might account for the eccentricity of its orbit, or some accident

has happened to rejuvenate it here. A collision with another

minor planet moving in an orbit that crossed its own, or with the

head of a large comet, would have reconverted it into a star,

perhaps after it had long been cold. A comet may first have so

changed the course of one of two small bodies as to make them

collide. This seems to me the most plausible theory. Over a

hundred years ago the English astronomer, Chambers, wrote of