Excerpt from The Creighton Chronicle, Vol. 4: January 20, 1913 As the telescope can only show us the distance between the two components, that is, the sum of the distances of both from their common center of gravity, we always regard the brighter star as fixed and the fainter one moving about it in an orbit, whose dimensions are the sum of the dimensions of both orbits just as we say that the earth moves about the sun as a center. Mathematics may demur to some extent, but as the results are the same and half the labor of computation is saved, and espe cially as in most cases we have no knowledge at all of the relative masses, there is no other method of procedure, and theory must for the once yield the right of way to practice. It is only by means of the spectroscope that we can arrive at any knowledge of the masses of the component stars, and that indirectly through their velocities. As both stars complete their respective orbits in the same time, it is evident that thelr speed must be directly proportional to their orbits and that conse quently once we know this speed, we can compute the masses. It is the privilege of the spectroscopic method that it enables us to measure this speed in miles per second, without requiring us in advance to know the distances of the stars from the earth. Here again a few words of explanation may be necessary. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.