t probability of being the true Central Sun.'

By a train of reasoning, which I shall not attempt to explain, he
finds the probable parallax of this great central star to be six
thousandths of one second of arc, and its distance to be 34 millions
of times the distance of the sun, or so remote that light, with a
velocity of 12 millions of miles per minute, requires a period of 537
years to pass from _the great centre_ to our sun.

As a first rough approximation, he deduces the period of the
revolution of our sun, with all its train of planets, satellites and
comets, about the grand centre, to be _eighteen millions two hundred
thousand years_.

=Ocean Steam Navigation.=

The 'Ocean Steam Company,' which has the patronage of the United
States Government to the amount of $400,000 per annum, are getting on
rapidly with the first steamship of their line. She is to be completed
and commence running on the first of March next.

SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN

NEW YORK, OCTOBER 10, 1846.

=Employment.=

It is dangerous for a man of superior ability to find himself thrown
upon the world without some regular employment. The restlessness
inherent in genius, being thus undirected by any permanent influence,
frames for itself occupations out of accidents. Moral integrity
sometimes falls a prey to the want of a fixed pursuit, and the man who
receives his direction in active life from the fortuitous impulse of
circumstances, will be very apt to receive his principles likewise
from chance. Genius, under such guidance, attains no noble ends, but
resembles rather a copious spring conveyed in a falling aqueduct,
where the waters continually escape through the frequent crevices, and
waste themselves ineffectually on their passage. The law of nature is
here, as elsewhere, binding, and no powerful results ever ensue from
the trivial exercise of high endowments. The finest mind, when thus
destitute of a fixed purpose, passes away without leaving permanent
traces of its existence; losing its energy by turning aside from its
course, it becomes as harmless and inefficient as the lightning,
which, of itself irresistible, may yet be rendered powerless by a
slight conductor.

=The Editor.=

Write--keep writing--is the motto of an editor. If he has no ideas, he
must dig for them; if he has but little time to arrange them, no
matter, the work must be done. Sickness may come upon him; want may
stare him in the face, but he must cogitate some