THE PLANETS.
Their Comparative Sizes and Positions.
To assist the mind in framing a conception of the magnitude and relative distances of the primary planets, let us have recourse to the following method. The dome of St. Paul’s is 145 feet in diameter. Suppose a globe of this size to represent the Sun; then a globe of 97⁄10 inches will represent Mercury; one of 179⁄10 inches, Venus; one of 18 inches, the Earth; one of 5 inches diameter, the Moon, (whose distance from the earth is 240,000 miles;) one of 10 inches, Mars; one of 15 feet, Jupiter; and one of 111⁄2 feet, Saturn, with his ring four feet broad, and at the same distance from his body all round.
In this proportion, suppose the Sun to be at St. Paul’s, then
☿ Mercury might be at the Tower of London,
♀ Venus at St. James’s Palace,
⊖ The Earth at Marylebone,
♂ Mars at Kensington,
♃ Jupiter at Hampton Court,
♄ Saturn at Clifden;
all moving round the cupola of St. Paul’s as ☉ their common centre.
ACCOUNT OF THE BEE-EATER
Of Selborne, Hampshire.
By the Rev. Gilbert White, 1789.
We had in this village, more than twenty years ago, an idiot boy, whom I well remember, who, from a child, showed a strong propensity to bees: they were his food, his amusement, his sole object; and as people of this cast have seldom more than one point in view, so this lad exerted all his few faculties on this one pursuit. In the winter he dosed away his time, within his father’s house, by the fire-side, in a kind of torpid state, seldom departing from the chimney-corner; but in the summer he was all alert, and in quest of his game in the fields and on sunny banks. Honey-bees, humble-bees, and wasps, were his prey, wherever he found them: he had no apprehensions from their stings, but would seize them nudis manibus, and at once disarm them of their weapons, and suck their bodies for the sake of their honey-bags. Sometimes he would fill his bosom between his shirt and his skin with a number of these captives; and sometimes would confine them in bottles. He was a very merops apiaster, or bee-bird, and very injurious to men that kept bees; for he would slide into their bee-gardens, and, sitting down before the stools, would rap with his finger on the hives, and so take the bees as they came out. He has been known to overturn hives for the sake of honey, of which he was passionately fond. Where metheglin was making, he would linger round the tubs and vessels, begging a draught of what he called bee-wine. As he ran about, he used to make a humming noise with his lips, resembling the buzzing of bees. This lad was lean and sallow, and of a cadaverous complexion; and, except in his favourite pursuit, in which he was wonderfully adroit, discovered no manner of understanding. Had his capacity been better, and directed to the same object, he had perhaps abated much of our wonder at the feats of a more modern exhibiter of bees; and we may justly say of him now,
“Thou,
Had thy presiding star propitious shone,
Should’st Wildman be.”
When a tall youth, he was removed from hence to a distant village, where he died, as I understand, before he arrived at manhood.