Nor has it ever been visible since that period for a single
moment, either to the eye or to the telescope. It burned up and
was lost in space.

"Humboldt," he added, "has not told us who set that world on fire!"

"But," resumed he, "I have still clearer proofs." Saying this, he thrust
into my hands the last London _Quarterly_, and on opening the book at an
article headed "The Language of Light," I read with a feeling akin to
awe, the following passage:

Further, some stars exhibit changes of complexion in themselves.
Sirius, as before stated, was once a ruddy, or rather a
fiery-faced orb, but has now forgotten to blush, and looks down
upon us with a pure, brilliant smile, in which there is no trace
either of anger or of shame. On the countenances of others, still
more varied traits have rippled, within a much briefer period of
time. May not these be due to some physiological revolutions,
general or convulsive, which are in progress in the particular
orb, and which, by affecting the constitution of its atmosphere,
compel the absorption or promote the transmission of particular
rays? The supposition appears by no means improbable, especially
if we call to mind the hydrogen volcanoes which have been
discovered on the photosphere of the sun. Indeed, there are a few
small stars which afford a spectrum of bright lines instead of
dark ones, and this we know denotes a gaseous or vaporized state
of things, from which it may be inferred that such orbs are in a
different condition from most of their relations.

And as, if for the very purpose of throwing light upon this
interesting question, an event of the most striking character
occurred in the heavens, almost as soon as the spectroscopists
were prepared to interpret it correctly.

On the 12th of May, 1866, a great conflagration, infinitely
larger than that of London or Moscow, was announced. To use the
expression of a distinguished astronomer, a world was found to be
on fire! A star, which till then had shone weakly and
unobtrusively in the _corona borealis_, suddenly blazed up into a
luminary of the second magnitude. In the course of three days
from its discovery in this new character, by Birmingham, at Tuam,
it had declined to the third or fourth order of brilliancy. In
twelve days, dating from its first apparition in the Irish
heavens, it had sunk to the eighth rank, an