It is in this part that Herschel supposes the layer to be broken up.*
[footnote] *Arago, in the 'Annuaire', 1842, p. 569
The number of telescopic stars in the Milky Way uninterrupted by any nebulae
is estimated at 18 millions. In order, I will not say, to realize the
greatness of this number, but, at any rate, to compare it with something
analogous, I will call attention to the fact that there are not in the whole
heavens more than about 8000 stars between the first and the sixth
magnitudes, visible to the naked eye. The barren astonishment excited by
numbers and dimensions in space, when not considered with reference to
applications engaging the mental and perceptive powers of man, is awakened
in both extremes of the universe, in the celestial bodies as in the minutest
animalcules.*
[footnote] *Sir John Herschel, in a letter from Feldhuysen, dated Jan.
13th, 1836. Nicholl, 'Architecture of the Heavens', 1838, p. 22. (See,
also, some separate notices by Sir William Herschel on the starless space
which separates us by a great distance from the Milky Way, in the 'Philos.
Transact.' for 1817, Part ii., p. 328.)
A cubic inch of the polishing slate of Bilin contains, according to
Ehrenberg, 40,000 millions of the silicious shells of Galionellae.
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