Between Mars and Jupiter lies an immense lane of over 300,000,000 miles. This lane had been considered vacant until a century and a quarter ago, and since it was an exception to the general law of planetary distances, it had long been of interest to astronomers. Mercury, Venus, Earth and Mars are distant 35,750,000; 66,750,000; 92,500,000 and 141,000,000 miles, respectively, from the sun; then came this wide vacancy, with the order for the distances between the planets again resumed beyond Jupiter. When the great Kepler suggested that there must be an invisible planet revolving in this gap, many thought that the idea was only a dream of a great mind, for a planet so close would have been discovered long ago. Yet the suggestion was often considered, for the space had been to astronomers as a false note is to a musician, and they knew that if there were only a planet circling here, the spaces between every world would "increase with regularity in proceeding outward from the sun" and the solar kingdom would then be laid out in perfect harmony. The matter was left at this stage for many years, indeed it was not until 200 years after the suggestion was made that astronomers banded together, divided up the zodiac into twenty-four parts and, distributing them among an equal number of observers, began a systematic search. It is quite likely that during the 200 years previous to 1801, when the search began, not an astronomer lived but who had at some time wished to participate in such a search. Astronomers were, however, so few, the heavens so wide and life so short, that there was more than a load already on each of those earnest workers among the star fields. Why is it, by the way, that more people are not curious about the sky? It sometimes happens that those who have stars for a hobby, a rocking-horse Pegasus, unexpectedly find themselves transported by the Winged Horse to regions above. Thus, Piazzi, at Palermo on the island of Sicily, happened across the first of the little planets, or "planetoids," quite by accident, delighting not only himself but every scientist in the world, for order was now established in the solar system. Although this newly discovered planet was so tiny that its whole surface was no more than equal to the area of the United States, the very fact of its existence in what had seemed a wasted space, probably gave as much satisfaction as the discovery of Uranus ten years before. At the request of Piazzi, the new planet was named Ceres after the tutelary Goddess of Sicily, and +C as a symbol was appropriately given the sign of the sickle: +C.