius, in order to enjoy the same amount of heat and light it now receives, it would have to be removed to a distance of nearly 800,000,000 miles, or about 8$1⁄2$ times its distance from the sun. Its time of revolution around Sirius would then be nearly 5$1⁄2$ years, or, in other words, the year would be lengthened 5$1⁄2$ times.

But, as I have said, the estimate of Sirius's distance used in these calculations is the smallest that can be accepted. Good authorities regard the distance as being not less than 100,000,000,000,000 miles; in which case the star's brilliancy must be as much as 228 times greater than that of the sun! And yet even Sirius is probably not the greatest sun belonging to the visible universe. There can be little doubt that Canopus, in the southern hemisphere, is a grander sun than Sirius.