The cluster known as 35 Messier, a little north of the star Eta Geminorum, is visible in an opera-glass, but a small telescope is required to see the component stars. A well-marked clustering tendency is visible among the brighter stars of the group, two, three, four, and sometimes five stars being grouped together in subordinate collections. Admiral Smyth says: “It presents a gorgeous field of stars from the ninth to the sixteenth magnitude, but with the centre of the mass less rich than the rest. From the small stars being inclined to form curves of three or four, and often with a large one at the root of the curve, it somewhat reminds one of the bursting of a sky-rocket.” This tendency to “stream” formation in the components of star clusters is also well marked in a photograph of the cluster 38 Messier (kindly sent to me by MM. Henry of the Paris Observatory). It was described by Webb as “a noble cluster arranged in an oblique cross,” and Smyth says: “The very unusual shape of this cluster recalls the sagacity of Sir William Herschel’s speculations upon the subject, and very much favors the idea of an attractive power lodged in the brightest part. For although the form is not globular, it is plainly to be seen that there is a tendency toward sphericity, by the swell of the dimensions as they draw near the most luminous part, denoting, as it were, a stream or tide of stars, setting toward the centre.” Sir W. Herschel, speaking of a compressed cluster in Perseus, says “the large stars are arranged in lines like interwoven letters,” and Webb says “it is beautifully bordered by a brighter foreshortened pentagon.” Observing with a 3-inch telescope in India, I noticed a beautiful cluster of stars, about 4° north of Gamma and Upsilon Scorpii, resembling in shape a bird’s foot, with remarkable streams of stars. This cluster is visible to the naked eye as a star of about the fifth magnitude. Although these loosely associated star clusters do not show such evidence in favor of family connection as the more closely compacted globular clusters, still we can hardly escape from the conviction that their apparent aggregation is really due to some physical bond of union, and not merely the result of a fortuitous scattering of stars at different distances in the line of sight. THE GREAT NEBULA OF ORION.—SIR ROBERT S. BALL