n its redundant
sportiveness. When we finally turned toward the swimming native again,
in the opposite direction, his shock of yellow hair was quite lost to
view amid the vivid sunlight which blazed over the quivering sea.

After the Samoan group, we passed through or near the Society Islands,
encircled by coral reefs, but kept steadily on our course
south-southwest, making thirteen knots an hour, and hastening out of the
heat of the tropics into a cooler and more comfortable region.

In no other part of the world has the author seen a clearer atmosphere
or a grander display of the heavens at night than was enjoyed in the
regions through which we were now sailing. Hours were passed in
watching the luminous sky, where new and brilliant constellations were
serenely gazing down upon us. Venus, the evening star, shone so clear
and bright as to cast a long wake upon the wrinkled surface of the sea.
There are but about fifteen hundred stars which can be counted from a
ship's deck by the naked eye,--a fact which but few persons realize.
With an opera-glass or telescope, however, the number can be much
increased. We are told that astronomers, by means of their greatly
improved facilities, have counted twenty millions of stars. This may be
true, and yet it seems almost incredible. We have seen an observer, not
familiar with the location of the Southern Cross, examine the heavens
long and patiently before being able to find this famous cluster of the
Southern Hemisphere,--a visual obtuseness not uncommon among persons who
seldom watch the heavens by night. Few give much thought to the stars.
Some hastily glance at them and pronounce them beautiful; others regard
them with more patient admiration; but not one in a thousand seriously
and carefully studies them. A good way of readily finding the Cross is
to remember that there are two prominent stars in Centaurus that point
directly to it. The one farthest from the Cross is regarded as the fixed
star nearest to the earth, but its distance from us is twenty thousand
times that of the sun. Stellar distances especially can be realized only
by comparison. For instance: were it possible for a person to journey to
the sun in a single day of twenty-four hours, basing the time upon a
corresponding calculation of speed, it would require fifty-five years
to reach this nearest star!

Probably not one half of those who have sailed beneath its tranquil and
impressive beauty are aware, that in