The Milky Way runs up in threads near the Scorpion. From the Swan down to the Southern Cross it is in two bright lines, enclosing a long dark space.
But look at the two pretty bridges over the black waters, connecting the two shining walks at the sides.
You remember, then, that the Milky Way, seen in the north and south, is a great ring of different breadths going round the heavens, and passing at some little distance from both poles.
It is like the Egyptian story you told me, father, of the people worshipping a serpent with his tail in his mouth. How singular that this milk-stream should be poured right round the heavens in a huge broad circle!
The Galaxy, or Milky Way, is seen to great advantage near the Cross.
It is about the milkiest in that quarter. And I can make a good guess now about the two Magellanic clouds, as the captain called them—these two clouds of light not far from the Cross. Why, they are only places where the shining stuff is thickest.
You would, then, really believe there might be lots of stars in those clouds.
Yes; but what are the two black clouds?
Look at them attentively, and tell me what you think of them?
There is no milk there, anyhow. I suppose they look black by contrast with the bright clouds near. How cold and dreary they seem! And yet now I can make out a few stars scattered about, like ships on a big sea at a great distance from one another.