Passing over the great comet of 1861, on which I have already said a good deal, I must quit the subject of famous comets by a few words about that of 1882, which, though by no means one of the largest, was, in some respects, one of the most remarkable of modern times. It was visible for the long period of nine months, and was conspicuously prominent to the naked eye during September, but these facts, though note-worthy, would not have called for particular remark, had not the comet exhibited some special peculiarities which distinguished it from all others. In the first place, it seems to have undergone certain disruptive changes, in virtue of which the nucleus became split up into four independent nuclei. Then the tail may have been tubular, its extremity being not only bifid, but totally unsymmetrical with respect to the main part. The tubular character of the tail was suggested by Tempel. To other observers, this feature gave the idea of the comet, properly so-called, being enclosed in a cylindrical envelope, which completely surrounded the comet, and overlapped it for a considerable distance at both ends. Finally (and in this resembling Biela’s comet) the comet of 1882 seems to have thrown off a fragment which became an independent body. What has gone before, will, I think, have served abundantly to establish the position with which I started, namely, that comets occupy (and deservedly so) the front rank amongst those astronomical objects in which, on occasions, the general public takes an interest. I have thus completed, so far as the space at my disposal has permitted, a popular descriptive Survey of the Solar System. Those who have perused the preceding pages, however slight may have been their previous acquaintance with the Science of Astronomy taken as a whole, will have no difficulty in realising that what I have said bears but a small proportion to what I have left unsaid. They will equally, I hope, be able to see, without indeed the necessity of a suggestion, that all those wondrous orbs which we call the planets could neither have come into existence nor have been maintained in their allotted places for so many thousands of years, except as the result of Design emanating from an All-powerful Creator. FOOTNOTES. [1]The remark in the text applies to all the major planets and to a large number of the minor planets, but certain of the minor planets travel in orbits which are considerably inclined to the ecliptic, and therefore to all the other planets. [2]Given in full in my _Handbook of Astronomy_, 4th ed., vol. i., p. 26. [3]“_Recollections of Past Life_,” 2nd ed., p. 305. [4]For some information respecting these Secchi “Types” of Stars, see my “_Story of the Stars_,” 2nd ed., p. 140. [5]The circle and the ellipse are what are called “closed” curves.