the middle of the Southern Cross
there is a brilliant cluster of stars, which though not visible to the
naked eye, are brought out with a strong telescope,--shining like new
gems in a beautiful necklace of pearls. In these far-southern waters we
saw for the first time what are called the Magellan Clouds. They lie
between Canopus, Acherner, and the South Pole. These two light
clouds--or what seem to be such, seen in a perfectly clear sky--are
nothing more nor less than visible nebulae, or star-clusters, at such
vast distances from the earth as to have by combination this effect upon
the human vision.

At sea the stars assume perhaps a greater importance in our estimation
than on land, because from them is obtained latitude and longitude, on
the principles of terrestrial measurement; and thus by their aid the
mariner determines his bearing in the great waste of ocean. Forty or
fifty centuries ago the Chaldean shepherds were accustomed to gaze upon
these shining orbs in worshipful admiration, but with no idea of their
vast system. They were to them "the words of God, the Scriptures of the
skies." It has been left to our later days to formulate the methods of
their constant and endless procession. All the principal stars are now
well known and their limits clearly defined upon charts, so that we can
easily acquire a knowledge of them. The inhabitants of North America
have the constellation of Ursa Major as also the North Star always with
them; they never wholly disappear below the horizon. When the mariner
sailing north of the equator has determined the position of this group
of seven stars, two of which are known as "the pointers" indicating the
North Star, he can designate all points of the compass unerringly. But
in the South Sea, where we are writing these lines, a little north of
New Zealand, they are not visible. Other constellations however, whose
relative positions are as fixed in the Southern Hemisphere, become
equally sure guides to the watchful navigator.

How suggestive are these "altar-fires of heaven," particularly when seen
from the deck of a ship, alone and at midnight, surrounded by infinite
space, thousands of miles from land and home! Generations of men succeed
one another in rapid succession, nations rise and fade away, whole races
are obliterated from existence, pyramids moulder into dust with
thousands of years upon their heads; but the stars fade not; they are
the same, unchanged, unchanging, through