THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELLS
 
 This book is DUE on the la?t date <r<>TiDrd V -w 
 
 I 
 
 SOUTHERN BRANCH 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA 
 LIBRARY 
 
 LOS ANGELES. CAIJ-
 
 ASTRONOMY 
 
 WITH T HE N AJ^E D E Y t 
 
 A NEW GEOGRAPHY OF THE HEAV ENS 
 
 WITH DESCRIPTIONS AND CHARTS OK 
 CONSTELLATIONS. STARS, AND PLANETS 
 
 IJY 
 
 GARRETT P. SERVISS 
 
 AfTIIOK OP 
 
 "ACTXONOMY WITH AN orixA GLAM* 
 
 NEW YORK AND LONDON 
 
 HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS 
 
 If CM VII]
 
 Copyright, 1908, by HARPKR & BROTHERS. 
 
 All rights rtiervtd. 
 
 Published April, 1908.
 
 MrtK & 
 Mathematical 
 Sciences 
 
 NORMAL SCHOOL, 
 
 ItOS AHOHUB8, CJUl. 
 
 TO 
 
 GARRETT P. SERVISS. JR. 
 
 UNTIMELY DEAD AT ITHACA, N. Y. 
 
 DECEMBER 23, 1907
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 i 
 
 HE PLEASURE OP KNOWING THE CONSTELLATIONS 
 
 ^1^ " I * n . dm * rks ~ Effec t of going north or south on the ap- 
 pearance of the heavens Personal influence of the stars View- 
 ing the constellations amid historic scenes Cassiopeia seen from 
 aytemnestra's tomb-The celestial pageant from Mount Etna 
 The stars announce the seasons-Atmospheric influence on 
 the appearance of the stars-Individuality of the stars Star 
 magmtudes-Star colors-The charm of star groupings-Th^ 
 hannonv of the <T>h,.r,.< H,,.., ._.-_ . 
 
 II 
 30NSTELLATIONS ON THE MERIDIAN IN JANUARY 
 
 efinition of the meridian The double revolution of the heavens 
 
 -Aunga, the charioteer-Capella and its history-Camelopar- 
 
 .s-Taurus, the Bull-Aldebaran-The Hyades-The Plda- 
 
 Worship of and superstition about the Pleiades Orion 
 
 toe most brilliant constellation Betelgeusc-Rigel-The Belt 
 
 Stars-Bellatrix-The Great Nebula-Story of Orion Tek- 
 
 jcopic nches-Eridanus-Great length of the constellation - 
 
 story-Telescopic stars-Lepus, the Hare-Its conspicuous 
 
 srtuation-Its ongm A wonderful red star Columba the 
 
 Page 16 
 
 III 
 WSTELLATIONS ON THE MERIDIAN IN FEBRUARY 
 
 nis Major, the Greater Dog Sinus Why called the Doe Star 
 -Legends and superstitions about Sirius Its strange com-
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 panion Monoceros Canis Minor Procyon Gemini, the] 
 Twins, the fourth constellation of the zodiac Castor and 
 Pollux Their history Why called the sailors' stars 
 Lynx Page 4 a 
 
 IV 
 CONSTELLATIONS ON THE MERIDIAN IN MARCH 
 
 Cancer, the Crab, the fifth constellation of the zodiac The Man- 
 ger, or Praesepe Ancient importance as a weather sign Ga- 
 lileo's discovery Planetary conjunctions in Cancer Hydra, 
 one of the largest of the constellations Superstitions concern- 
 ing it Page 57 
 
 V 
 CONSTELLATIONS ON THE MERIDIAN IN APRIL 
 
 Leo, the Lion, sixth of the zodiacal set The figure of the Sickle 
 The famous star Regulus This constellation always repre- 
 sented as a lion Leo Minor Ursa Major, the Greater Bear 
 The celebrated figure of the Great Dipper Its various names 
 The names of its seven stars Mizar and Alcor Sextans 
 Crater, the Cup Page 65 
 
 VI 
 CONSTELLATIONS ON THE MERIDIAN IN MAY 
 
 Corvus, the Crow Virgo, the seventh constellation of the zodiac 
 The beautiful Spica A mine of myths The field of the Neb- 
 uUe Coma Berenices The legend of a queen's hair Lilac 
 stars Canes Venatici, the Hunting Dogs The beautiful Cot 
 Caroli Page ; 
 
 VII 
 CONSTELLATIONS ON THE MERIDIAN IN JUNE 
 
 Libra, the Balance, eighth in the zodiacal circle A green star- 
 Bootes, the great constellation of the north Arcturus and its 
 vi
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 greatjame Corona Borealis-Beautiful form of the constella- 
 
 ! Thn .IP i thC C !? wn ~ Ursa Minor - the polar constella- 
 Uon-The star Polaris-Draco, the great dragon of the north- 
 Alpha Draconis, formerly the pole star-Relation of the Great 
 Pyramid to th,s star-History of Gamma Draconis . Page 8 7 
 
 VIII 
 CONSTELLATIONS ON THE MERIDIAN IN JULY 
 
 inth zodiacal constellation -Conspicuous figure of the 
 -The great red star Antares-Its wonderful croon 
 
 -.n^uH.u^-OphiuchuV^nd^pe^^^.r^^nsS 1 
 
 turn toward, which the earth is tmvelling-Mystic ^ signTficanco 
 
 istellation in ancient times Pag c Ioa 
 
 IX 
 [CONSTELLATIONS ON THE MERIDIAN IN AUGUST 
 
 fVhM%l e w rCher> tCnth *tion of the zodiac-Beauty 
 of the Milky Way m Sagittarius-Scutum Sobicskii and itTsUr 
 
 " Uia E ~ " 
 
 Ie7 d U f a ' l E ^~^ " Altair-Thc curious Ch 
 legend of the Spinning Damsel and the Magpie Bridgc- 
 
 w'h ' a n P ^ f O ^ h ^~^^^r s^endor of^he 
 When it will be the pole star again . . Page 1 12 
 
 X 
 
 CONSTELLATIONS ON THE MERIDIAN IN SEPTEMBER 
 
 , n, f thc "x** 1 circle-The Gate 
 
 7? Ph , inUS 'T thC DoI P hi "-The fable of Arion- 
 -Vulpecula-Lord Rossc's wonderful Dumb-bell 
 
 Northcm 
 
 XI 
 ONSTELLATIONS ON THE MERIDIAN IN OCTOBER 
 
 Aquarius the Water-bearer, the last in the zodiacal 
 Austrahs, the Southern Fish-The star 
 
 vii
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 the Winged Horse The Great Square of Pegasus Legends of 
 the Winged Horse Lacerta Cepheus, the King The Royal 
 Family of the sky Page 130 
 
 XII 
 CONSTELLATIONS ON THE MERIDIAN IN NOVEMBER 
 
 Pisces, the Fishes, leader of the zodiac The Greenwich of the 
 sky Planetary conjunctions in Pisces Andromeda, the con- 
 stellation of romance The great Andromeda nebula Story of 
 Andromeda and her rescuer, Perseus Cassiopeia, the Queen 
 The "W," or Key Tycho Brahe's star . . . Page 138 
 
 XIII 
 CONSTELLATIONS ON THE MERIDIAN IN DECEMBER 
 
 Aries, the Ram, leader of the zodiacal signs Antiquity of the 
 constellation Triangulum Perseus, the conqueror of the Gor- 
 gon The Gorgon star Alcor The new star of 1901 Cetus, 
 the Whale The wonderful variable Mira . . . Page 148 
 
 XIV 
 THE SOUTHERN CONSTELLATIONS 
 
 Argo Navis The great star Canopus The South Pole The 
 Southern Cross Centaurus Alpha Centauri, the nearest star 
 Ara, the Altar The Triangle Grus and Toucan The Phce- 
 nix The Southern Eridanus The star Achernar The Magel- 
 lanic clouds Page 158 
 
 XV 
 THE MILKY WAY 
 
 Ancient ideas of the Milky Way The pathway of the gods and 
 of spirits The story of Phaeton The Milky Way figured as a 
 river Course of the Milky Way through the sky Great stars 
 that follow the Milky Way The Coal Sack Mythology of the 
 
 ay Page 171 
 
 viii
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 XVI 
 
 THE ZODIACAL LIGHT 
 
 Its appearance and the seasons when best seen Traced across 
 the whole sky Du Chaillu's description Humboldfs descrip- 
 tion Scientific theories of the Zodiacal Light Page 182 
 
 XVII 
 THE PLANETS 
 
 How they differ in appearance from stars Their motions Five 
 nly known to the ancients Superstitions about them The 
 first discoveries Mercury. Venus. Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn; 
 their peculiarities, their sizes, distances, movements, rotations, 
 surface characteristics, and their condition from the point of 
 view of habitability . p agc , 86 
 
 XVIII 
 THE MOON 
 
 Fascination exercised by the moon The strange spots on her 
 surface Stories of the Man in the Moon Stories of the Woman 
 in the Moon The Hare in the Moon Galileo's discoveries- 
 Nature of the lunar surface The birth of the moon from the 
 earth The question of habitability Eclipses, their scientific 
 importance, their popular interest, and the superstitions asso- 
 ciated with them Earthlight on the moon The moon and the 
 months Occultations by the moon Paae 226 
 
 INDEX Page a 43
 
 LIST OF CHARTS 
 
 CHART I Facing page 1 6 
 
 CHART II " " 43 
 
 CHART III " " 58 
 
 CHART IV " " 66 
 
 CHART V " " 78 
 
 CHART VI " " 88 
 
 CHART VII " " 102 
 
 CHART VIII " " ua 
 
 CHART IX " " 122 
 
 CHART X " " 130 
 
 CHART XI " " 138 
 
 CHART XII " " 148 
 
 CHART XIII " " 158 
 
 CHART XIV. " " 226
 
 PREFACE 
 
 / 8847 
 
 T^HE specific things undertaken in this book are: 
 1 First, the presentation of a set of star-charts, ac- 
 companying and illustrating the text, and containing 
 the constellation figures, so that the reader may see 
 those strange forms that the imaginations of men 
 for thousands of years have drawn in the sky. The 
 charts also contain all the stars that have received 
 distinctive names, and with these all the other stars 
 that the unaided eye readily perceives. The sixth- 
 magnitude stars are visible to ordinarily good eyes, 
 but they are inconspicuous. The charts are reduc- 
 tions from Heis's Atlas Ctclestis. 
 
 A chart of the southern sky has been added to 
 cover the constellations not visible from our latitudes. 
 
 Second, the march of the constellations across the 
 sky, resulting from the annual revolution of the earth 
 in its orbit, is followed from month to month, and 
 they are presented in the text according to the times 
 of their successive arrivals near the meridian, the 
 north and south line of the sky. Of course they are 
 not visible only when on or near the meridian; but 
 some system must be followed in describing them, 
 and this arrangement, recognizing the sequence of the 
 months, and presenting them when, upon the whole, 
 they are best placed for observation, seemed prefer- 
 xiii
 
 PREFACE 
 
 able to any other. The appearance of the constella- 
 tions, as viewed with the naked eye, is described, 
 their histories and mythologies are given, and the 
 stories of their chief stars and star groups are detailed. 
 For the convenience of those who have telescopes, 
 some of the double stars and other interesting tele- 
 . scopic objects in each constellation are described 
 and their positions indicated. 
 
 Third, the planets are described in a separate 
 chapter, with illustrations intended to enable the 
 uninitiated reader to follow their paths among the 
 stars and to predict their approximate places for 
 himself. In consequence of their constant motion, 
 the planets cannot be indicated by symbols definitely 
 located on the charts like the fixed stars. 
 
 To sum up, the general purpose is to revive and 
 cultivate interest in the picturesque and easily un- 
 derstood side of astronomy, so that everybody who 
 wishes may "feel at home in the starry heavens," 
 may share in the great intellectual pleasures which 
 an acquaintance with them invariably gives, and may 
 understand and enjoy the references to the stars, the 
 constellations, and the planets that abound in all 
 literatures and in all the periodicals of the day. 
 
 GARRETT P. SERVISS. 
 
 BOROUGH OP BROOKLYN, NEW YORK, 
 March, 1908.
 
 ASTRONOMY 
 WITH THE NAKED EYE
 
 ASTRONOMY 
 WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 i 
 
 THE PLEASURE OP KNOWING THE CONSTELLATIONS 
 
 " If the stars should appear one night in a thousand years, how 
 would men believe and adore and preserve for many generations 
 the remembrance of the city of God which had been shown?" 
 
 RALPH WALDO EMERSON. 
 
 THE stars are the true landmarks which are 
 never changed. Because of their infinite dis- 
 tance they are always at hand, for no shifting of our 
 place upon the tiny earth can sensibly alter their 
 position. If, when we travel into strange lands, the 
 familiar stars vanished and new ones took their place, 
 our feeling of remoteness from home would become 
 unbearable. We should lose confidence in ourselves. 
 It was the friendly stars that first led men round the 
 globe. As long as those well-known sentinels shone, 
 tranquil and steadfast overhead, they had courage 
 to go on and on. If the stars had deserted him, even 
 Columbus would have lost heart. Because when we
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 cross the equator and travel into the southern hemi- 
 sphere some of the constellations do sink permanently 
 below the horizon, while unfamiliar ones rise in the 
 opposite quarter, a journey in that direction seems 
 longer than others. Nothing astonished the early 
 navigators more than the unusual aspect of the 
 austral firmament, and in particular the splendor of 
 the Magellanic clouds and the Southern Cross, which 
 seemed to them symbolic of an unknown world. 
 The renown that these constellations attained in the 
 days of the first circumnavigators still kindles the 
 imagination. 
 
 So, in the far north the strange aspect of the noc- 
 turnal sky and the displacement of the arctic con- 
 stellations agitate the most undaunted spirits as 
 much as does the extraordinary character of the 
 landscapes. The man who stands upon the pole of 
 the earth, as somebody will do some day, will behold 
 nothing so fantastically wonderful as the horizontal 
 motion of the heavens, carrying the stars in circles 
 of perpetual apparition, and swinging the sun and the 
 moon round the whole horizon as if suspended by 
 invisible chains from the vortex of the world. 
 
 In the experiences and sentiments of individual 
 life the stars play a great part. Many a lonely night, 
 with all terrestrial friends far away, has been bright- 
 ened for me by the fraternal presence of Orion or 
 Bootes. Amid the solitude of a hunter's camp, with 
 companions absent on a night-long expedition, and 
 the watch-fire languishing, it has been an inexpres- 
 sible comfort to see through the lofty tops of the 
 trees familiar constellations flashing recognition and
 
 KNOWING THE CONSTELLATIONS 
 
 giving assurance of their unfailing nearness. Aratus, 
 the Greek singer of the stars, clearly expressed a 
 personal experience when he wrote that "from all 
 quarters heaven speaks to man." Make the ac- 
 quaintance of Polaris, Sirius, Arcturus, Regulus, Vega, 
 Spica, Rigel, and they will be always with you on 
 your mundane way, never leaving you alone and 
 unfriended. He who knows the stars and constel- 
 lations carries the map of the world in his head. He 
 has a book older than Homer always open before him. 
 He is in a gallery of pictures containing the master- 
 pieces of the human imagination when the world was 
 young and thought untrammelled. 
 
 The mere names of the ancient constellations cap- 
 tivate the mind. Who can look unmoved upon 
 Andromeda, chained, and Perseus, with diamond 
 sword, speeding to her rescue; or upon Orion, lifting 
 his starry club to meet the Bull, charging headlong 
 down the curve of the zodiac? It is a felicity to 
 know Sirius, that great prismatic star that awed the 
 ancient land of the Nile at his rising, and in whose- 
 honor immense temples, the oldest in the world, were 
 erected; or Arcturus, whose power and beauty in- 
 spired the poet Job. 
 
 Among the tableaux of memory that I should most 
 grieve to lose are views of the picturesque heavens 
 disclosed amid remarkable scenes in foreign lands. I 
 would instance a vision of Cassiopeia, seen shortly 
 before dawn on an August morning through the 
 broken roof of the huge vaulted sepulchre at Mycenae, 
 called Clytemnestra's tomb. I had ridden through 
 a moonlit night from Corinth, over the mountain- 
 3
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 cms neck of the Peloponnesus, and down to the 
 head of the Valley of Argolis, and had arrived at the 
 ruins of Agamemnon's capital just as the moon set, 
 at the darkest hour of the night. Amid the gloom, 
 fighting off the awakened dogs, I set out with my 
 guide to explore the half-disinterred city. After we 
 had viewed the bat-inhabited interior of the so- 
 called Treasury of Atreus by the light of a brush- 
 fire, we approached the smaller "beehive tomb" of 
 Clytemnestra, near the Gate of the Lions. Stum- 
 bling over fallen stones, I found myself in the empty 
 chamber where the body of the royal murderess is 
 said to have lain three thousand years ago, and, 
 glancing upward, was startled at the sight of Cas- 
 siopeia, flashing down through the shattered dome 
 from her throne of stars. Near her shone her daugh- 
 ter Andromeda, and Perseus, the slayer of the Medusa 
 and the Sea Dragon. From the underground gloom 
 that enveloped us the spectacle was more magnifi- 
 cent than I can picture it in words. But its great- 
 est power lay in suggestion, for who could help re- 
 membering the legend that those starry characters 
 had had their birth in this very valley, and had 
 founded Mycena?, long anterior to the days of Clyt- 
 emnestra and Helen, Agamemnon and Hector ? Cas- 
 siopeia had probably found her place in the stars, and 
 been recognized there, before Homer's songs were sung. 
 To know the constellations is better than to know the 
 Iliad and easier. 
 
 Another instance of the exquisite pleasure that 
 acquaintance with the constellations is capable of 
 adding to the enjoyment of impressive and historic 
 4
 
 KNOWING THE CONSTELLATIONS 
 
 scenes recurs with the recollection of a view of the 
 starry heavens which I once had from the unob- 
 structed summit of Mount Etna, which, having no 
 rival within the entire range of vision, puts a circle 
 eight hundred miles in circumference under the 
 observer's eyes, while lifting him on its lone pinnacle 
 into the midst of the sky. Three or four hours after 
 midnight, at the time of the Autumnal Equinox, I 
 stood on the verge of the great crater, and after a 
 shuddering glance at the fiery spiracles of the volca- 
 no, deep in its throat, turned to look off. The dark- 
 ness over the world below seemed fathomless, except 
 where the lights of Catania lay sparkling tremulously, 
 as if a living constellation had fallen there and sunk 
 to the bottom of the aerial ocean. For an instant I 
 quailed at the sight of the smooth, jet-black slopes 
 of the cone, gliding, terrifically steep, down into the 
 gloom until, like shadows, they vanished; but the 
 glory of the surrounding heavens soon blended all 
 sensations into that of sublimity alone. 
 
 Beyond the Gulf of Erebus, in the direction of the 
 Strait of Messina, where modern guide-books show 
 the seats of Scylla and Charybdis, and above the 
 dimly visible mountains of Calabria, rose a refulgent 
 procession. First, the starry prow of Argo, Jason's 
 ship, in which he chased the Golden Fleece; then 
 Canis Major, with blinding Sirius in his jaws; then 
 Orion, magnificent with his jewels as I had never 
 beheld him ; Eridanus, winding in streams of golden 
 stars; and Taurus, ablaze with the splendor of the 
 Hyades and the Pleiades. Parallel with this train 
 of celestial pageants was stretched the lustrous scarf 
 5
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 of the Galaxy, and from another point on the horizon 
 towered the Zodiacal Light, a gleaming portent, with 
 Jupiter glowing calm and steady at its apex, as if 
 Zeus on Olympus were presiding again over the gods 
 and heroes. The whole sky was a pictured scroll of 
 Greek mythology, while the land beneath it was 
 "more Greek than Greece itself" the land of The- 
 ocritus, Amaryllis, Persephone, Lacon, Daphnis, Em- 
 pedocles. Yonder, just under the coils of the celes- 
 tial Hydra, was the slope where the heedless com- 
 panions of Ulysses hunted the oxen of the sun, and 
 I knew that when daylight came I should perceive, 
 just at the edge of the sea there, the black rocks 
 that Polyphemus is said to have hurled after the 
 escaping ship of the cunning hero who had blinded 
 him. Towards the south, with Jason's ship glitter- 
 ing above it, lay ancient Syracuse, with Arethusa's 
 magic fountain, and the reedy home of Cyane. 
 Southwest, under the star-shod feet of Pegasus, was 
 the sacred hill of Enna, and the necromantic lake 
 where Aidoneus carried off Persephone to the under- 
 world, until Demeter found and rescued her. Thus 
 the memories that rose in crowds from the storied 
 land hidden below, answering to the emblazoned 
 legends written with starry fires overhead, afforded 
 an hour of romantic contemplation without a parallel 
 in my experience. 
 
 It is no small part of the charm and interest of 
 the constellations that they announce and prefigure 
 the seasons. Spring,, summer, autumn, and winter 
 each has its characteristic stars, which keep step 
 with the year. When the early snows whiten the 
 6
 
 KNOWING THE CONSTELLATIONS 
 
 hills in December comes, with the jingling of sleigh- 
 bells, Orion. Who would not wish to know him as 
 he climbs the eastern sky, scintillant with star-gems, 
 darting vivid sparks of varied color that affect the 
 eye as the bells do the ear? The coruscating land- 
 scape and the spangled firmament are in accord. 
 Orion, in a listless summer night, when the face of 
 the earth is dark and still, and the starlight falls 
 without a ripple in the languid air, would be deprived 
 of half his splendor. Orion, declining to the west in 
 a spring evening when the snows are gone, the trees 
 have begun to feel the sap, and the misty atmosphere 
 is drowsy with the aroma of the awakening earth, 
 is a dethroned monarch. The mighty star fields 
 surrounding him are then like the scenes of a theatre 
 after pallid dawn steals in upon them. 
 
 But the charm of the heavens does not cease at 
 the advent of spring the wand passes to another set 
 of constellations. The vernal sky has its own en- 
 chantment. As the earth puts on its earliest verdure 
 the mild light of Virgo appears in the east, and 
 silvery Spica beams in placid rivalry with the gold- 
 orange radiance of Arcturus hanging below the great 
 handle of the Dipper, between the sheen of Berenice's 
 Hair and the linked pearls of the Northern Crown. 
 The constellations that rise at the opening of the 
 year, instead of the ostentation and magnificence 
 displayed in the hiemal sky, possess a quiet beauty 
 that harmonizes with the season. When, in an April 
 or May night, the sedate Virgin glows amid her well- 
 ordered stars, like an abbess surrounded by white- 
 veiled nuns, how exquisitely the celestial mood re-
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 spends to the brooding planet! No one who has not 
 had the experience can imagine, or fully credit, the 
 thrill of pleasure that comes to the lover of the stars 
 with his earliest glimpse of the constellations that 
 announce the morning of the year. It is a joy deeper 
 than that felt by the discoverer of the first rhodora 
 in the woods. Those constellations are as much a 
 part of the season and as prophetic of its delights 
 as are the scented air and the pied meadows. 
 
 And with summer arrives yet another empyreal 
 pageant as gorgeous as that which then decks the 
 teeming surface of the globe. Scorpio, sprawling 
 over the horizon, with fire-red Antares flaring on 
 his carapace, seems to burn with ardent reflection of 
 the torrid sunset. The Crown hangs lambent in the 
 zenith, and, festooned across the orient sky, like 
 sheets of summer lightning arrested and motionless, 
 hangs the Milky Way. Vega, as pure a diamond as 
 the sky contains, glows among the silver-gemmed 
 strings of the Lyre, while the centaur, Sagittarius, 
 lazily draws his arrow to the head and takes his 
 never-ending aim, where the Galaxy spreads brightest 
 above the southern verge of the sleeping earth. 
 
 Then on comes winter once again, and the snort- 
 ing blasts of December are not more characteristic 
 of the boreal season than is the return of those con- 
 stellations whose distinguishing feature is the keen 
 brilliance of their stars, startling and piercing the eye 
 with incessant darts. The quality of the sidereal 
 radiations is now different. Aldebaran in Taurus is 
 red, and so is Antares in Scorpio, but the redness of 
 Aldebaran is that of a polished gem, while the redness
 
 KNOWING THE CONSTELLATIONS 
 
 of Antares is the soft color of flame. The cause of 
 the difference is no doubt largely atmospheric, and 
 allied to that which produces the distinctive textures 
 of summer and winter clouds. The mien of Orion 
 and his glittering attendants is essentially spectacu- 
 lar. The aspect of this assemblage of epauletted 
 constellations recalls a fanfare of trumpets. They 
 are so showy and restless in their multitudinous 
 flickerings, and have such an appearance of carry- 
 ing the celestial battlements with a rush, that one 
 almost fancies a shout from the sky! 
 
 The individuality, and perhaps I may say the 
 personal peculiarities, of the stars, are sources of 
 endless pleasure for those who study them. The 
 science of stellar photometry divides the stars visible 
 to the naked eye into six magnitudes, or orders of 
 brightness. But these are arbitrary, and the actual 
 gradations are innumerable. Perhaps it would be 
 as difficult to find two stars precisely alike as to find 
 exact counterparts among the faces in a crowd. 
 This is particularly true of the conspicuous stars which 
 the eye sees without any effort of looking. No two 
 ranked as of the first magnitude are equal, and the 
 inequality in some cases is very great. Sirius, the 
 indisputable leader of the whole stellar host, is ten 
 or twelve times brighter than either Fomalhaut or 
 Deneb Cygni, yet both of these are generally called 
 first - magnitude stars. In fact, the first - magnitude 
 stars, to which dignity the most indulgent estimate 
 can admit but twenty in the entire firmament, con- 
 stitute a kind of sidereal peerage whose members 
 exhibit as much variation in splendor and impres- 
 
 a 9
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 siveness as do the princes, dukes, marquises, and 
 earls of a terrestrial nobility. Indeed, according to 
 the more strict photometry developed in the closing 
 decade of the nineteenth century, there are eight 
 star magnitudes embraced within the range of the 
 naked eye, two grades having been added above the 
 old first magnitude. The highest, or brightest, is the 
 negative first magnitude. Then comes the zero mag- 
 nitude, and below that follow, in order, the former 
 first, seco^, third, fourth, fifth, and sixth magni- 
 tudes. Between one magnitude and its next neighbor 
 the increase, or decrease, of brightness is approxi- 
 mately two-and-a-half times (accurately, 2.512) *. e., 
 a star of the first magnitude is two-and-a-half times 
 as bright as one of the second magnitude, six-and-a- 
 quarter times as bright as one of the third mag- 
 nitude (2.5 x 2.5 = 6.25), and so on, a sixth-magnitude 
 star having only one-one-hundredth as much light 
 as a first-magnitude one. Standards of the first 
 magnitude are Aldebaran and Altair. The zero mag- 
 nitude is two-and-a-half times as bright as the first 
 magnitude. Arcturus is a representative of this rank. 
 The negative first magnitude, two-and-a-half times 
 brighter yet, has but one member, the princely 
 Sirius, and he even exceeds the ideal standard of 
 his own rank, his .actual magnitude being 1.4. 
 The actual brilliance of Sirius exceeds that of a 
 standard first-magnitude star about nine times. Next 
 to Sirius in brightness is Canopus, in the Southern 
 Hemisphere, invisible from most of the United States. 
 According to some estimates, Canopus should be 
 admitted to the negative first magnitude, but he
 
 KNOWING THE CONSTELLATIONS 
 
 would occupy a place in that order far below 
 Sirius. 
 
 But it is not only in brightness that the stars 
 differ one from another. Their variations in color 
 are only less striking. Even those that are called 
 white show surprising chromatic variations. Both 
 Vega and Sirius are reckoned as white, but the 
 former has a distinct tinge of blue and the latter a 
 shada of green. Rigel is also a blue-white star, but 
 the intermixture of azure is less pronounced than in 
 Vega. Procyon is white of a yellowish tinge, Capella 
 is creamy white, and Spica silvery. On the other 
 hand, Arcturus, Betelgeuse, Aldebaran, and Antares 
 are all spoken of as red, or ruddy, yet the first is 
 yellowish-red (in some states of the air simply light 
 yellow), the second is topaz-hued, the third is a 
 light rose, and the fourth is the color of fire. The 
 atmosphere has much to do with the color and aspect 
 of the stars. Faint stars are best seen near the 
 zenith, where their light suffers the least absorption. 
 Very bright stars, on the contrary, often seem most 
 brilliant when near the horizon, where, although 
 they are robbed of half their light, their rays play 
 with amazing vivacity, and dart prismatic flashes. 
 Prosper Henry pointed out the fact that when a star 
 close to the horizon is viewed with a telescope its 
 image, instead of being a point, appears in the form 
 of a little vertical spectrum, or band of prismatic 
 colors, the red, as the least refrangible, being at 
 the top. 
 
 Then there is a wonderful charm in the grouping 
 of the stars, and this gave rise to the invention of the 
 ii 
 
 , cm*.
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 constellations. In their assemblages they set off and 
 heighten one another's attractions. Anybody can 
 verify the truth of Xavier de Maistre's remark that 
 when one fixes his eyes on a particular star all of its 
 neighbors seem to scintillate more vividly, as if to 
 divert his attention to them. The shapes of many 
 constellations give a geometrical enjoyment to the 
 eye. The suggestion of some law of connection 
 among their stars also sets the imagination at work. 
 The impression thus produced recalls what Hum- 
 boldt says of the singular mental influence of the 
 forms of such lands as Italy, Sicily, and Greece, and 
 of such bodies of water as the Black and Caspian 
 seas. The Belt of Orion, with its surprising straight- 
 ness and the notable equality of its stars, which 
 resemble carefully matched gems set on a bar, pro- 
 duces an ineffaceable impression which seems as won- 
 derful the hundredth time of viewing as the first. 
 Even the most uncultivated minds are affected by 
 the air of comradeship which some star groups 
 exhibit. Thus the Rev. W. M. Beauchamp relates 
 that the Onondaga Indians have a story that the 
 Pleiades are a group of merry children who once, 
 with shouting and laughter, danced away into the 
 sky, and could never find their way back to the earth. 
 Scorpio, with its curiously curved lines of stars, arrests 
 everybody's attention, and with its look of crawling 
 along just on the verge of the horizon, it gives an 
 uncanny feeling, for there is hardly another constel- 
 lation whose appearance so completely corresponds 
 with its name. 
 
 Regarded in their broader relations and contrasts,
 
 KNOWING THE CONSTELLATIONS 
 
 the stars as a whole possess a marvellous harmony 
 of effect. It is the true music of the spheres, for who 
 shall say that the universally felt influence of the 
 star-bedight heavens does not arise from our in- 
 stinctive, but as yet uneducated, perception of a con- 
 cord which is not of "sweet sounds," but of light and 
 color, whose range of vibrations in the ether infinitely 
 exceeds that of sonant oscillations in the atmosphere ? 
 It has been half-seriously suggested that man may 
 some time develop a new aesthetic capacity which will 
 enable him to enjoy the choral effects of color, and 
 that this lucent harmony, or prismatic music, will 
 afford a more exquisite pleasure, and a more com- 
 plete expression of the deeper emotions, than is now 
 offered by the harmonies of sound, based as they are 
 on a smaller range of sensation, and addressed to a 
 less perfect and comprehensive sense. The music of 
 the spheres is photometric not sonometric, and the 
 canticles of the stars are analogous to the wild 
 melodies of nature. If we choose to exercise our 
 fancy we may imagine that on some planet more 
 advanced or more happily situated this noblest form 
 of artistic expression has been fully developed, and 
 that there the sparkling heavens pour forth a soundless 
 music as yet unappreciated by our dull senses. 
 
 Yet, while the declaration of Aratus, that the 
 heavens from all quarters speak to man, is universally 
 true, there is no doubt that the proportion of man- 
 kind acquainted with the starry heavens and listen- 
 ing to their voices is smaller to-day than it was two 
 thousand years ago. As astronomy has become more 
 scientific in its aims and methods, it has drifted almost 
 13
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 beyond the ken even of educated people. It has be- 
 come a science apart, cultivated by a select few, ap- 
 pealing occasionally to the sense of wonder in the mul- 
 titude by some striking discovery, but upon the whole 
 pursuing its way in solitary grandeur along unfamiliar 
 paths, and uncomprehended except by experts. 
 
 From the popular point of view this is a great pity. 
 As the astronomers, immersed in their technical 
 labors, have ceased to dwell upon the beauties and 
 wonders of the midnight sky which is visible to every- 
 body, the public, lacking an incentive and guidance, 
 has lost interest in the heavens. Yet the universe 
 is there for everybody to see, and no observatory, 
 no instruments, and no mathematics are needed to 
 enable any person to enjoy the immensely ennobling 
 and uplifting pleasure afforded by the contemplation 
 of the stars and constellations that pass every night 
 over our heads. It is only necessary to look. 
 
 The object of this book, then, is to recall busy men 
 to that branch of astronomy which is within every- 
 body's reach, which was once the principal branch, 
 and the basis of all, and which becomes only the more 
 interesting as the scientific aspects of the subject are 
 developed. But with these strictly scientific aspects 
 we are here little concerned. Let us get back to 
 astronomy as the first star-gazers knew it, and with 
 only the aid which they had that of their eyes. 
 
 There is nothing that possesses a more fascinating 
 interest, outside the practical concerns of life, than 
 the constellations. Yet they have been virtually 
 banished from modern celestial charts. There is 
 nothing more beautitul in nature, and nothing that 
 14
 
 KNOWING THE CONSTELLATIONS 
 
 appeals more powerfully to the imagination, than the 
 fifteen or twenty great stars that from time imme- 
 morial have borne individual names; yet modern 
 books on astronomy seldom take any trouble to 
 enable their readers to recognize and know them. 
 There is nothing more captivating to thought than 
 the planets Jupiter, Mars, Venus, Saturn those 
 mysterious worlds that circle with us around the sun ; 
 yet, outside a few observatories, who ever watches 
 them, who knows even where to look for them? 
 
 It is quite time that an attempt should be made to 
 correct so lamentable a state of affairs. I have been 
 simply amazed by information which has recently 
 come to me of the manner in which astronomy is 
 regarded in our institutions of learning. More and 
 more it is neglected. The public schools do not 
 teach the constellations, do not tell their pupils 
 where, or when, they should look for Sirius, or 
 Aldebaran, or Arcturus, or at what time they can see 
 " Bootes leading his hunting-dogs over the zenith in 
 their leash of sidereal fire." To the vast majority, 
 to nine hundred and ninety-nine out of every thou- 
 sand, all these names are mere Greek. The colleges 
 and universities teach their students nothing pertain- 
 ing to the great universe beyond the earth, except a few 
 mathematical formuke, forgotten as soon as learned. 
 Possibly this is unavoidable, in view of the constant 
 encroachment of the trade-school spirit, but it is not 
 irremediable. As long as men have eyes to see and 
 minds to think, it needs but a word, a hint, a glance, 
 to turn them with rapt and ever increasing attention 
 to the wonders overhead.
 
 II 
 
 CONSTELLATIONS ON THE MERIDIAN IN JANUARY 
 
 The meridian is an imaginary line traversing the sky from 
 north to south and passing through the pole of the heavens 
 (near the pole-star), and through the zenith, the point exactly 
 over the observer's head. When a star crosses the meridian it is 
 equidistant from its rising and setting points and is said to 
 culminate. At noon the sun is on the meridian. The starry 
 sphere (regarding the heavens as the shell of a hollow globe seen 
 from the centre) has two apparent revolutions, one diurnal, 
 caused by the earth's rotation on its axis, and the other annual, 
 caused by the earth's revolution around the sun. In consequence 
 of the annual revolution of the heavens the constellations seem 
 to advance slowly from the east, new ones appearing above the 
 eastern horizon each month, while old ones disappear behind 
 the western horizon. Thus those that occupy a place on the 
 meridian at any given hour are not the same from month to 
 month. In this book the constellations are described in the 
 order of their arrival on the meridian month after month, at about 
 nine o'clock in the evening, in the middle of the month. Only 
 those lying between the north pole and the southern horizon are 
 described, as those situated below the pole may usually be better 
 seen at another time. 
 
 Auriga 
 
 (CHART V) 
 
 IF you go out-of-doors at nine o'clock on a clear 
 evening in the middle of January you will see 
 overhead, and not far from the zenith, if your lati- 
 16
 
 5O 10 CTX 
 
 
 
 
 it 
 8^ 
 
 fl "* 
 
 r *"> " 
 
 'G N* TJ 
 
 290 CT.W 40 
 
 *
 
 Chart I 
 
 5O CTJ 
 
 m CT.J 
 
 \ariabilt.
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN JANUARY 
 
 tude is near that of New York, a brilliant white star, 
 of the first magnitude, and of remarkable beauty. 
 It is the star celebrated in fable from remote antiquity 
 under the name of Capella (a Aurigas). At its great 
 elevation, so near the centre of the starry dome, its 
 light falls through an atmosphere so steady that it 
 shows hardly a twinkle. Once in a while a lazy 
 ripple seems to pass on the surface of the atmospheric 
 ocean, the star flashes like a tipped mirror, and then 
 immediately resumes its quiet beaming. The name 
 Capella, as Mr. Allen says in his exhaustive work 
 on Star Names and Their Meanings, signifies "the 
 little She-goat." It is a curious fact that in many 
 widely separated parts of the earth, and in widely 
 separated times, Capella has borne this designation. 
 Not only the Greeks and the Romans called it the 
 Kid, but the ancient Peruvians, who knew nothing 
 of European or Asiatic mythology, had a similar 
 name for it in their language, Colca, and they con- 
 nected it with the affairs of shepherds. For them 
 instead of shining overhead it appeared far down in 
 the north; but remembering that in the southern 
 hemisphere, summer corresponds with our winter, it 
 is evident that the time of Capella' s culmination cor- 
 responded with the season when the shepherds would 
 be watching their flocks. 
 
 Modern research has proved that Capella is a star 
 of immense actual magnitude, exceeding our sun in 
 brightness, according to Professor Newcomb, about 
 one hundred and twenty times. It belongs to that 
 very strange class of stars known as spectroscopic 
 binaries, which term means that they consist each of
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 two stars so close together that no telescope is able 
 to separate their disks, although their duplicate nature 
 is proved by the periodic splitting of their spectro- 
 scopic lines as they revolve swiftly about their com- 
 mon centre of gravity. The period of revolution of 
 the Capella system is one hundred and four days. 
 The principal star almost exactly resembles the sun 
 in its spectrum, while the companion resembles Pro- 
 cyon, a star further advanced in the order of devel- 
 opment. 
 
 Capella is the leading star of the constellation 
 Auriga, the Charioteer, or the Wagoner, which covers 
 a large space in the sky, about 40 from east to west 
 and 30 from north to south, and contains twenty 
 stars from the first to the fifth magnitude inclusive. 
 Auriga is a very ancient constellation, its origin being 
 lost in antique myths. It has been represented for 
 ages under the figure of " a mighty man seated on the 
 Milky Way," and carrying a kid on his left arm. 
 Capella shines in the heart of the imaginary kid. 
 About ten degrees east of Capella is the second- 
 magnitude star, Menkalina 08). This star marks the 
 right shoulder, or upper part of the right arm, of the 
 Charioteer. Menkalina, like Capella, is a spectro- 
 scopic binary, but its period is only four days, the 
 spectroscopic lines appearing split every alternate 
 night. The right foot of the Charioteer rests upon 
 the tip of the northern horn of Taurus the Bull, 
 the second-magnitude star, El Nath 08 Tauri), being 
 shared in common by the two constellations. A 
 third - magnitude star, Iota 0), about ten degrees 
 northwest of El Nath, shines in the Charioteer's left 
 18
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN JANUARY 
 
 foot. Three fourth - magnitude stars, Epsilon (e), 
 Zeta (5"), and Eta (17), which form a little triangle 
 a few degrees southwest of Capella, indicate the 
 left hand of the Charioteer, which supports the Kid. 
 This little starry triangle is a sort of signboard to 
 insure the recognition of Capella by beginners. A 
 third-magnitude star, Theta (0), about ten degrees 
 south of Menkalina, with a fourth and two fifth- 
 magnitude stars near it, marks the Charioteer's right 
 hand, resting on his right knee, and bearing a long 
 upright whipstock, the wind-driven thongs of which 
 are represented by a scattered group of half a dozen 
 fifth-magnitude stars with a few of the sixth magnitude 
 among them. All of these bear the name of the 
 Greek letter Psi (-^), with distinguishing numerals. 
 The head of the Charioteer bears a fourth-magnitude 
 star, Delta (8), with a fifth, Xi (), above it. The 
 Milky Way passes across the lower half of Auriga , 
 Capella lying on its northern edge. 
 
 The mythological history of Auriga is not very 
 clear. Allen, who thinks that the constellation 
 originated among the early star-gazers of the Eu- 
 phrates valley, mentions a sculpture from Nimroud 
 on which the figures of the Charioteer and the Goat 
 or Kid are represented almost as they are drawn 
 to-day. Sometimes a chariot has also been repre- 
 sented here. By the Greeks Auriga was imagined 
 to represent Erechtheus, son of Hephasstus and 
 Athena, who was fabled to have invented the four- 
 horse chariot, and to have been rewarded by Zeus with 
 a place in the sky. The Romans followed this idea 
 of the Greeks: 
 
 19
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 Close by the Kneeling Bull behold 
 
 The Charioteer, who gained by skill of old 
 
 His name and heaven, as first his steeds he drove 
 
 With flying wheels, seen and installed by Jove. 
 
 Manilius. 
 
 Dr. Joseph A. Seiss, in his Gospel in the Stars, 
 will have it that the Greeks were greatly puzzled 
 by the constellation of Auriga, not understanding 
 its origin, and that they only preserved here a tra- 
 ditional figure which had existed long before their 
 time, and which represents the Good Shepherd who 
 was to lay down his life for the sheep ; in other words, 
 a symbol foretelling the coming of Christ. In the 
 zodiac of Dendera there is a representation of Auriga 
 which, as Dr. Seiss interprets it, holds a sceptre, the 
 upper part showing the head of a lamb and the lower 
 part the form of a cross. 
 
 This constellation affords a good field for the opera- 
 glass or telescope. The star 14 is a pretty double of 
 magnitudes five and seven-and-a-half ; distance apart, 
 14"; colors, pale yellow and bluish or greenish. The 
 star 4 (also known as 26i6) is a closer double; dis- 
 tance, 6" ; magnitudes, five and nine ; colors, pale red 
 (although some say green) and light blue. The star 
 41 (2 845) is double; magnitudes, five and six; dis- 
 tance, 8". The cluster (2 38) is very beautiful with a 
 telescope. A number of its stars imitate roughly the 
 form of a cross. Several other less brilliant clusters 
 are scattered over this part of the constellation. 
 
 Camelopardalis 
 
 (CHART II) 
 
 Between Auriga and the pole lies the faint, strag-
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN JANUARY 
 
 gling constellation of Camelopardalis. It has no 
 legendary or mythological interest, having been un- 
 known to the ancients. It dates only from the 
 seventeenth century, when it was first represented 
 on a chart by Jacobus Bartschius, the son-in-law of 
 the astronomer Kepler, who with poetic fancy saw 
 in its stars an image of the camel that bore Rebecca 
 on her way to join Isaac. It is always represented in 
 the form of a giraffe. It has ten stars of the fifth 
 magnitude and two of the fourth. 
 
 Taurus 
 
 (CHART V) 
 
 South and southwest of Auriga we find Taurus 
 the Bull, the third constellation of the zodiac, and 
 one of the most brilliant in the heavens on account 
 of its two celebrated clusters, the Hyades and the 
 Pleiades. The Hyades adorn the head of the huge 
 charging bull, who threatens Orion with his long 
 horns, while the Pleiades hang on his shoulder, like 
 a glittering banderilla. The lucida (the name some- 
 times given to the brightest star of a constellation) 
 of Taurus is Aldebaran, a first-magnitude star, of 
 extraordinary beauty on account of the pale -rose 
 tint perceptible in its light. This is situated in the 
 right eye of the Bull, and at the top of the eastern 
 arm of the capital letter V, which is plainly marked 
 out by the stars forming the group called the Hyades. 
 This group is one of the most striking figures in the 
 starry heavens. With its neighboring cluster of the 
 Pleiades it carries us into the very heart of myth-
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 ological romance. Nothing can be more beautiful 
 than these stars seen high in the mid-heaven on a 
 clear, frosty winter's night, in the absence of bright 
 moonshine, and when there are no powerful electric 
 or other lights near to dim the vision. The gem- 
 like rays of Aldebaran are splendidly set off by the 
 glitter of the smaller stars, which seem to have been 
 arranged by the hand of a bijoutier to enhance the 
 splendor of the principal jewel. Besides Aldebaran 
 the group contains five stars of the fourth magni- 
 tude, two of them almost touching each other in the 
 lower arm of the letter; four of the fifth magnitude, 
 and half a dozen of the sixth. And all around the 
 sky is rich with scattered gems. They have always 
 been connected in the popular imagination with the 
 weather, and especially with showery or rainy weather, 
 the poets calling them the "rainy Hyades," the 
 "watery Hyades," and so on. Mr. Allen remarks 
 that they are among the few stellar objects mentioned 
 by Homer, and Pliny said that they caused storms 
 and tempests on both land and sea. This probably 
 originated in their rising at the time when stormy 
 weather usually begins. 
 
 The letter V just referred to has its three cor- 
 ners marked by Aldebaran, Epsilon (e Tauri), and 
 Gamma (7 Tauri). Epsilon marks the top of the 
 northern branch of the V, and Gamma its point. 
 About half-way between Epsilon and Gamma are a 
 pair of stars, the larger, of the fourth magnitude, be- 
 ing Delta (B Tauri.) Its companion, also sometimes 
 called Delta, is of the fifth magnitude, and they form 
 an attractive combination. Occupying a similar
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN JANUARY 
 
 position in the other branch' of the V, between 
 Aldebaran and Gamma, are two fourth-magnitude 
 stars, much closer together, the Thetas (9}. It re- 
 ' quires a good eye satisfactorily to separate these 
 stars, and there is a fifth-magnitude star near them 
 which increases the beauty of the sight. A little 
 southeast of Aldebaran the eye catches another small 
 pair, of the fifth magnitude, the Sigmas (9). The 
 Sigmas are only seven minutes of arc apart, less than 
 one-fifth of the apparent diameter of the moon. 
 
 The smaller, fainter, and more compact group of 
 ; the Pleiades is even more famous. They shine in 
 poetry almost as they shine in the sky. Everybody 
 knows by heart Tennyson's lines about them in 
 " Locksley Hall," as well as the verse of Job in which 
 their name is so poetically woven. They are men- 
 tioned in the fragments of " Sappho." Sir G. C. Lewis, 
 in his Astronomy of the Ancients, says that their 
 name evidently comes from the Greek word plem, to 
 sail, because their rising was synchronous with the 
 opening of the season of navigation in the Greek seas. 
 They comprise one star (Alcyone), of the third mag- 
 nitude; one (Maia) of the fourth; four (Atlas, Electra, 
 Merope, and Taygeta) of the fifth, or near the fifth; 
 and one (Celasno) of rather less than the sixth, so 
 that only a sharp eye can see it. This is usually 
 called the "Lost Pleiad," but that name has also 
 been applied to Pleione, another member of the 
 group too faint for ordinary vision. There is also a 
 double, Asterope, which lies a little below the limit 
 of ordinary eyesight. Alcyone, the lucida, is famous 
 as the supposed centre of revolution of the starry 
 23
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 heavens, which the German astronomer Madler im- 
 agined that he had detected. Astronomy knows no 
 such centre of revolution, if any exists. 
 
 Within recent years marvellous photographs of the 
 Pleiades have been made, showing this group of stars 
 to be embedded in a wonderful mass of nebulous mat- 
 ter, the most singular in aspect of any in the heavens. 
 
 This wonderful nebula, or, rather, mass of inter- 
 twisted nebulae, is not visible to the naked eye, and 
 but little of it can be seen with telescopes. Yet the 
 strange fact exists that every observe*- seems to feel 
 that there is something else in the Pleiades besides 
 the star rays. It is a kind of glimmer which is not 
 starlight or, at least, does not impress the eye as 
 starlight, but rather as an indefinite, misty luminos- 
 ity forming a background against which the stars ap- 
 pear. The descriptive truth of Tennyson's line about 
 the Pleiades, when he says that they 
 
 Glitter like a swarm of fireflies tangled in a silver braid, 
 
 impresses everybody who has ever seen them. The 
 meaning of this intermingling of stars and nebulous 
 matter may be that the Pleiades are a group of suns 
 in which the formative process is but partially com- 
 pleted, a large part of the original chaotic matter 
 remaining still uncombined and uncondensed. 
 
 Besides the two great clusters just described, Taurus 
 contains a number of notable stars. El Nath or Beta 
 (/3) Tauri has already been mentioned as common to 
 Taurus and Auriga, since it indicates the place where 
 the foot of the latter rests upon the tip of the Bull's 
 24
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN JANUARY 
 
 horn. El Nath is of the second magnitude, and 
 appears singularly beautiful when carefully observed, 
 on account of its pure whiteness. Many other ap- 
 parently white stars are seen to be slightly colored 
 when compared with El Nath. About nine degrees 
 below El Nath, in the direction of Orion, is a third- 
 magnitude star, Zeta () Tauri, marking the tip of 
 the southern horn. Between the two horns, and 
 in the top of the head, are four or five fourth and 
 fifth magnitude stars, and several of the sixth mag- 
 nitude, which impart a glimmering beauty to the 
 scene, and justify Virgil's epithet of the "golden 
 horns" of Taurus. The body of the Bull ends ab- 
 ruptly just west of the Pleiades, and the old myth 
 which represents Taurus as the bull into which Zeus 
 transformed himself in order to carry off Europa, 
 swimming with her through the sea, sufficiently ac- 
 counts for the invisibility of the hind quarters of the 
 animal, which must be supposed immersed in the 
 waves. But his breast and forefeet are visible, and 
 contain several moderately bright stars, which may 
 be found on the chart. 
 
 Taurus contains one star of the first magnitude; 
 one of the second; three of the third; ten of the 
 fourth; twenty-seven of the fifth; and a crowd of 
 the sixth. 
 
 Taurus is rich with myths and legends. The 
 identification of this constellation with the bull of 
 Europa has already been mentioned. It seems to 
 have been regarded as a bull in all of the ancient 
 Mediterranean countries, and also in countries far 
 distant -from Europe, and the natal lands of Greek 
 25
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 mythology. The Indians of the Amazon, according 
 to some of the early explorers in South America, 
 called it the Ox. In Egypt it was identified with 
 Osirus, the bull-god, although there is some question 
 as to the time when this identification occurred. It 
 may have been subsequent to the Greek legend. 
 But, at any rate, the constellation always played 
 an important part in the Egyptian religious cere- 
 monies connected with the zodiac, and there was a 
 belief in Egypt that the human race sprang into 
 being at a time when the sun was in Taurus. It 
 seems also to have been identified by the Egyptians 
 with Apis, the bull-god of the Nile, and in this form, 
 as Mr. Allen suggests, it may have been known before 
 the building of the great pyramids. Among the 
 Chinese, when white men first visited them, this 
 constellation was known as the White Tiger, but 
 after the Jesuit Fathers had introduced occidental 
 ideas its name in China became the Golden Ox. The 
 idea of "whiteness" in connection with Taurus 
 seems to have had a very early origin. This prob- 
 ably arose from the legend that Europa's bull was 
 snowy white, for the great ruler of Olympus could 
 not be expected to turn himself into an ordinary 
 brindle beast when he was going to carry on his back 
 the beautiful rival of his queen! 
 
 But the myths pertaining to Taurus centre par- 
 ticularly around the two groups of the Hyades and 
 the Pleiades. I have mentioned above the charm- 
 ing legend of the Onondaga Indians concerning the 
 Pleiades. This legend brilliantly expresses their po- 
 etic attractiveness, but there are many older ones,
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN JANUARY 
 
 found everywhere in the world, which show that 
 the Pleiades have always impressed mankind with 
 a sense of mystery. From ancient Egypt and 
 Chaldea to the shores of the Northern Ocean; from 
 Japan to Australia and the island groups of the 
 South Pacific ; from the Great Lakes of North America 
 to Mexico and Peru, traces have been found of a 
 strange worship of this group of stars. They have 
 been connected in a most remarkable manner with 
 legends of a deluge, and their cult has often assumed 
 the form of a festival of the dead, as among the 
 Egyptians. The Spanish conquerors found in Mex- 
 ico a tradition that the world was once destroyed 
 when the Pleiades culminated at midnight. The 
 Japanese Feast of Lanterns has been supposed by 
 some to be a survival of an ancient rite relating to 
 the Pleiades, and commemorating a vast calamity 
 which overwhelmed the race of man at some period 
 in the remote past when that group of stars hap- 
 pened to occupy a conspicuous position in the sky. 
 There seems to be no doubt that one of the mysterious 
 passages constructed through the heart of the pyra- 
 mid of Cheops was intended to point to the Pleiades 
 at the moment when they passed their upper cul- 
 mination at the hour of midnight. It has even been 
 suggested that the Europa myth, already mentioned, 
 may have originated in the tradition of a connection 
 between the Pleiades and an apparently universal 
 deluge, since it introduces the idea of a flood of 
 waters through which the Bull is struggling with 
 more than half his body submerged. The Druids 
 also had a cult of the Pleiades, or at any rate of the 
 27
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 constellation Taurus, and, in connection with this, 
 Mr. Allen mentions an old Scotch myth concerning 
 the Candlemas Bull, which is said to appear at 
 twilight, rising in the east and sailing across the sky. 
 But the most definite of the Pleiades legends is 
 that which connects them with the seven daughters 
 of Atlas, the "Atlantic! nymphs." Of these Alcyone 
 is the chief, and is sometimes called "the light of the 
 Pleiades." Maia was both the eldest and the most 
 beautiful of the daughters, although her star is less 
 brilliant than that of her great sister. Electra was 
 the mother of Dardanos, the founder of Troy, and 
 the legend avers that upon the destruction of that 
 city she covered her face and has never since shone 
 as bright as before. Merope is also said once to have 
 faded in shame at the recollection of her having 
 married a mortal. But in this she was not singular 
 among her immortal sisters. Taygeta was the patron 
 goddess of Sparta, since her son Lacedaemon founded 
 that redoubtable little state. The other two sisters 
 were Celaeno and Asterope, both of whose stars are 
 faint, and one of them, as already mentioned, double. 
 An eighth member of the group, hardly visible to the 
 naked eye, is Pleione. She was the mother of the 
 seven sisters and her star may be the true "Lost 
 Pleiad" of the legend, rather than either Electra 
 or Merope, because modern spectroscopic investiga- 
 tion has shown that Pleione bears evidence of a 
 temporary character. Atlas, the father, also has his 
 star, which shines a little below Pleione, but is 
 much brighter. On the accompanying little chart 
 the names of the Pleiades will be found. 
 28
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN JANUARY 
 
 TAYGfTA 
 
 PLElOA/f 
 
 Although their history is as old as that of the 
 Pleiades, the Hyades have a less extensive mythology. 
 They also were supposed to be daughters of Atlas, 
 half-sisters of the Pleiades, their mother being ^Ethra. 
 They are said to have been the nurses of the infant 
 Bacchus, and Zeus rewarded them with a place in 
 the sky. Unlike the Pleiades, the names of these 
 nymphs were never individually distinguished by 
 applying them to particular stars. The entire group 
 was simply regarded as being composed of the 
 sisters, and the name Aldebaran was formerly applied 
 to it as a whole. 
 
 According to Dr. Seiss, the modern exponent of 
 religious mysticism among the stars, the constella- 
 tion Taurus represents the fabled Unicorn, and the 
 Egyptians, although not appreciating the divine 
 spirit of prophecy that guided them, called it by 
 names signifying "the Head, the Captain, the Mighty 
 Chieftain who cometh," the real symbol being that of 
 "Christ as the irresistible and Angry Judge." The 
 sister stars of the Hyades and Pleiades, according 
 to the same authority, "beautifully symbolize the 
 29
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 saints, securely supported by the terrible Judge, and 
 who, together with the holy angels, whom thsy are 
 like, thus move with Him and His inflictions upon 
 a guilty world." 
 
 Perhaps Dr. Seiss's interpretation has as much 
 foundation as the older myths, but certainly it lacks 
 their charm. 
 
 In a small telescope Alcyone presents a captivat- 
 ing sight, on account of the presence of two minute 
 stars forming a little triangle with it. Aldebaran, 
 remarkable, as already pointed out, for its pale ruby 
 color, has a distant tenth-magnitude companion. Al- 
 debaran is one of the standard first-magnitude stars. 
 The star Lambda (\) is a rapid variable, changing 
 from about the third to about the fourth magnitude 
 once in every four days. About one degree north- 
 west of the star Zeta () , at the tip of the southern 
 horn, is the celebrated "Crab Nebula," which is only 
 to be seen with a very powerful telescope. It presents 
 an extraordinary appearance when photographed. 
 
 Orion 
 
 (CHARTS V AND IX) 
 
 Southeast of Taurus flashes the "Golconda of the 
 heavens" the brilliant constellation Orion. The 
 celestial equator passes through the centre of this 
 constellation, almost touching the northernmost star 
 in the Belt. The two great first-magnitude stars, 
 Betelgeuse and Rigel the former something over 
 ten degrees above, and the latter an equal distance 
 below the three stars forming the Belt seem bal- 
 anced against each other. Their splendid contrast 
 30
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN JANUARY 
 
 of color, and the dazzling beauty of the stars in the 
 Belt, which lie in an almost true straight line, and 
 are matched as perfectly in size and tint as selected 
 gems, impart to this constellation the appearance of 
 a gigantic piece of jewelry. There is nothing else 
 in all the sky to equal it in splendor. The famous 
 Southern Cross is far inferior to Orion as a celes- 
 tial spectacle. The unparalleled magnificence of the 
 constellation of Orion lifts the name of a compara- 
 tively obscure hero of Grecian mythology to a prom- 
 inence before which even Zeus, or Jupiter, and the 
 other great Olympian gods and goddesses dwindle to 
 relative insignificance. Jove is fabled to have placed 
 Orion among the stars as a reward of merit as merit 
 was reckoned in those days but surely he could never 
 have looked upon the splendid constellation which 
 he thus gave away, else he would have reserved it 
 to enshrine his own fame. Orion is one of the few 
 constellations visible from all parts of the earth. 
 
 Now, near the twins behold Orion rise. 
 His arms extended measure half the skies; 
 His stride no less. Onward with steady face, 
 He treads the boundless realms of starry space; 
 On each broad shoulder a bright gem displayed, 
 While three obliquely grace his mighty blade. 
 On his vast K id three lesser stars are seen, 
 Their rays commingled in a silvery sheen, 
 So far removed that half their splendor's lost. 
 Thus graced and armed he leads the heavenly host. 
 
 - Manilius. 
 
 The traditional figure of Orion is that of a Hercules 
 standing with uplifted club to confront the Bull, who
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 is charging down upon him from the circle of the 
 zodiac. Thrown over his left arm like a shield is a 
 lion's hide, represented in the sky by a remarkable 
 bending row of small stars. Betelgeuse glitters on 
 his right shoulder and Rigel on his left foot. His 
 left shoulder is epauletted with the star Bellatrix, 
 not so bright as the other two, but still a beauty. 
 It is sometimes called the Amazon Star. These three 
 are the leaders of the constellation, Betelgeuse being 
 honored with the name Alpha (a), while Rigel is 
 Beta (/8), and Bellatrix is Gamma (7). Both Rigel 
 and Betelgeuse are above the standard first magni- 
 tude, and approach the zero magnitude mentioned 
 in Chapter I. Rigel is ordinarily the brighter, al- 
 though it ranks in nomenclature below its rival. 
 Betelgeuse is irregularly variable, and probably the 
 first letter of the alphabet was assigned to it at a 
 time when it was in one of its brilliant moods. It 
 attained a great degree of splendor in 1894. Since 
 then it has been fainter than Rigel, but now (1908) 
 it is brighter. In 1852 it was so brilliant that it was 
 reckoned the brightest star north of the equator, 
 brighter than either Capella, Vega, or Arcturus. Its 
 color is remarkable, a rich topaz hue, especially when 
 viewed with a glass. The color appears to vary with 
 the brightness, the tone becoming deeper as the star 
 grows fainter. This would indicate that it is enter- 
 ing upon the earlier stages of extinction. At present 
 it must be a sun of prodigious splendor. It is so 
 distant that its parallax has not been certainly ascer- 
 tained, and from this it follows that it exceeds our 
 sun in intrinsic brilliance probably thousands of times, 
 32
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN JANUARY 
 
 because the sun at its distance would be invisible. 
 The name Betelgeuse is derived from the Arabic, 
 and means "The Armpit of the Central One." 
 
 Rigel, which generally appears a little brighter than 
 Betelgeuse, is an equally distant and equally great 
 sun, possessing, according to Professor Newcomb, 
 possibly ten thousand times the intrinsic brightness 
 of our sun. Its color is invariably brilliant white with 
 a tinge of blue, the color of a diamond of the first 
 quality. If Betelgeuse is a sun falling into decrepi- 
 tude Rigel is one enjoying the heyday of solar youth. 
 
 Bellatrix is of the standard second magnitude and 
 of a yellowish color. It is often called Mirzam, a 
 name, as we shall see, applied to one or two other 
 stars. Even Betelgeuse was sometimes called Mirzam 
 by the Arabs, the word meaning Announcer or Herald. 
 
 The three stars in the Belt, which is about three 
 degrees in length, and which adds so strikingly to 
 the picturesqueness of the constellation, are named, 
 respectively, beginning with the northernmost, Min- 
 taka, Alnilam, and Alnita. Their Greek letter desig- 
 nations, in the same order, are Delta (8), Epsilon (e), 
 and Zeta (). The first two are white, the third 
 slightly yellowish. In the right knee is a star of 
 near the third magnitude called Saiph, or Eta (77). 
 Saiph, Rigel, Bellatrix, and Betelgeuse mark the 
 corners of an irregular parallelogram, about eighteen 
 degrees in its greatest length, and having the Belt 
 in its centre. 
 
 Below the Belt hangs the Sword made conspicuous 
 by a short row of stars of the fourth and fifth mag- 
 nitudes, the lowermost of which, Iota (t), is rather 
 33
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 brighter than fourth magnitude. The middle star, 
 Theta (0), is involved in misty light. This light 
 comes from the celebrated Great Nebula of Orion, 
 one of the most astonishing objects in the firmament 
 of heaven. A good opera-glass shows this nebula, 
 and in a telescope its appearance is wonderful beyond 
 description. A third-magnitude star, Eta (77), below 
 Mintaka, and making a right angle with the line of 
 the Belt, indicates the handle of the Sword. 
 
 The Head of Orion is represented by a group of 
 stars, somewhat crowded in appearance, the principal 
 member of which is Lambda (X), of the third magni- 
 tude. The Arabs called the head of Orion Al Hakah, 
 meaning a White Spot. Its glimmering aspect may 
 be thought to justify this designation. Mr. Jules A. 
 Colas has called attention to the curious fact that 
 the full moon could be inserted in the little triangle 
 of stars constituting the head of Orion. This is an 
 instructive example of the exaggerated impression 
 of size that the moon makes upon the eyes of persons 
 unaccustomed to astronomical observation, for few 
 could be found willing to believe that its disk would 
 not cover a far greater space. The uplifted Club of 
 Orion, and his right hand which holds it, contain 
 five fifth - magnitude stars and several of the sixth 
 magnitude. The upper end of the Club is almost on 
 a level with the point of the southern horn of Taurus. 
 
 The Lion's Hide which Orion bears on his left arm, 
 like a shield, contains four stars of the fourth magni- 
 tude, two of the fifth, and about ten of the sixth, 
 which impart to it a curious glimmer. 
 
 Orion contains altogether two stars of the first 
 34
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN JANUARY 
 
 magnitude (really brighter than first magnitude) ; 
 four of the second; four of the third; three of the 
 fourth ; twenty-four of the fifth ; and a great number 
 of the sixth. According to Burritt, there are seventy- 
 eight stars visible to the unaided vision, but most 
 eyes do not distinctly discern so many. An opera- 
 glass reveals many hundreds. 
 
 As already indicated, Orion is of great mythological 
 fame. A far more brilliant constellation has been 
 assigned to him than to the great hero Herakles, 
 or Hercules, yet he plays comparatively an incon- 
 spicuous and uncertain part in the old myths. He 
 is generally regarded as a mighty hunter of gigantic 
 stature, so tall that he could wade the sea. Some 
 say he was the son of the Amazonian queen Euryale 
 and Neptune, and boasted that the mightiest beasts 
 of the earth could not successfully strive with him. 
 Then a scorpion bit him, and when he died of the 
 wound the gods placed him among the stars. Ac- 
 cording to another story, he was born, like Athena, 
 without a mother, and became so famous as a worker 
 in iron that Vulcan employed him to build a palace 
 under the sea. Still another legend avers that he 
 offered violence to the daughter of (Enopion, King 
 of Chios, who thereupon put out his eyes when he 
 was asleep. But Vulcan, remembering his services, 
 sent him a guide to lead him to a place where he 
 could confront the rising sun, and its rays restored 
 his sight. According to some, Orion had one of his 
 own forgemen carry him on his back to meet the sun. 
 It is also said that Diana fell in love with him, thereby 
 arousing the jealousy of Apollo, who persuaded the 
 35
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 goddess to a trial of skill at archer)-. Diana aimed 
 a shaft at an object in the sea and pierced it. It 
 was the head of Orion, who was amusing himself by 
 wading far from shore. Having killed him with her 
 arrow, Diana had him transported to the heavens, 
 and made him outshine all his rivals there. We may 
 smile at these legends, yet as products of the human 
 imagination they cannot but interest us when we see 
 them perpetuated among the stars. But for his 
 constellation Orion would never have been remem- 
 bered; now he has a monument more lasting than 
 the pyramids. 
 
 Among the Arabs the constellation Orion was 
 known as Al Jauzah, a term of uncertain significa- 
 tion. The translation "Giant," Mr. Allen thinks, 
 is incorrect. The Egyptians said that the soul of 
 Osiris rested in Orion. Among the Jews, Orion was 
 the great hunter Nimrod. The ancient Hindoos 
 said that he abased his own daughter, the rosy 
 Aldebaran, whereupon Sirius transfixed him with 
 an arrow, represented by the three stars of the Belt. 
 In English popular lore the Belt is called the "Yard 
 and Ell." The Chinese knew Orion under the name 
 of Shen. For Dr. Seiss, and his Gospel in the Stars, 
 Orion stands as a prophetic representation of the great 
 "enemy and destroyer of death," and all the ancient 
 myths are rehandled to accord with this interpretation. 
 
 In telescopic objects Orion is wonderfully rich. Most 
 famous of its double stars is Rigel. The companion 
 may be seen with a three-inch telescope. Its dis- 
 tance is 9.5"; color, deep blue; magnitude, eight - 
 a most beautiful object. Alnita () in the Belt is 
 36
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN JANUARY 
 
 triple; magnitudes, second, sixth, and tenth; dis- 
 tances, 2.5" and 56"; colors, yellowish white, grayish 
 purple, pale blue. Delta (8) in the Belt is double; 
 magnitudes, second and seventh; distance, 53"; 
 colors, white and greenish white. Sigma (9) is 
 multiple, the telescope showing eight or ten stars 
 varying from the fourth to the tenth or eleventh 
 magnitudes, and exhibiting divers tints, one star of 
 the seventh magnitude being described as "grape- 
 red." Theta (0) in the Sword is quadruple, and the 
 telescope shows it surrounded with the Great Nebula, 
 a true wonder-cloud which can be very well seen with 
 a three -inch telescope. Lambda in the Head is 
 double; magnitudes, three-and-a-half and sixth; dis- 
 tance 4" ; colors, light yellow and reddish. Orion also 
 contains many doubles which are not visible, or not 
 easily visible, as single stars to the naked eye. The 
 whole constellation is enveloped in a gigantic nebula, 
 traces of which may be seen with powerful telescopes, 
 but which only reveals itself in its entirety in long- 
 posed photographs. 
 
 Eridanus 
 
 (CHARTS VIII AND IX) 
 
 Directly west of Rigel, the starry river, Eridanus, 
 takes its rise. It goes winding far westward, under 
 Taurus, and finally, after meeting Cetus, the Whale, 
 turns abruptly southward. Then making a long 
 reach back eastward, it arrives almost under its 
 starting-point, and at last drops beneath the horizon 
 of northern middle latitudes. As soon as the eye 
 has once traced out the "river," its resemblance to 
 a stream becomes quite striking. The entire length 
 of this river of stars is no less than a hundred and 
 37
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 thirty degrees. It is sometimes divided, for con- 
 venience of reference, into two streams, or reaches, 
 the northern stream reaching westward from Orion 
 to Cetus, and the southern stream, which, as already 
 remarked, runs back nearly to the longitude of the 
 source. Many of the stars of Eridanus are strik- 
 ingly arranged in pairs. Far down in the southern 
 hemisphere, invisible from latitudes north of 32, 
 Eridanus possesses a splendid star of the first magni- 
 tude named Achernar. But for us of the northern 
 hemisphere its brightest star is Cursa, or Beta (), 
 some three degrees northwest of Rigel in Orion. 
 The name Cursa, Mr. Allen explains, comes from an 
 Arabic word signifying the footstool, this star being 
 regarded as a support for the left foot of Orion, on 
 which Rigel blazes like a gem-set shoe-buckle. The 
 star Gamma, also called Zaurak, seems to have been 
 connected with the idea of a boat afloat in the stream. 
 Cursa is rather above the third and Zaurak a little 
 below that magnitude. The other stars in the 
 northern stream specially worthy of note are Nu (v) t 
 the pair of the Omicrons (o), Delta (S), and Epsilon 
 (e), which are near together, Zeta (), and Eta (17). 
 Nearly three hundred naked-eye stars have been 
 catalogued in Eridanus, but the ordinary star-gazer 
 will not notice more than thirty or forty. 
 
 The scorched waters of Eridanus, tear-swollen flood 
 Welling beneath the left foot of Orion. 
 
 Aratus. 
 
 These lines of the old Greek poet indicate the 
 connection which some of the ancients made between 
 38
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN JANUARY 
 
 Eridanus and the story of Phaeton, the ambitious 
 son of Phoebus, who persuaded his father to allow 
 him to drive for one day the Chariot of the Sun, and 
 whose wild ride nearly resulted in the burning up of 
 the earth, when his coursers, feeling a feebler hand 
 on the reins, took the bits in their teeth and ran away 
 with the Sun, leaving the track of Zodiac, and dash- 
 ing so close to the earth that it began to smoke. 
 Order was restored by Jove, who smote the presump- 
 tuous youth with a thunderbolt and precipitated him 
 into the river Eridanus, whose nymphs " swelled the 
 flood with their tears," shed in mourning over the 
 fate of their unhappy favorite. This story has been 
 thought to contain the fading memory of some season 
 of terrible drought, that brought famine and disaster 
 to the Mediterranean lands. Jove is said to have 
 turned the weeping nymphs into poplars, the tree 
 now so abundant in the valley of the Po (Eridanus), 
 and Ovid has commemorated their grief in these lines : 
 
 " All the long night their mournful watch they keep, 
 . And all the day stand round the tomb and weep." 
 
 Dr. Seiss says Eridanus is the " River of the Judge," 
 and refers to Daniel's vision of the four beasts that 
 were cast into a fiery stream. 
 
 The star 32 Eridani is a superb double; magnitudes, 
 fifth and seventh; distance, 6.7"; colors, topaz and 
 ultra -marine. The lower of the Omicrons (o 2 ) is 
 triple; magnitudes, fourth, tenth, and eleventh; dis- 
 tances, 82" and 2.6". A powerful telescope is re- 
 quired for this object. The star 1 2 Eridani is a close 
 binary; magnitudes, fourth and eighth; distance, 2". 
 39
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 Lepus 
 
 Below Orion's feet the Hare 
 
 Is chased eternally; behind him 
 
 Sirius ever speeds as in pursuit, 
 
 And rises after, and eyes him as he sets. 
 
 Aratus. 
 
 The eye is led to Lepus by the conspicuous aspect 
 of its little quadrangles and triangles of stars lying 
 just south of Orion. It contains two stars of the 
 third magnitude, Alpha (a) and Beta (/3) ; six of the 
 fourth, Mu (/*), Epsilon (e), Gamma (y), Delta (8), 
 Zeta (), and Eta (17); and ten of the fifth. Mu is 
 situated in the eye of the animal, and Eta in the tail. 
 Three fifth and one sixth magnitude stars, forming 
 a little quadrangle, mark the ears, lying just below 
 Rigel. 
 
 The lines already quoted from Aratus tell the 
 mythological story of Lepus. The hare has always 
 been a favorite victim of the hunter's skill, and it 
 seems to have been no less a favorite with Orion. 
 The Great Dog, Sirius, is Orion's hound chasing the 
 Hare. In Dr. Seiss's gospel mythology Lepus is 
 interpreted as typifying the overthrow of the enemy 
 of mankind, and he remarks that in Persian and 
 Egyptian zodiacs the figure represented is that of 
 a serpent trodden under the feet of Orion. 
 
 The star R Leporis is very remarkable for its intense 
 crimson color, which has been compared with that 
 of a drop of blood. It is variable, and the color is 
 deepest when the star is faintest. The star Kappa 
 (K) is double ; magnitudes, fifth and eighth ; distance, 
 40
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN JANUARY 
 
 2,5"; colors, pale yellow and blue. The star Iota (t) 
 shows in the telescope a beautiful tinge of green, 
 which is comparatively a rare color among the stars. 
 It has an eleventh -magnitude companion, distant 
 about 13". 
 
 Columba. 
 
 The constellation of Columba, the Dove, south of 
 Lepus, has one star, Alpha (a), or Phaet, of the second 
 magnitude, one, Beta (/3), of the third, and two, 
 Epsilon (e) and Gamma (7), of the fourth. It is 
 said to represent the Dove that Noah sent forth 
 from the ark. The constellation appears to have 
 first been named in the sixteenth century. Norman 
 Lockyer, in his Dawn of Astronomy, avers that 
 Phaet was particularly worshipped among the ancient 
 Egyptians, no less than a dozen temples having been 
 oriented to this star. Mr. Allen records the curious 
 fact that the Chinese call Phaet Chang Jin, the "Old 
 Folks."
 
 Ill 
 
 CONSTELLATIONS ON THE MERIDIAN IN FEBRUARY 
 
 Cants Major 
 
 (CHART IX) 
 
 TOOK directly towards the south at nine o'clock 
 L in the evening in the middle of February, and you 
 will see the brightest of all stars Sirius, the Dog 
 Star. It is situated about sixteen and a half degrees 
 south of the celestial equator, and is the leader of 
 the constellation Canis Major, the Greater Dog. 
 
 ... In his fell jaw 
 
 Flames a star above all others with searing beams 
 Fiercely burning, called by mortals Sirius. 
 
 Aratus. 
 
 The name of this magnificent star has been de- 
 rived by some from the Greek word setpo? ("spar- 
 kling" or "scorching"; by others from the Egyptian 
 Osiris; by Dupuis from the Celtic word Syr. All 
 readers of the Iliad will recall the passage in which 
 Achilles is likened to this star as he rushes across 
 the plain of Troy to encounter Hector at the gates: 
 
 " Him the old man Priam first beheld, as he sped across the 
 plain, blazing as the star that cometh forth at harvest time, 
 42
 
 -n*, 6- 67.
 
 Chart II 
 
 Variabiles. 
 
 * *
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN FEBRUARY 
 
 and plain seen his rays shine forth amid the host of stars in 
 the darkness of the night, the star whose name men call 
 Orion's Dog." Iliad, bk. xxii. (Lang and Leaf's Translation). 
 
 It is impossible to be guilty of exaggeration in 
 speaking of the splendid beauty of Sirius. Its ra- 
 diance is as indescribable as that of a great diamond- 
 As remarked in the introductory chapter, it stands 
 in a class by itself as far as magnitude is concerned. 
 It has a hundred moods, according to the state of 
 the atmosphere. Sometimes, when the air is still, 
 the star burns with a steady white light, unflickering, 
 like a core of electric fire; then, as invisible atmos- 
 pheric waves flow over it, its rays spread and leap 
 and flutter, breaking into keen prismatic darts that 
 almost cause the eye to wince. By turns it flames, 
 it sparkles, it glows, it blazes, it flares, it flashes, it 
 contracts to a point of intensest brilliance or ex- 
 pands into a coruscating spectrum. There is some 
 evidence for thinking that two thousand years ago 
 its prevailing hue may have been red. From its 
 cross -motion in space it has been calculated that six 
 hundred centuries ago it was on the eastern border 
 of the Milky Way; now it is on the western border. 
 
 " Since Sirius crossed the Milky Way 
 
 Full sixty thousand years have gone, 
 Yet hour by hour and day by day 
 This tireless star speeds on and on. 
 
 " Methinks he must be moved to mirth 
 
 By that droll tale of Genesis, 
 Which says Creation had its birth 
 For such a tiny world as this; 
 43
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 To hear that One who fashioned all 
 Those solar systems tier on tiers, 
 
 Expressed in little Adam's fall 
 The purpose of a million spheres! 
 
 On planets old, ere form or place 
 
 Was lent to earth, may dwell, who knows? 
 
 A godlike and perfected race 
 
 That hails great Sirius as he goes. 
 
 E. W. Wilcox. 
 
 But splendid beyond comparison as he appears to 
 our eyes, Sirius is now known not to be, by any 
 means, the greatest sun in space. He owes his ap- 
 parent primacy to his relative nearness. His dis- 
 tance is only a little over eight light-years (a light-year 
 is the distance that a wave of light travels in a twelve- 
 month), or, say, forty-seven trillions of miles, and his 
 intrinsic brilliance exceeds that of the sun only thirty 
 times, while such stars as Rigel and Betelgeuse may 
 be thousands of times brighter than the sun. Sir 
 G. C. Lewis remarks that the time of Sirius 's rising 
 with the sun was connected at an early period, with 
 the idea of intense summer heat, and Muller con- 
 jectures that it was called the Dog Star on account 
 of the prevalence of canine madness at that season. 
 Some think that Sirius is identical with the Maz- 
 zaroth of the book of Job. Its midnight culmina- 
 tion, or passing of the meridian, was celebrated in 
 the Eleusinian Mysteries. Four hundred years be- 
 fore the Christian era Sirius rose just before the sun 
 at the hottest season of the year, whence the dies 
 canicularia, or "dog days," of the Romans. 
 
 The spectrum of Sirius is typical of a class known 
 
 44
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN FEBRUARY 
 
 as (he Sirian stars, which include, perhaps, half of 
 all that are visible, and which are characterized by 
 a brilliant white color and broad absorption bands, 
 indicating the presence of enormous quantities of 
 hydrogen. They are believed to represent a rela- 
 tively early stage of solar evolution, so that Sirius 
 is to be regarded as a youthful giant among the suns. 
 
 After the princely splendor of Sirius, the other 
 stars of Canis Major seem insignificant, and yet the 
 constellation when well above the horizon presents 
 A striking appearance. Sirius is in the jaw of the 
 imaginary dog. The second star of the constellation, 
 Beta (/3), or Mirzam, of near the second magnitude, 
 is in one of the uplifted paws, towards Lepus. Delta 
 (8), also called Wezen, and Epsilon (e), also called 
 Adara, are in the right flank, the dog standing nearly 
 upright on its hind legs. These stars are of the full 
 second magnitude and brighter than Mirzam. Zeta 
 (5"), or Furud, in the right hind paw, is of the third 
 magnitude, as is Eta (77), or Aludra, in the tail. The 
 last-named star is, however, rather the brighter of 
 the two. There are seven stars of the fourth magni- 
 tude and fourteen of the fifth, besides many of the 
 sixth. A comparatively empty space separates Sirius 
 with its group of attendants from the more southern 
 stars of the constellation, so that the latter seem 
 almost to form a constellation by themselves. 
 
 Just east and northeast of the tail of the Dog is 
 a group of fourth and fifth magnitude stars which 
 mark the prow of Jason's Ship in the constellation 
 Argo. But the larger part of this constellation lies 
 too far, south to be seen from the mean latitude of 
 45
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 the United States. It will be described in the chapter 
 on the southern stars. Its principal star, Canopus, 
 ranks next to Sirius in brightness, and can be seen 
 from the extreme southern parts of the United States. 
 It is almost directly south of Sirius, at a distance 
 of about 35. 
 
 The mythological history of Canis Major, as already 
 indicated, is intimately related to that of Orion. 
 But the constellation, or at least its principal star, 
 seems to have been associated with the idea of a 
 dog among ancient nations unacquainted with the 
 myth of Orion. Thus among the Scandinavians it 
 was regarded as the dog of Sigurd. In ancient India 
 it was called the Deerslayer. Some of the early 
 Greek myths represented it as the hound of Actaeon, 
 and also as one of Diana's hunting dogs. Mr. Allen 
 mentions the curious facts that an ivory disk, found 
 by Schliemann in his excavations on the site of Troy, 
 contains a representation of a dog believed to be 
 Canis Major, and that an ancient Etruscan figured 
 mirror shows this constellation, together with Orion 
 and Lepus, with the neighboring stars correctly 
 located. Those who find a prophecy of the coming 
 of the reign of Christ in the constellations have made 
 much of Canis Major. Novidius called it the Dog 
 of Tobias. Dr. Seiss claims that it represents the 
 Messiah himself, "the Appointed Prince." He has 
 a curious passage in which he derives the name Sirius 
 from the word Seir, meaning " Prince," or " Guardian," 
 and then connects this with "Naz-Seir," found in 
 an Egyptian zodiac. Thus he arrives at the word 
 " Naz-seir-ene," whence "Nazarene," and lo! an ex- 
 46
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN FEBRUARY 
 
 planation of the much-discussed origin of the prophecy 
 that Christ should be called a Nazarene! 
 
 In Egypt the Dog was regarded as the celestial fore- 
 runner of the annual flood in the Nile, announcing 
 the coming of the waters by rising just before the 
 sun. Mr. Lockyer has found seven Egyptian temples 
 which were so oriented as to receive upon their 
 altars the rays of Sirius rising. In the famous zodiac 
 of Dendera, Canis Major appears in the form of a 
 cow carried in a boat. It was also represented as the 
 goddess So this, and bore likewise the names of Isis, 
 Osiris, and Thoth. As the " Nile star," Sirius was wor- 
 shipped under the name of Sihor. Its supposed influ- 
 ence in causing the annual flooding of the river is indi- 
 cated in the zodiac of Dendera by overflowing urns. 
 
 Sirius is a famous double star. The companion, of 
 the ninth magnitude, revolves around Sirius in a 
 period of about forty-nine years. The apparent dis- 
 tance, therefore, varies. In 1890 the two stars were so 
 close that no telescope could separate them. In 1896 
 Burnham, then at the Lick Observatory, caught sight 
 of the companion emerging from the overpowering 
 rays of its primary, and since then the distance has 
 been slowly increasing. In 1905 it had become 
 about 6". A very singular fact is that this com- 
 panion, although ten thousand times less bright than 
 Sirius, is nearly half as massive as its great neighbor! 
 The star Mu (/*) is double; magnitudes, fifth and 
 eighth; distance, 2". 8; colors, white and pale blue. 
 About four degrees south of Sirius is the star cluster 
 1454, which presents a beautiful view in the telescope, 
 having a red star neai* the centre, and curving rows 
 of minute stars about it. 
 
 47
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 Monoceros 
 
 (CHART IX) 
 
 North of Canis Major and the prow of Argo lies 
 Monoceros, the Unicorn, an inconspicuous constella- 
 tion covering a space 40 long from east to west. It 
 has but four stars as bright as the fourth magni- 
 tude, and these are scattered. In addition there are 
 thirteen of the fifth magnitude, five of which appear 
 in the head, which faces Orion, with the horn nearly 
 touching his c'ub. The stars of this constellation 
 have not even enjoyed the honor of having the letters 
 of the Greek alphabet applied to them, much less of 
 being designated by special names. They are only 
 indicated by numerals. It is a modern constellation, 
 and has no mythological history. It is interesting 
 for those possessing telescopes on account of its many 
 small clusters of stars, and for one beautiful triple, 
 the star u, whose magnitudes are fifth, sixth, and 
 seventh; distances, 7". 4 and 2". 7. The star 8 is 
 double; magnitudes, fifth and seventh; distance, 
 14"; colors, golden yellow and lilac. A little north- 
 east of 8 the eye catches a faint glimmering point 
 which is expanded by a telescope into a beautiful 
 cluster, No. 1424. 
 
 Cards Minor 
 
 (CHART IX) 
 
 Above Monoceros shines Canis Minor, the Lesser 
 Dog, two of whose stars are conspicuous, the large, 
 beautiful, first-magnitude brilliant Procyon, and its 
 48
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN FEBRUARY 
 
 attendant, some five degrees northwest, Beta (/3), 
 or Gomeisa, of the third magnitude. Gomeisa has 
 near it two fifth-magnitude stars. Canis Minor is 
 only about fifteen degrees in its greatest length, and 
 contains only three fifth-magnitude stars in addition 
 to those already mentioned. It owes its fame en- 
 tirely to Procyon, one of the most interesting stars 
 in the heavens. Its comparatively lone situation 
 emphasizes its brightness, and it is rather nearer the 
 Zero than the First Magnitude. Yet its light always 
 impresses me as lacking the brilliance that one ex- 
 pects from so large a star. This may be due to its 
 color, which is yellowish white. For half a century, 
 from 1844 until 1896, Procyon presented a curious 
 problem on account of its slight, yet measurable, 
 changes of position. These changes were ascribed 
 by their discoverer, Bessel, to the presence of a mas- 
 sive invisible companion, but the nineteenth century 
 was in its last pentad when Schaeberle, at the Lick 
 Observatory, for the first time caught sight of the 
 mysterious attendant. The spectrum of Procyon 
 places it between Sirius and the sun in the order of 
 stellar evolution. Procyon is in the hind quarter of 
 the Lesser Dog, while Gomeiza and its two fifth-mag- 
 nitude companions mark the animal's head. The 
 traditional figure of Canis Minor represents it as a 
 well-trained house or watch dog, in contrast with the 
 fierce aspect of Canis Major rearing on his hind legs 
 with Sirius blazing in his wide-stretched jaws. 
 
 The name Procyon from the Greek vrpo and icvtov, 
 means the "Dog Before" i.e., before Sirius; for, on 
 account of its greater northern declination, it rises 
 49
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 a little ahead of Canis Major. In the valley of the 
 Euphrates it seems to have been regarded as a water- 
 dog on account of its standing on the border of the 
 Milky Way, the river of the sky. For some reason 
 known only to themselves, astrologers connect this 
 constellation, and particularly Procyon, with good- 
 fortune and the possession of wealth. 
 
 The companion of Procyon is of the ninth magni- 
 tude, and distant only 4". 46 in 1905, so that but a 
 few of the most powerful telescopes can show it. 
 The two form a binary system with a period of revo- 
 lution of about forty years. Their actual distance 
 apart is only as great as that between the sun and 
 the planet Uranus. A little telescopic star about 
 ten minutes of arc east of Procyon is double ; magni- 
 tudes, seventh and eighth; distance, i".2. 
 
 Gemini 
 
 (CHARTS V AND IX) 
 
 On the meridian northwest of Canis Minor shine 
 the twins, Gemini, the fourth constellation of the 
 zodiac, Taurus being the third. The two chief 
 stars, Castor and Pollux, are popularly supposed to 
 be equal, and often they are both spoken of as belong- 
 ing to the first magnitude. In reality there is a 
 decided difference between them. Castor, bearing the 
 Greek letter name Alpha (a), and + herefore ranking 
 as the leading star of the constellation, is about half- 
 way between the first and second magnitudes, while 
 Pollux, Beta (ft), is but little less than the first. 
 Within the last three hundred years either Castor 
 50
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN FEBRUARY 
 
 has faded or Pollux has brightened, so that the order 
 of their actual brightness has been reversed. There 
 is a striking difference of color between them, Castor 
 being white and Pollux pale orange. From the re- 
 motest antiquity these stars seem to have impressed 
 all beholders with the idea of a sort of fraternal re- 
 lationship. Their distance apart, about five degrees, 
 is not too great for them to resemble a pair, signifi- 
 cantly placed with regard to each other, and when 
 their magnitudes were equal this impression must 
 have been yet stronger. 
 
 The Twins stand with their feet in the Milky Way, 
 and their heads in the clear space northeast of its 
 borders. The eye readily notices two or three rows 
 of stars crossing the constellation, nearly parallel 
 with the line joining Castor and Pollux. The middle 
 row has a third - magnitude star at each end, the 
 lower one, Delta (S), also called Wasat, being in the 
 right arm of the twin named Pollux, and the upper 
 one, Theta (6), in the out-stretched left hand of his 
 brother Castor. Another third-magnitude star, Ep- 
 silon (e), in Castor's left thigh, makes an obtuse 
 triangle with Delta and Theta. The star Zeta, in 
 the right thigh of Pollux, is variable, changing from 
 between the third and fourth to between the fourth 
 and fifth magnitudes. The brightest star in the con- 
 stellation, after the two leaders, is Gamma (7), or 
 Almison, in the left foot of Pollux. Castor's left 
 foot and ankle are marked by the stars Eta (17), or 
 Propus, and Mu (p), both of the third magnitude. 
 
 Gemini has one star of the first magnitude, two 
 of the second, four of the third, six of the fourth, 
 5 1
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 and thirteen of the fifth. Sixth-magnitude stars are 
 numerous, four of them making a striking row be- 
 tween Gamma (7) and Lambda (A,), which is ex- 
 tended eastward beyond Lambda by three others, 
 with a fifth-magnitude one in their string. 
 
 Fair Leda's twins, in time to stars decreed, 
 One fought on foot, one curbed the fiery steed. 
 
 Dry den's Virgil. 
 
 The heroes Castor and Pollux are among the most 
 interesting figures in Greek mythology, and they so 
 fascinated the imagination of the Romans that they 
 adopted them as the celestial leaders of their world- 
 conquering armies. In the chase of the Calydonian 
 boar, in Jason's Argonautic expedition in search of 
 the Golden Fleece, and in many another famous 
 adventure of the demi-gods in Greece, Castor and 
 Pollux took their part, and it was inevitable that 
 they should finally be translated to the stars. Ac- 
 cording to one legend, they were the brothers of 
 Helen, for whose fair face "the topless towers of 
 Ilium" were burned; according to another, they were 
 the twin sons of Leda and Jupiter. In any event, 
 they were fighters without stint, and that was enough 
 to insure their adoption at Rome as the "Great 
 White Brethren," whose appearance in the thick of 
 a desperate battle more than once restored the courage 
 of both generals and soldiers. 
 
 By many names men call us, 
 
 In many lands we dwell. 
 Well Samothracia knows us, 
 
 Cyrene knows us well. 
 52
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN FEBRUARY 
 
 Our house in gay Tarentum 
 
 Is hung each morn with flowers, 
 High o'er the masts of Syracuse 
 
 Our marble portal towers. 
 But by the proud Eurotas 
 
 Is our dear native home, 
 And for the right we come to fight 
 
 Before the ranks of Rome. 
 
 >Macaulay's Battle of Regillus. 
 
 Visitors to Rome to-day admire their colossal 
 figures in the "Dioscuri," on the Monte Cavallo. 
 One among the many legends about these heroes is 
 interesting as indicating that in very ancient times 
 the names of Castor and Pollux may have been 
 applied to other conspicuous stars, one of which 
 (for instance, Vega) rises when the other (for instance, 
 Aldebaran) is setting. This story asserts that at a 
 double wedding-feast the brothers got into a broil 
 with the bridegrooms and killed them while attempt- 
 ing to carry off the two brides. But Castor was 
 mortally wounded in the fray, whereupon Pollux, 
 who possessed the gift of immortality, wished to 
 die also. Jove solved the difficulty by transferring 
 them to the sky, decreeing that while one shone 
 resplendent the other should pass the time in the 
 nether world, and so alternately. 
 
 The Twins have from time immemorial been re- 
 garded as the sailors' stars. There is a curious 
 reminder of this in the story of St. Paul's voyage to 
 Rome, which was interrupted by the shipwreck at 
 Malta. An Alexandrian ship, which had wintered 
 in the isle, and whose sign, says St. Paul, was Castor 
 53
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 and Pollux, carried the apostle on to the Eternal 
 City. St. Paul's taking the trouble to mention this 
 fact is characteristic of his interest in a wide range 
 of things outside his religion. We know that he had 
 read the astronomical poem of Aratus, for he quoted 
 a line from it in his celebrated oration on Mars' Hill 
 in Athens. Dr. Seiss would persuade us that Gemini 
 was intended to represent the mystic union of Christ 
 and His redeemed. For the Jews they were Simeon 
 and Levi. The Egyptians represented them as the 
 two gods Horus, the Elder and the Younger. They 
 have also been called David and Jonathan, and even 
 Adam and Eve. They have likewise been connected 
 with the St. Elmo's lamps of the sailors. Homer's 
 "Hymn to Castor and Pollux" seems to suggest this 
 imagined connection between these stars and the 
 mysterious mast-head lights: 
 
 When wintry tempests o'er the savage sea 
 Are raging, and the sailors tremblingly 
 Call on the Twins of Jove with prayer and vow, 
 Gathered in fear upon the lofty prow, 
 
 . . . they suddenly appear, 
 On yellow wings rushing athwart the sky, 
 And lull the blasts in mute tranquillity. 
 
 Shelley's translation. 
 
 The two stars were regarded as twins among the 
 aborigines of the South Pacific islands. In Australia 
 they were called the "Young Men," and among the 
 South African Bushmen the "Young Women." For 
 the Assyrians and the Babylonians, independent of 
 the Greek traditions, they were also the Twins. 
 54
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN FEBRUARY 
 
 Castor is a celebrated double-star, one of the first 
 binaries demonstrated to possess orbital motion. The 
 magnitudes are, approximately, second and third; 
 distance in 1907, 5". 5; colors, greenish white and 
 white. The period of revolution is long, estimated 
 all the way between two hundred and fifty and one 
 thousand years. Delta (8) is double; magnitudes, 
 third and eighth; distance, 7"; colors, yellow and 
 purple. A couple of degrees northwest of the star 
 Eta (?;) is a beautiful cluster, No. 1360, which can 
 be seen as a glimmering mass with a good opera -glass. 
 The telescope reveals it as an astonishing assemblage 
 of minute stars of various magnitudes. 
 
 Lynx 
 
 (CHARTS II, III, AND VI) 
 
 North of Gemini, and between the head of Ursa 
 Major, the Greater Bear, and that of Auriga, lies the 
 very inconspicuous constellation of the Lynx. It 
 contains one star of the third magnitude, one of the 
 fourth, and nine of the fifth. It is a modern constel- 
 lation, invented by Hevelius in the seventeenth cen- 
 tury. It has sometimes been called the Tiger. Al- 
 though so insignificant to the naked eye, it contains 
 a remarkable number of beautiful double and triple 
 stars. The most interesting of these is the star 12, 
 in the eye of the animal. The components are of the 
 sixth, seventh, and eighth magnitudes; distances, 
 i".4 and 8". 7. The star 38, in the extreme south- 
 eastern part of the constellation, is a fine double; 
 55 
 
 SIAIEKOKMALSaitWL, 
 
 ZlQS HftGElAHS, CHI*.
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 magnitudes, fourth and seventh ; distance, 3" ; colors, 
 white and lilac. 
 
 North of the Lynx lies a part of Camelopardalis 
 (already described), and the tail of Draco, a constel- 
 lation which will be described later.
 
 IV 
 
 CONSTELLATIONS ON THE MERIDIAN IN MARCH 
 
 Cancer 
 
 (CHARTS V AND VI) 
 
 THE central point in the sky is now occupied by 
 the fifth constellation of the zodiac, Cancer, the 
 Crab. It is not conspicuous, and the line of the 
 meridian is not brilliant, although on either side of 
 it there are beautiful constellations Auriga, Gemini, 
 and Canis Minor lying near on the west, while Hydra, 
 Leo, and Ursa Major are approaching it from the 
 east. 
 
 The constellation Cancer is so inconspicuous that 
 one wonders at its antiquity, and at the universal 
 recognition which it seems to have had in all ages. 
 Its position in the zodiac partly accounts for this. 
 It contains no star brighter than the fourth magni- 
 tude, and only five of them. Two of these stars, 
 Delta (B) and Gamma (<y), have been famed from 
 ancient times under the name of the Aselli, or Little 
 Asses. Gamma is the Asellus Borealis, and Delta 
 the Asellus Australis. Nearly between them, a little 
 to the west, gleams a naked-eye cluster of small stars 
 called Praesepe, or the Manger, from which the Aselli 
 s 57
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 are supposed to feed. The Manger was a celebrated 
 weather portent in the days of Aratus and Homer. 
 
 And watch the Manger. Like a little mist 
 
 Far north, in Cancer's territory, it floats. 
 
 Its confines are two faintly glimmering stars, 
 
 One on the north, the other on the south. 
 
 These are two Asses that the Manger parts, 
 
 Which suddenly, when all the sky is clear, 
 
 Sometimes quite vanishes, and the two stars 
 
 Seem closer to have moved their sundered orbs. 
 
 No feeble tempest then will soak the leas. 
 
 A murky Manger, with both stars 
 
 Unaltered, is a sign of rain. 
 
 If while the Northern Ass is dimmed 
 
 By vaporous shroud, he of the South gleam radiant, 
 
 Expect a south wind. Vapor and radiance 
 
 Exchanging stars, harbinger Boreas. 
 
 Aratus' s Diosemia. 
 
 The dimming of the Manger may truly portend a 
 change of weather, since its stars are so faint that 
 only their number makes them noticeable at all, and 
 the least veil of cirrus at night would hide them 
 before the cloud became sufficiently pronounced to 
 reveal its presence to the eye. Historically the Man- 
 ger is interesting, because it afforded to Galileo one 
 of his earliest telescopic proofs of the existence of 
 multitudes of stars invisible to the naked eye. In 
 his Sidereus Nuntius, containing the original account 
 of his discoveries, he says : " Prassepe is not one star 
 only, but a mass of more than forty small stars. I 
 have noticed thirty-six stars, besides the Aselli, ar- 
 ranged in the order of the accompanying diagram." 
 58
 
 a-760", (7- +57. 
 
 m eo CT.I 70 no so zat 190
 
 Chart III
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN MARCH 
 
 He then gives the diagram, which is herewith repro- 
 duced : 
 
 * * 
 
 ***** 
 * * * * 
 
 * * ir 
 * * * ** * * 
 
 .'*. 
 
 * ^ .. * 
 
 * 
 
 1 
 
 * * 
 
 * * 
 
 * 
 
 This was a great astronomical discovery in his 
 day, but now anybody possessing a large opera-glass 
 or field-glass can see all that he saw, and even yet 
 many persons, who have never looked at the sky 
 with a telescope, may be almost as much surprised 
 and delighted as Galileo was. An assemblage of stars 
 like this, seen through a glass, always produces a 
 vivid impression which can never be forgotten. 
 
 The former Astronomer Royal, Mr. Hind, has 
 recorded another historic event commemorated by 
 the Manger. The most ancient scientific observa- 
 tion of Jupiter that is known to us, he says, was 
 noted by Ptolemy as having occurred eighty-three 
 59
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 years after the death of Alexander the Great, when 
 the planet, happening to pass over the Prassepe 
 cluster, eclipsed the star Delta, or the Asellus Aus- 
 tralis. 
 
 In English astronomical folk-lore the Manger is 
 called the Beehive, surely a more descriptive name 
 than the other. There are yet two more events in 
 astronomical history connected with this constella- 
 tion. It was in its neighborhood that the celebrated 
 comet of Halley, the most infrequent in its returns, 
 and the largest of all periodic comets, was first no- 
 ticed in 1531, and the two supposed intramercurial 
 planets, which the American astronomer Watson im- 
 agined that he had discovered during the solar eclipse 
 of 1878, were identified by Professor Peters with the 
 stars Zeta () and Theta (0). Formerly the summer 
 solstitial point was situated in Cancer, although now 
 the Precession of the Equinoxes has carried it more 
 than thirty degrees towards the west, but we still 
 speak of the tropic of Cancer. 
 
 An ancient Greek myth avers that Cancer repre- 
 sents the Crab that Hera sent to bite the foot of 
 Herakles when he was battling with the Hydra in 
 the Lernaean marshes, but the hero slew the Crab as 
 well as the Hydra, whereupon the goddess induced 
 Zeus to translate the former to the sky. In ancient 
 Egypt this constellation was imagined as a Scarabasus, 
 and regarded as emblematic of immortality. One 
 may wonder how far the ghostly glimmer of the 
 Praesepe cluster contributed to this idea. The astro- 
 logical significance of Cancer has generally been 
 malign, and Berosus predicted that the earth would 
 60
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN MARCH 
 
 be drowned when all the planets should assemble in 
 this constellation. In that case we seem to have had 
 a narrow escape in June, 1895, for at that time all of 
 the planets, except Neptune, were visible near the 
 Crab. But of course the absence of Neptune, as 
 god of the sea, was fatal to the combination. There 
 could not well be a universal flood with him left out 
 of the conspiracy. Mr. Allen says that one of the 
 Chinese names for this constellation was the Red 
 Bird, supposed to mark one of the residences of the 
 Red or Southern Emperor. Praesepe has been re- 
 garded as representing the Manger in which Christ 
 was born. The Jews referred the constellation to 
 Issachar. Dr. Seiss likes the mystic idea of the 
 Egyptians, only he thinks that they were handling 
 a prophecy which they did not understand. Their 
 Scarabseus was a symbol of the Christian resurrection. 
 Zeta () is a celebrated quadruple star; magni- 
 tudes, sixth, seventh, six-and-a-half, and seven-and- 
 a-half; distances, i".i6, 5", and 6".i8, in 1907. 
 There is a complicated set of revolutions effected by 
 these stars around their several centres of gravity. 
 Iota (t) is double; magnitudes, four-and-a-half and 
 six-and-a-half; distance, 30". 
 
 Hydra 
 
 (CHARTS IX AND X) 
 
 Under Cancer, and just north of the celestial 
 
 equator, is a conspicuous pentagon of stars marking 
 
 the head of Hydra, a very long constellation which 
 
 occupies four months in crossing the meridian, the 
 
 61
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 tail arriving upon that line at 9 P.M. in the middle 
 of June. But, upon the whole, it is best, perhaps, 
 to include the description of this constellation in 
 the present chapter. The total length of Hydra, 
 about a hundred degrees, is less than that of Eridanus, 
 but it appears much longer because, unlike the great 
 "river," it does not turn back upon its course. Two 
 of the stars in the Head of this immense Sea Monster, 
 Zeta () and Epsilon (e), are of the third magnitude, 
 one, Delta (8), of the fourth, and three of the fifth. 
 The lucida of the constellation, Alpha (a), or Al- 
 phard (also Cor Hydrae), is of the second magnitude. 
 It is in line with the eastern edge of Cancer and 
 below the forepaws of Leo. In its comparatively 
 lone situation it is fairly conspicuous, made more so, 
 perhaps, by its orange-yellow color. From this point 
 the constellation, marked with third, fourth, and 
 fifth magnitude stars, often arranged in striking 
 pairs, winds eastward under Leo, Sextans, Crater, 
 Corvus, and Virgo, the tail ending near a bright star 
 in the uplifted claw of Scorpio. After the eye has 
 once traced out the course of Hydra the image of 
 a serpent is not difficult to recognize. Nearly all of 
 the bright stars of the constellation are included in 
 the figure as it is usually drawn. Hydra, facing 
 westward, seems to be contemplating an attack upon 
 Canis Minor, just ahead of him, and standing appar- 
 ently upon the back of Monoceros. It has sometimes 
 been called Draco, but that name is reserved for the 
 great dragon that curls about the northern pole of 
 the heavens. 
 
 In Greek mythology this was the Lernaean monster 
 62
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN MARCH 
 
 destroyed by Herakles. It was fabled to have a 
 hundred heads, and those who sought to destroy it 
 found that if they cut off one, two grew in its place 
 while they were occupied with a second. Herakles 
 got over the difficulty, at the suggestion of lolaus, 
 by searing the stumps with a hot iron as fast as the 
 heads were severed an excellent plan for other 
 Hydras. 
 
 Art thou proportioned to the Hydra's length, 
 Who from his wounds received augmented strength? 
 He raised a hundred hissing heads in air; 
 When one I lopped up sprang a dreadful pair. 
 
 The Egyptians at one time regarded this constel- 
 lation not as a serpent but as the celestial counter- 
 part of the Nile. It has also been identified with the 
 dragon of the Argonautic expedition, but that is 
 generally regarded as being represented by the Draco 
 of the North Polar region. Dr. Seiss avers that 
 Hydra stands for "the Great Dragon, that old Ser- 
 pent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceived the 
 whole world" (see Revelations xii.), and earlier con- 
 structors of Biblical symbols among the stars re- 
 garded this constellation as representing the Flood, 
 while Corvus, the Raven, standing on its back, was 
 the bird sent out by Noah. 
 
 Epsilon (e) is a remarkably beautiful double ; mag- 
 nitudes, fourth and eighth; distance, 3". 4; colors, 
 yellow and blue. Theta (6) is double; magnitudes, 
 fourth and twelfth; distance, 50". 
 
 Underneath the Head of Hydra, extending down 
 to the southern horizon, is a relatively barren region, 
 63
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 covered by a part of the constellation Argo Navis. 
 Turning to the region north of Cancer, near the line 
 of the meridian, we find before reaching the Pole 
 Star only the hind quarters of the Lynx, the fore- 
 paws and head of Ursa Major, and the head of Cam- 
 elopardalis, which have already been described or will 
 be described later.
 
 V 
 
 CONSTELLATIONS ON THE MERIDIAN IN APRIL 
 
 Leo 
 
 (CHART VI) 
 
 EX3, the great Lion of the sky, now reigns supreme, 
 king of celestial as of terrestrial beasts. Leo is 
 the sixth constellation of the zodiac, and one of the 
 most clearly marked on account of the figure of a 
 large sickle, with its handle downward and its curving 
 blade open towards the west, which occupies the 
 western part of the constellation, including the head 
 and fore quarters of the Lion. At the end of the 
 handle of this sickle glows the principal star of the 
 constellation, Regulus, or Alpha (a), usually ranked 
 as of the first magnitude, but in reality of less than 
 the standard brightness. Still, Regulus is a conspic- 
 uous and beautiful star, and, lying very close to the 
 ecliptic, it is sometimes occulted by the moon. 
 
 This star has been famous in all ages. Copernicus 
 bestowed upon it the name it now bears, a diminu- 
 tive form, says Mr. Allen, of the earlier name Rex, 
 which arose from the ancient belief that it ruled the 
 affairs of heaven. In English it has often been called 
 the Royal Star. In Persian uranography it was one 
 65
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 of four Royal Stars, the " Four Guardians of Heaven," 
 the others of which have been identified with Fomal- 
 haut, Aldebaran, and An tares. These marked the 
 four cardinal points, Regulus standing for the South, 
 Fomalhaut for the North, Aldebaran for the East, 
 and Antares for the West. As they are about six 
 hours of Right Ascension apart, and all very con- 
 spicuous, their selection for this purpose was not 
 unnatural. With the exception of Fomalhaut, they 
 all lie quite close to the ecliptic, the annual path of 
 the sun. 
 
 Regulus shines near the heart of Leo, and accord- 
 ingly is sometimes spoken of as the Lion's Heart. 
 The second star of the constellation lies far away 
 to the east in the end of the tail. It is called Dene- 
 bola, or Beta (/3), and is of the second magnitude. 
 Five other stars besides Regulus constitute the figure 
 of the sickle already spoken of. One of these, Ganir 
 (7), Algieba, is of the second magnitude; thre , Eta 
 (77), Zeta (), and Epsilon (e), are of the third 
 nitude; and one, Mu (i>), of the fourth. G; 
 is a beautiful double, and is also interesting for 
 close to the radiant point of the great Novt 
 meteor shower, which was so brilliant in 1833 
 1866. These stars lie in the mane and head o 
 Lion, Lambda (X), a little west of Epsilon (e), 1 
 in the open jaws. Regulus, Gamma, Denebola ; 
 Delta mark the corners of a conspicuous quadril; 
 which covers the whole central part of the constel- 
 lation. Both Regulus and Denebola, by their spectra, 
 belong to the Sirian order of suns that is to say, 
 they are younger than our sun. 
 66
 
 30 
 
 i' r* 
 
 ' 
 
 ' 
 
 ** 
 
 ' 
 
 >/ CT>HI
 
 **> JBW 
 
 hart iv 
 
 CTVB m 
 
 1 
 
 \ -V 
 
 . * 
 V 
 
 NI3ROM 
 
 -A 
 
 
 a 
 
 r 
 
 **
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN APRIL 
 
 Nearly all of the old nations saw a lion in this con- 
 stellation. According to the Greeks, it was the cel- 
 ebrated Nemaean Lion slain by Herakles. In India 
 and in Egypt it was always represented in the zodi- 
 acs by the figure of a lion. It was associated with 
 the great heat of summer, and Burritt remarks: 
 
 The Egyptians were much annoyed by lions during the 
 heat of summer, as they at that season left the desert and 
 haunted the banks of the Nile, which had then its greatest 
 elevation. It was therefore natural for their astronomers 
 to place the Lion where we find him in their zodiac. 
 
 The Lion was the symbol of the tribe of Judah, 
 and the constellation is found in the Hebrew zodiac, 
 where it is the twelfth or last sign instead of the 
 fifth. Allen calls attention to a remark of Land- 
 seer that the association of Leo with Judah arose 
 from the fact that Leo was Judah 's natal sign, and 
 as such was borne on the signet ring which he gave 
 to Tamar. In the Middle Ages Leo was identified 
 with Daniel's lion. Dr. Seiss develops in detail the 
 connection of Leo with the lion of the tribe of Judah, 
 and, referring to the Apocalypse, he says that " what 
 is thus pictured in the last book of the Scriptures is 
 the same that was fore-intimated and recorded in 
 this last sign of the zodiac before any one book of 
 our present Bible was written." As in China every- 
 thing goes by contraries, the Lion of the zodiac was 
 there regarded as a Horse. Regulus has always been 
 a fortunate star with the astrologers, while Denebola, 
 at the other end of the constellation, is an unfortunate 
 67
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 one a very even-handed distribution of powers for 
 one constellation. 
 
 Regulus has at a distance of three minutes of arc 
 a faint companion star which, it has been said, 
 looks as if it had been steeped in indigo, and which 
 is double; magnitudes, eight-and-a-half and thir- 
 teenth; distance, 3". 3. Gamma is one of the most 
 charming doubles in the sky; magnitudes, second 
 and fourth; distance, 3". 6; colors, orange and green. 
 These colors are pronounced. Iota is double; mag- 
 nitudes, fourth and eighth; distance, 2". 2; colors, 
 lemon yellow and light blue. The variable star R 
 is remarkable. Its color is deep red, and in the space 
 of three hundred and twelve days it changes from the 
 fifth magnitude to the tenth, and back again. Con- 
 sequently for a part of the time it is entirely absent 
 from the sky, as far as naked-eye observation is con- 
 cerned. Being at a maximum about January 20, 
 1908, future periods of visibility of this star may be 
 predicted from its periodic time. 
 
 Leo Minor 
 
 (CHARTS III AND VI) 
 
 This is a small constellation lying north of Leo and 
 under the hind feet of Ursa Major. The Lesser Lion 
 is inconspicuous to the eye, and possesses no mythol- 
 ogy, having been invented by Hevelius in the seven- 
 teenth century. It contains only three stars as bright 
 as the fourth magnitude and six of the fifth magni- 
 tude. It is almost equally uninteresting for telescopic 
 observation. 
 
 68
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN APRIL 
 Ursa Major 
 
 (CHARTS I, III, AND VI) 
 
 Directly north of Leo Minor is one of the great 
 figures of uranography, and one of the most familiar 
 to ordinary observation of all the constellations Ursa 
 Major, the Greater Bear. Indeed, on account of its 
 situation within about forty degrees of the north polar- 
 star, Ursa Major is probably oftener seen and recog- 
 nized in the heavens than any other group of stars. 
 It is especially known by the celebrated figure of the 
 Great Dipper, formed by seven stars in the flank and 
 tail of the Bear. In the latitude of New York the 
 Great Dipper never sets, the star in the extreme end 
 of the long handle just skimming the horizon in the 
 evenings of November and December, while in May 
 and June it is almost overhead. 
 
 There is no other figure among the stars so well 
 marked as this, unless it may be the Northern Cross 
 in Cygnus, or the Northern Crown. But the Great 
 Dipper is far more conspicuous than either of these. 
 Six of its seven stars are of the second magnitude, and 
 one of the third. 
 
 In the middle of the handle is a famous naked-eye 
 double, Mizar, whose companion, close by on the 
 northeast, is named Alcor. These stars are sometimes 
 called the Horse and Rider. Any good eye can easily 
 separate them, and yet they were at one time regarded 
 as a test of naked-eye seeing. 
 
 The Great Dipper has had many names, among 
 them being Charles's Wain, and the Plough, the popu- 
 69
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 lar title in England. Mr. Allen has shown how the 
 name Charles's Wain (meaning wagon) is derived 
 from an earlier title which made it Charlemagne's 
 Wain. The courtiers of King Charles I. of England 
 connected it with his name: 
 
 . . . those bright stars 
 
 Which English shepherds Charles's Wain do name, 
 But more this isle is Charles's wain, 
 Since Charles her royal wagoner became. 
 
 John Taylor (1630). 
 
 The use of this asterism as a timekeeper is vividly 
 illustrated by Shakespeare in the scene between the 
 carriers in the inn-yard at Rochester, in "King Henry 
 IV.," Part L, Act II., Scene!.: 
 
 Heigh-ho! an' it be not four by the day, I'll be hanged: 
 Charles's Wain is over the new chimney, and yet our horse 
 is not packed! 
 
 In earlier England it was called Arthur's Wain. In 
 America the seven stars of the Dipper have sometimes 
 borne the pleasing title of the Seven Little Indians, 
 and I recall from boyhood days, in the Mohawk Val- 
 ley, this doggerel, which was sung to a childish air: 
 
 One little, two little, three little Injuns, 
 Four little, five little, six little Injuns, 
 Seven little Injun boys. 
 Seven little, six little, five little Injuns, 
 Four little, three little, two little Injuns, 
 One little Injun boy. 
 
 I do not know whether the Indians had any legend 
 about the seven stars, but the Algonquins called the 
 70
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN APRIL 
 
 whole constellation the Bear and Hunters. The name 
 Plough, so popular in England, is of classic origin, 
 the Romans having known the Dipper as the Triones, 
 or Oxen, which were figured as drawing a plough. 
 These became with later writers the Septentriones, 
 as in Virgil. 
 
 For the people of the far North, the Laplanders, the 
 stars of the Dipper represent a reindeer. The name 
 Seven Stars has often been given to the Pleiades, but, 
 as Mr. Allen remarks, seems more appropriate when 
 applied to the stars of the Dipper, on account of the 
 conspicuousness of the latter. They have been called, 
 variously, the Seven Wise Men of Greece, the Seven 
 Sleepers of Ephesus, and the Seven Champions of 
 Christendom. 
 
 The individual names of these stars, beginning with 
 the northwestern corner of the bowl of the imaginary 
 dipper, are Dubhe, Merak, Phaed, Megrez (the faint 
 one), Alioth, Mizar (before mentioned with its com- 
 panion, Alcor), and Benetnasch. Their Greek letter 
 names, in the same order, are Alpha (a), Beta 09), 
 Gamma (7), Delta (8), Epsilon (e), Zeta (?), and Eta 
 (?/). Alpha and Beta, the pair in the outer side of 
 the bowl, are often called the Pointers, because an im- 
 aginary line drawn through them and extended pole- 
 wards nearly hits the pole-star at a distance of about 
 thirty degrees. These seven stars differ in color, al- 
 though the fact may not be apparent to hasty ob- 
 servation. Alpha and Gamma are yellow, Beta is 
 greenish, and Zeta and Eta are brilliant white. Delta, 
 now so much fainter than its sisters that one feels a 
 certain disappointment over the irregularity which
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 it introduces into an otherwise perfect array of equal 
 stars, seems formerly to have been as bright as any 
 of them, and, in his time, Tycho Brahe, the famous 
 Danish astronomer, estimated it of the second mag- 
 nitude, like the others. It is probably a long-period 
 variable. 
 
 The idea of dancing was connected with Ursa Major, 
 as well as with the other circumpolar constellations, 
 by the ancients. Sir G. C. Lewis says that this was 
 derived from the circular dances of the Greeks. The 
 two bears (Ursa Major and Ursa Minor) were imag- 
 ined reeling round the pole like a pair of waltzers : 
 
 Onward the kindred Bears, with footsteps rude, 
 Dance round the pole, pursuing and pursued. 
 
 E. Darwin. 
 
 The mythology of Ursa Major is intimately asso- 
 ciated with that of Ursa Minor (see Chapter VII.), 
 and together they have furnished more poetic sug- 
 gestions to the literature of many nations than any 
 half-dozen of the other constellations. The ceaseless 
 tread of the Bears, keeping guard round the north 
 pole, naturally appeals to the popular imagination. 
 Ursa Major was fabled to be Helice, or Callisto, a 
 princess of Arcadia, who, having offended Hera by 
 attracting the attention of the ever -amorous Zeus, 
 was turned into a bear: 
 
 . . . her hand within her hair she wound, 
 Swung her to earth and dragged her on the ground. 
 The prostrate wretch lifts up her hands in prayer; 
 Her arms grow shaggy and deformed with hair, 
 72
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN APRIL 
 
 Her nails are sharpened into pointed claws, 
 Her hands bear half her weight, and turn to paws, 
 Her lips, that once could tempt a god, begin 
 To grow distorted in an ugly grin. 
 
 Ovid's Metamorphoses. 
 
 After this painful tragedy of female jealousy, Jove, 
 with his usual regard for his friends, translated poor 
 Helice to the sky and bestowed upon her the im- 
 mortality of the stars. The extreme and very un- 
 bear-like length of Ursa Major's tail has always been 
 a subject of pleasantry, and Mr. Allen quotes a quaint 
 explanation suggested by Dr. Thomas Hood early in 
 the seventeenth century: 
 
 Imagine that Jupiter, fearing to come too nigh unto her 
 teeth, layde holde on her tayle, and thereby drew her up 
 into the heaven, so that shee of herself, being very weightie, 
 and the distance from the earth to the heavens very great, 
 there was great likelihood that her taile must stretch. 
 Other reason know I none. 
 
 In Scandinavia Ursa Major was Thor's Wagon, and 
 also the Wagon of Odin, Thor's father. Among the 
 Hebrews the constellation was regarded as a bier, or 
 coffin, and the early Christians called it the Bier of 
 Lazarus. In the Middle Ages it was regarded by some 
 as one of the bears sent by Elisha the prophet to de- 
 vour the mocking boys. Dr. Seiss regards it as sym- 
 bolical of the heavenly Sheepfold, and he manages to 
 derive the name Callisto from a Semitic root meaning 
 a sheepfold, or enclosure. 
 
 Ursa Major has six stars of the second magnitude ; 
 eleven of the third ; three of the fourth ; forty of the 
 6 73
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 fifth, and a great number of the sixth. The three f 
 pairs in the feet are conspicuous. 
 
 The star Zeta (), or Mizar, has already been de- 
 scribed as a naked -eye double. The larger star is 
 again doubled in the telescope, presenting a very 
 charming spectacle; magnitudes, second and fourth; 
 distance, 14". 5 ; colors, white and emerald. The larger 
 star of this pair is a close spectroscopic binary. Zeta 
 is also interesting as the first telescopic double ever 
 observed. Riccioli detected its duplicity in 1650. 
 The star Xi (), in the right hind-foot, is double; 
 magnitudes, fourth and fifth; distance, 2". 5. The star 
 Sigma (er) is double; magnitudes, fifth and eighth; 
 distance, 2 ".6. 
 
 Sextans 
 
 (CHARTS VI AND X) 
 
 Between Ursa Major and the north pole winds the 
 body of Draco, which will be described in a subse- | 
 quent chapter. We turn now to the neighborhood of 
 the meridian south of Leo. Directly underneath the 
 Sickle of Leo is the small constellation Sextans, the 
 Sextant. This is one of the seventeenth - century 
 constellations formed by Hevelius from star spaces, 
 either left out of their constellations by the ancients, 
 or apparently useless to them, and consequently re- 
 garded as a kind of "public land," which the first 
 settler could seize. Hevelius was not unmindful of 
 his own glory in this case, since he formed the con- 
 stellation to immortalize the sextant used by him in 
 his stellar observations. Admiral Smyth says that 
 Hevelius put the Sextant between Leo and Hydra 
 74
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN APRIL 
 
 because those constellations, according to the as- 
 trologers, were of a fiery nature, and he wished to 
 commemorate the fire which destroyed his house and 
 his instruments at Dantzic in 1679. After a couple 
 of thousand years this could be transformed into as 
 good a myth as any, Hevelius becoming a demigod 
 who hunted down celestial monsters and brought or- 
 der into the sky with a terrible three-bladed weap- 
 on more fatal than the Club of Herakles. In the 
 seventeenth century Von Rheita imagined that he 
 saw Saint Veronica's Sacred Handkerchief among the 
 stars out of which Hevelius constructed his Sextant. 
 Sir John Herschel, who was not without humor for 
 an astronomer, remarked concerning Von Rheita's 
 sacred handkerchief that many strange things were 
 seen among the stars before powerful telescopes be- 
 came common. Sextans contains one star of the 
 fourth magnitude, and four of the fifth. 
 
 Crater 
 
 (CHART X) 
 
 The constellation Crater, the Cup, is represented 
 by an appropriate figure standing on the back of the 
 immense sea-serpent Hydra. Its shape suggests the 
 name by which it has been known from time imme- 
 morial. It is usually represented in the form of a 
 large urn, or beaker, tipped towards the east. In 
 China it seems to have been figured as a dog. It 
 contains one star of the third magnitude, Delta (8), 
 four of the fourth, and two of the fifth. The leading 
 75
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 star, Alpha (a), or Alkes, is not now the brightest. 
 The mythology of this constellation is more inter- 
 esting than its appearance promises. The Greeks 
 regarded it as the Goblet of Apollo, but Manilius 
 ascribes it to Bacchus: 
 
 Close by the Serpent spreads, whose winding spires 
 With ordered stars resemble scaly fires. 
 Next flies the Crow, and next the generous Bowl 
 Of Bacchus flows, and cheers the thirsty pole. 
 
 It was also known as the Cup of Herakles, of Achil- 
 les, of Dido, and of Medea. Later it was identified 
 with the cup that Joseph found in Benjamin's sack, 
 and with Noah's wine-cup. Dr. Seiss gives it a tragic 
 turn, and ominously calls it the Cup of Wrath of the 
 Revelations: "Dreadful beyond all thought is the 
 picture John gives of this cup of unmingled and eter- 
 nal wrath, but not a whit more dreadful than the 
 picture of it which the primeval prophets have thus 
 inscribed upon the stars." 
 
 It must be confessed that the good doctor's im- 
 agination is vivid, for Crater is a very inoffensive- 
 looking constellation, much more suggestive of Bac- 
 chus than of wrath.
 
 VI 
 
 CONSTELLATIONS ON THE MERIDIAN IN MAY 
 
 Corvus 
 
 (CHART X) 
 
 DIRECTLY east of Crater, and also standing on 
 the back of Hydra, is Corvus the Crow. Four 
 bright stars, marking out an irregular quadrilateral, 
 make this constellation conspicuous. Three of these 
 stars, Beta OS), Delta (S), or Algorab, and Gamma (7), 
 or Giena, are of the second magnitude. The fourth, 
 Epsilon (e), is of the third magnitude, while Alpha 
 (a), or Al Chiba, the leader of the constellation, sit- 
 uated below Epsilon, is only of the fourth magnitude. 
 It was probably brighter in ancient times, for it bears 
 the name which the Arabs, according to Mr. Allen, 
 gave to the entire constellation. A fifth-magnitude 
 star, Eta (77), makes a striking naked-eye pair with 
 Delta. Alpha is in the beak of the bird, which is 
 represented pecking at the scales of Hydra: 
 
 A phantom Crow that seems to peck her spires. 
 
 Aratus. 
 
 The ancient Akkadians seem to have regarded this 
 constellation as representing a horse, but nearly all 
 77
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 the other ancients saw a bird there. With the Chinese 
 it was the Red Bird, with the Romans and the He- 
 brews the Raven, and in the valley of the Euphrates 
 it may, according to Mr. Allen's interpretation of an 
 ancient tablet, have been called the Great Storm Bird, 
 or the Bird of the Desert, connected with the myth 
 of Tiamat. Among the Greeks, Apollo was credited 
 with having placed this bird among the stars, as 
 usual in such cases, for services rendered in an amo- 
 rous adventure. Becoming suspicious of the beautiful 
 Coronis, the mother of ^Esculapius, the god sent a crow 
 to watch her. The testimony of this winged detective 
 led to the death of Coronis by an avenging arrow, and 
 to the translation of the tell-tale bird to the sky. 
 Corvus is Dr. Seiss's Bird of Doom, indicating by his 
 attack on Hydra, the Fleeing Serpent, the final over- 
 throw of the Evil One. 
 
 Virgo 
 
 (CHARTS VI AND X) 
 
 North of Corvus, but extending far beyond the 
 eastern limit of that comparatively small constella- 
 tion, is Virgo, the seventh constellation of the zodia :, 
 which contains one of the most beautiful of all tl.e 
 first-magnitude stars, Spica, or Alpha (a) Virginis. 
 
 No one can familiarize himself with the stars with- 
 out insensibly choosing favorites among them. Spica 
 has long been one of my favorites, not because of ex- 
 traordinary brilliancy, for it has not the full bright- 
 ness of the first magnitude, but rather because of the 
 78

 
 -90\ ($-+28*. 
 
 HO 50 09 CT.M OP
 
 Chart V
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN MAY 
 
 singular purity of its white rays, and because of its 
 association with the opening of spring. Its situation 
 in the sky is also such as to attract and please the 
 eye. There is no other star of anything like equal 
 brightness within thirty degrees of it. Spica, to- 
 gether with Denebola in the Lion's tail, Arcturus in 
 Bootes, and Cor Caroli in Canes Venatici, form the 
 celebrated "Diamond of Virgo," a geometrical figure 
 fifty degrees in its greatest length and very striking 
 when once the eye has traced it out. Historically 
 Spica is very interesting, as having, together with 
 Regulus in Leo, furnished to Hipparchus the data 
 which enabled him to discover the Precession of the 
 Equinoxes. It belongs to the first, or youngest, order 
 of suns, together with Sirius, Rigel, and Vega. Like 
 them, too, it is a sun of enormous magnitude. It is 
 one of the spectroscopic binaries, the period of revo- 
 lution being only four days. 
 
 Virgo, the Virgin, has been the name of this con- 
 stellation among all peoples and in all parts of the 
 world, even in China, where she was called the 
 Frigid Maiden. As generally drawn by the makers 
 of constellation figures, she carries a head of wheat in 
 her left hand, and here shines Spica, a name signi- 
 fying a wheat ear. She has folded wings springing 
 from her shoulders, the star Beta (/?), or Zavijava, 
 marking the top of the left wing. Three fourth, one 
 fifth, and two sixth magnitude stars indicate the head. 
 The star Eta (77), or Zaniah, of the third magnitude, 
 is in the heart. Gamma (7), or Porrima, of the third 
 magnitude, shines on the girdle. Theta (0), Zeta (), 
 and Delta (8) are spangled upon the drapery. Theta 
 79
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 is of the fourth and the others of the third magnitude. 
 Epsilon (e), or Vindemiatrix, of the third magnitude, 
 shines in the right wing. The name means "grape- 
 gatherer," and originated from the fact that this star 
 was seen rising before the morning sun at the begin- 
 ning of the vintage. The stars Lambda (\), Pi (TT), 
 and Iota (*) are in the Virgin's feet. There are about 
 a dozen fairly conspicuous stars belonging to the con- 
 stellation which are not included in the figure. Al- 
 together Virgo contains one star of the first magni- 
 tude, six of the third, nine of the fourth, and seventeen 
 of the fifth. The sixth-magnitude stars are very nu- 
 merous, a striking band of them running down the 
 middle of the drapery below the girdle and above 
 Spica. 
 
 Virgo is a mine of beautiful myths. Mr. Andrew 
 Lang has shown that the old English "Kern-baby," 
 made up of the last gleanings of the harvest, and es- 
 corted with music from the field, recalls the harvest 
 goddess of ancient Peru and a similar divinity of 
 Sicily, who was identical with Persephone, the daugh- 
 ter of Demeter, the goddess of the corn. Georgius 
 Ca3sius, in the sixteenth century, beautifully imag- 
 ined the classic Virgo as Ruth gleaning in the fields 
 of Boaz. Mr. Allen recalls an old custom of La 
 Vendee, where the farmer's wife, under the name of 
 the Corn Mother, is tossed in a blanket at the end 
 of the harvest to bring good-luck at the threshing. 
 All of these popular customs are directly associated 
 with the myths concerning the constellation Virgo. 
 
 Hesiod identified Virgo with Astrasa, the Goddess 
 of Justice, who ruled the world in the Golden Age. As 
 80
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN MAY 
 
 mankind passed in succession through the Silver and 
 the Bronze ages to the terrible Age of Iron, all the 
 gods and goddesses one by one quitted the earth, but 
 Astraa lingered until the last. When she could no 
 longer endure the brutal scenes and passions dis- 
 played around her, "loathing that race of men," she 
 
 Winged her flight to heaven, 
 Where still by night is seen 
 The Virgin goddess near to bright Bootes. 
 
 Aratus. 
 
 The Romans had an equally exalted opinion of the 
 character of Virgo: 
 
 But modest Virgo's rays give polisht parts, 
 And fill men's breasts with honesty and arts; 
 No tricks for gain, nor love of wealth dispense, 
 But piercing thoughts and winning eloquence. 
 
 Manilius. 
 
 Another Greek legend associated Virgo with Erig- 
 one, the unfortunate daughter of Icarius, the Athe- 
 nian who enjoyed the friendship of the god Bacchus. 
 The god fell in love with Erigone, but this honor 
 which was not, to be sure, a very singular one did not 
 deter her from hanging herself for grief over the mur- 
 der of her father. Mr. Allen, whose suggestions are 
 always interesting, supposes that the name Erigone 
 may have been derived from the Homeric 'Hpiyeveia, 
 the Early Born, the constellation being a very old one. 
 In Egypt, Virgo was identified with Isis, and it was 
 said that she had made the Milky Way by dropping 
 wheat.- heads. In the valley of the Euphrates she 
 81
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 seems to have been associated with Ishtar, the Queen 
 of the Stars, turned, says Allen, into the Ashtoreth of 
 the Book of Kings, the Astarte of Syria, the Hathor of 
 Egypt, and the Aphrodite of Greece. In Assyria she 
 was Bel's wife. In Judea her name was Bethulah, 
 and she was regarded as giving abundant harvests. 
 Dr. Seiss, as we might anticipate, identifies her with 
 the Virgin Mary. The same thing was done by the 
 churchmen of the Middle Ages. 
 
 Scattered over the area between the stars Beta, 
 Eta, Gamma, Delta, and Epsilon lies the celebrated 
 Field of the Nebulae, thus called on account of the 
 surprising assemblage of faint telescopic nebulas to 
 be seen there. They number more than three hun- 
 dred! Nebulas are the seeds of future suns, and, re- 
 membering this fact, one cannot help being impressed 
 by the singular choice of Virgo as the celestial patron 
 of husbandry, a choice made thousands of years be- 
 fore the invention of the telescope or the discovery 
 that such things as nebulae existed. Was there once 
 a now forgotten age when men were as learned as we 
 are to-day, and did a little of this knowledge descend 
 to their degenerate successors in the form of uncom- 
 prehended traditions? Another thing which associ- 
 ates the Field of the Nebulae with the ideas of seed- 
 time and harvest, of growth, life, and development, is 
 the presence in the same area of an extraordinary 
 number of variable stars. 
 
 Among telescopic objects may be mentioned the 
 star Gamma, one of the most celebrated of visual 
 binaries. In brightness the two components are near- 
 ly equal, both being usually reckoned of the third 
 82
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN MAY 
 
 magnitude. The distance between them is variable, 
 since they revolve around their common centre of 
 gravity in a long period, which may be as much as a 
 hundred and seventy years. In 1836 they were so 
 close that no telescope could split them. In 1904 
 their distance was 5". 8. In 1931 their distance should 
 be over 6", and after that, if the period mentioned 
 is correct, they will begin to close up again. Theta 
 is double; magnitudes, fourth and ninth; distance, 
 7". There is a third faint star at a distance of 65". 
 
 Coma Berenices 
 
 (CHARTS III AND tfQ. 
 
 North of Virgo, directly on the meridian in the mid- 
 dle of May, and almost exactly overhead in the mean 
 latitude of the United States, is the beautiful little 
 constellation of Coma Berenices, or Berenice's Hair. 
 To the eye it appears as a glimmering spot in the sky, 
 and a little attention is needed to reveal the separate 
 stars composing it. There are six of these in a close 
 group in the crown of the chevelure, one of the fourth, 
 and five of the fifth magnitude. There are two other 
 fourth -magnitude and twelve fifth -magnitude stars 
 in the constellation, with many of the sixth magnitude 
 which serve to increase the glimmer. They have no 
 names or letters only numbers. Yet the constella- 
 tion is an ancient one. It is situated at the northern 
 pole of the Milky Way. The name is said to be that 
 of Berenice, the queen of Ptolemy Euergetes, and the 
 legend relates that when her husband started on a 
 dangerous campaign into Assyria, Berenice vowed to 
 83
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 dedicate her beautiful hair to the Temple of Venus if 
 he should return safe. He did return, and the queen 
 kept her vow. Then Jove, who was always ready to 
 oblige a beautiful woman, even though she were mor- 
 tal, translated the shining locks to the stars. Eratos- 
 thenes, however, identified the constellation with the 
 hair of Ariadne. In later Christian times it was 
 identified with the sacred handkerchief, the Vera 
 Icon, of Saint Veronica. Dr. Seiss associates it with 
 the Star of the Magi. It was vertically overhead at 
 Jerusalem on the 2$th of December at the time of 
 Christ's birth, he says, and he locates the wonderful 
 new star observed by Hipparchus, more than a hun- 
 dred years before, in this constellation. It was the 
 appearance of this star that led Hipparchus to make 
 his stellar catalogue. Hipparchus lived more than 
 , century before Christ, but Dr. Seiss has found a 
 Chinese reference to the new star as being brilliant 
 at a period corresponding to that of the Saviour's 
 birth. In the days of Ptolemy, a century and a half 
 after Christ, the star was so faint as hardly to be dis- 
 tinguishable. If it was a temporary star, it has not 
 reappeared since. 
 
 There is in Coma Berenices a singular collection of 
 double stars with lilac-colored companions. I quote, 
 on this subject, from my Pleasures of the Telescope: 
 
 Let us begin with the star 2 , magnitudes sixth and seven 
 and a half, distance 3". 6. The color of the smaller star is 
 lilac. This color, although not extremely uncommon among 
 double stars elsewhere, recurs with singular persistence in 
 this little constellation. In the very next star that we look 
 at, 12, we find a double whose smaller component is lilac. 
 84
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN MAY 
 
 The magnitudes are fifth and eighth, distance 66". So 
 also the wide double 17, magnitudes fifth and six and a 
 half, distance 145", exhibits a tinge of lilac in the smaller 
 component. The triple 35, magnitudes fifth, eighth, and 
 ninth, distances i" and 2 8' '.7, has for colors yellow, lilac, and 
 blue; and the double 24, magnitudes fifth and sixth, dis- 
 tance 20", combines an orange with a lilac star. 
 
 Canes Venatid 
 
 (CHARTS I, II, AND VI) 
 
 Between Coma Berenices and the handle of the 
 Great Dipper we find another extremely interesting 
 little constellation Canes Venatici, or the Hunting 
 Dogs. It has but one star as bright as the third mag- 
 nitude, the beautiful Cor Caroli, or Charles's Heart, 
 thus named by Halley in honor of King Charles II. 
 of England, because it was said to have shone with 
 extraordinary brilliancy on the night of his corona- 
 tion. This star is double, having at a distance of 
 20" a sixth-magnitude companion of a light-blue or, as 
 some say, lilac hue. The contrast is superb in a small 
 telescope. 
 
 But while the principal star of the Hunting Dogs 
 has received a name whose romance is associated with 
 English history, the constellation was invented in 
 Germany by Hevelius He named the two dogs As- 
 terion and Chara, the former being the more north- 
 ern one. Cor Caroli flames on the collar of Chara. 
 These dogs are represented as a pair of hounds held 
 in a leash by Bootes, and seeming to chase Ursa Major 
 round the pole, whence Carlyle's reference to the dogs 
 85
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 of Bootes running across the zenith " in their leash of 
 sidereal fire." Canes Venatici contains, besides Cor 
 Caroli, one star of the fourth magnitude and seven- 
 teen of the fifth. In the head of the dog Asterion, 
 invisible to the naked eye, and revealing its full won- 
 der only in photographs, is the famous Whirlpool 
 Nebula of Lord Rosse. 
 
 Some degrees north - northwest of Cor Caroli is a 
 remarkable star, faintly visible to the naked eye, 
 which Secchi named La Superba, on account of its 
 surprisingly brilliant red color. A telescope should 
 be used to appreciate its beauty.
 
 VII 
 
 CONSTELLATIONS ON THE MERIDIAN IN JUNE 
 
 Libra 
 
 (CHARTS X AND XI) 
 
 WE begin with the eighth constellation of the zo- 
 diac, Libra, the Balance, which at nine o'clock in 
 the middle of June appears just entering upon the 
 meridian from the east, following the feet of Virgo. 
 This constellation was blended by the Greeks with 
 Scorpio, forming the out -stretched claws of that mon- 
 ster. It seems to have been separated from Scorpio, 
 under the name of Libra, in the time of Julius Caesar. 
 Homer's reference to "golden scales" hung by Zeus 
 in heaven is thought to have been associated with 
 some other group of stars, but Milton places the 
 Balance where we see it in his description of the 
 threatened battle between Gabriel and Satan: 
 
 . . . Now dreadful deeds 
 Might have ensued, nor only Paradise 
 In this commotion, but the starry cope 
 Of heaven perhaps, or all the elements 
 At least, had gone to wrack, disturbed and torn 
 With violence of this conflict, had not soon 
 87
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EY I 
 
 The Eternal, to prevent such horrid fray, 
 
 Hung forth in heaven his golden scales, yet seen 
 
 Betwixt Astrasa and the Scorpion sign. 
 
 Paradise Lost, Book IV. 
 
 Astraea here refers to Virgo. Two stars of the sec 
 ond magnitude, Beta 09), or Zubeneschemali, anc 
 Alpha (a), or Zubenelgenubi, indicate the two scale; 
 of the balance, Beta being the more northern anc 
 the brighter. This star is remarkable as the onh 
 naked-eye star which has a green color. The hue i; 
 sufficiently pronounced to be evident to any sensitiv< 
 eye. Green is a rare stellar color, except with som< 
 of the components of telescopic doubles. Some eyes 
 however, detect a tinge of green in the rays of Sirius 
 Alpha has a fifth -magnitude companion easily seei 
 with an opera-glass. Besides its two leading stars 
 Libra contains one star of the fourth magnitude anc 
 nine of the fifth. 
 
 The mythology of this constellation is confusing 
 Although forming the claws of Scorpio in the time o 
 Eratosthenes, it seems to have been an independen 
 constellation at an earlier date. The Greeks at om 
 time called it the Beam, and associated it with th< 
 scales of the Goddess of Justice. Readers of Addisoi 
 will recall his beautiful dream of the Balance in th< 
 Taller. In China the constellation at first representec 
 a dragon, but afterwards a celestial balance. Theri 
 are indistinct indications that in the valley of thi 
 Euphrates it stood for the Tower of Babel. It wa 
 also regarded as an altar. Another identificatioi 
 among the Greeks was with Pluto's chariot, in whicl 
 88
 
 Chart VI 
 
 Vari a,bilt s . 
 
 **
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN JUNE 
 
 he ran off with Persephone, or Proserpina. For Dr. 
 Seiss it symbolizes the Divine Judgment. He ac- 
 counts for the confusion arising from its association 
 with the claws of Scorpio by saying that in some of 
 the ancient zodiacs the under bowl of the balance was 
 represented as being seized by the Scorpion. 
 
 The star Delta (8) is a remarkable short -period 
 variable, changing every two days, seven hours and 
 fifty-one minutes from the fifth down to less than the 
 sixth magnitude, and back again. Variables of this 
 kind belong to what is called the Algol type, from 
 the star Algol in Perseus, the first of them to be dis- 
 covered. Their changes are probably caused by the 
 periodic interposition of huge dark bodies revolving 
 around them. 
 
 Bootes 
 
 (CHARTS III, VI, AND VII) 
 
 Another breath from Homer comes to us when we 
 reach Bootes, the great constellation of the North. 
 The name is taken letter for letter from the Odyssey : 
 
 So he sat and cunningly guided the craft with the helm, 
 nor did sleep fall upon his eyelids as he viewed the Pleiades 
 and Bootes, that setteth late, and the Bear, which they like- 
 wise call the Wain, which turneth ever in one place and 
 alone hath no part in the baths of Ocean. This star, Ca- 
 lypso, the fair goddess, bade him keep ever on the left as 
 he traversed the deep. 
 
 Odyssey, Book V. 
 
 The constellation is represented by the figure of a 
 tall man, with uplifted hand, holding a leash to which 
 r 89
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 are attached the Hunting Dogs, Canes Venatici. They 
 seem to be chasing the Greater Bear around the pole, 
 hence the name, often given to Bootes, of the Bear 
 Driver. But he has also been represented as a Herds- 
 man and a Ploughman. The constellation is nearly 
 fifty degrees in length from north to south, and imme- 
 diately attracts the eye by the splendor of its principal 
 star, the celebrated Arcturus, which many regard as the 
 brightest star north of the celestial equator. It has, 
 however, two rivals for this honor, Capella and Vega, 
 or Alpha Lyrae. Photometric measurements show 
 all three of about the same brightness only three- 
 tenths of a magnitude below the zero rank. But 
 Arcturus possesses a peculiar prestige on account of 
 the admiring mention of its name in the Book of Job, 
 where the Almighty, answering Job out of the whirl- 
 wind, is represented as demanding, at the end of a 
 dazzling string of astronomical allusions, "Canst thou 
 guide Arcturus with his sons?" It is doubtful, how- 
 ever, whether the Hebrew poet was thinking of the 
 star Arcturus or of the constellation Ursa Major when 
 he wrote this magnificent passage, whose rhetoric loses 
 none of its sublimity in the English rendering. 
 
 Arcturus is generally regarded as a red star. When 
 near the horizon it flames splendidly, but high in the 
 heavens its color seems to fade. There is evidence 
 that it undergoes changes of color, and that formerly 
 the ruddy tint was more pronounced. At present 
 it may, perhaps, best be described as golden yellow. 
 It is a sun of great magnitude, exceeding ours in 
 intrinsic brilliancy at least a hundred times. Its 
 spectrum resembles that of the sun, but indicates a 
 90
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN JUNE 
 
 more advanced stage. In 1858, when Donati's comet 
 blazed in the Northern sky, Arcturus shone brilliant- 
 ly one night through the comet, close to the head. 
 Curiously enough, the great comet of 1618 also passed 
 over Arcturus without dimming its light. Arcturus 
 is one of the "runaway suns," its proper motion 
 amounting to two hundred or three hundred miles per 
 second. It is moving in a southwesterly direction 
 across the sky, the change of position amounting to 
 more than 2" of arc per year. It has travelled twice 
 the diameter of the moon since the time of Ptolemy. 
 The sudden arrest of the motion of so vast a star by 
 means of one of the "astronomical collisions" which 
 occasionally occur in space would produce an outburst 
 of light exceeding anything of the kind that has ever 
 been witnessed from the earth. 
 
 Arcturus is sometimes represented in the knee of 
 the figure, and sometimes, like a great pendent jewel, 
 it hangs on the hem of the giant's robe. Next to 
 Arcturus, the brightest star in the constellation is 
 Epsilon (e), or Mirac, of the third magnitude, or, as 
 Heis charts it, the second. This is reckoned by some 
 observers as the most beautiful double star in the 
 heavens, on account of the contrast of colors presented. 
 Mirac is in the right elbow. Beta (/?), or Nakkar, in 
 the head, is of the third magnitude, as are Gamma (7) 
 in the left shoulder, Delta (S) in the staff held in the 
 right hand, Zeta () in the right foot, and Eta (?/) in 
 the left knee. A group of three fifth-magnitude stars 
 northeast of the end of the Great Dipper's handle 
 marks the uplifted left hand holding the leash. The 
 most easterly of these stars, Theta (0), bears the curi- 
 91
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EY 
 
 cms name of Alkalurops, of Arabic origin, but said b 
 Allen to be an adaptation of the Greek name K< 
 XaOpoi/r, meaning club. The staff, or crook, in the rigl 
 hand is marked by a row consisting of Psi (^), Delt 
 (5), Mu (ji), and Nu (*>), with smaller stars amon 
 them. 
 
 In all, Bootes contains one star of the first magn 
 tude (and above), one of the second, five of the thin 
 nine of the fourth, and twenty-four of the fifth. The] 
 are, of course, many of the sixth magnitude, but tl 
 constellation covers a space so large that as a who. 
 it does not greatly impress the eye. 
 
 Its mythology is interesting. According to sorr 
 of the Greeks, it represented Icarius, the father ( 
 Erigone. Others said that it represented Erichthoniu 
 the inventor of chariots; still others that it was tt 
 son of Zeus and the nymph Callisto, who was change 
 into Ursa Major through Hera's jealousy. It WE 
 also sometimes called Areas, the son of Zeus and Ca 
 listo. Ovid identifies Arctophilax, one of the earl 
 names of the constellation, with Areas. Arctophila 
 was the Bear Watcher. According to Lockyer, th 
 star Arcturus was one of those to which Egyptia 
 temples were oriented. In Dr. Seiss's system of go* 
 pel mythology, Bootes represents the Great Shej 
 herd and Harvester of Souls, and he manages to trac 
 this prophetic meaning back through all the Orients 
 myths. 
 
 Mention has already been made of the beauty c 
 
 the double star Mirac, or Epsilon Bootes. The mag 
 
 nitudes are third (or two and a half) and sixth ; dij 
 
 tance, 2". 6; colors, bright orange and brilliant emei 
 
 92
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN JUNE 
 
 aid. Delta is double; magnitudes, three and a half 
 and eighth; distance, no"; colors, white and pale 
 lilac. Mu is triple; magnitudes, fourth, seventh, and 
 eighth; distances, 108" and i". Iota is double; 
 magnitudes, fourth and seventh; distance, 38". 
 
 Corona. Borealis 
 
 (CHART VII) 
 
 When Bootes is on the meridian, the beautiful 
 Northern Crown, Corona Borealis, is seen just to the 
 east of it. It is one of the constellations which every- 
 body recognizes as bearing a resemblance to the ob- 
 ject for which it is named, for it is indeed a crown, or 
 circlet, of stars, set with a central gem, and so mani- 
 fest to the eye that nobody ever sees it for the first 
 time without an admiring exclamation. The circle 
 of stars is not complete, but the whole outline is at 
 least suggested, while what may be called the front 
 of the crown resembles a diadem in the regular ar- 
 rangement of its stars. The brightest of these, " the 
 Pearl of the Crown," is Alphacca, or Alpha (a), of be- 
 tween the second and third magnitude. It is some- 
 times called Gemma Coronae, or simply Gemma. 
 Five fourth-magnitude stars unite with Alphacca to 
 form the curve of the front, or southern half, of the 
 crown. There is one other fourth-magnitude star at 
 some distance towards the north, and scattered over 
 the constellation there are six stars of the fifth magni- 
 tude. In 1866 a new star, as bright as the Pearl 
 itself, suddenly appeared near the eastern edge of the 
 93
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 crown. It soon faded, but is still visible with tele- 
 scopes. 
 
 This constellation has been known from remote 
 antiquity. It was called by the Greeks Ariadne's 
 Crown, placed among the stars in memory of the un- 
 fortunate daughter of Minos, who, after giving Theseus 
 the clew to the Cretan labyrinth, as well as her heart, 
 was deserted by the faithless hero. Apollonius oJ 
 Rhodes, in his Tale of the Argonauts, represents the 
 heroes who sailed with Jason in search of the Gold- 
 en Fleece as watching this constellation while the} 
 crossed the Pontus Euxinus: 
 
 . . . the immortals divine 
 Loved well that maid. In the midst of the firmament i: 
 
 set her sign, 
 
 A crown of stars, which they name Ariadne's diadem, 
 All night circling amidst of the signs that the heavens begem 
 
 Way's Translation. 
 
 Plutarch has a story that, after the desertion o: 
 Theseus, Ariadne espoused Bacchus, who gave hei 
 a crown of seven stars, which, upon her death, was 
 translated to the sky. 
 
 And there that crown by sheeny Dionysus fixed, 
 Monument of dead Ariadne. 
 
 Aratus. 
 
 The star Gamma (7) is a famous binary; magni- 
 tudes, fourth and seventh; distance (1907), 0^.63 
 Zeta is double ; magnitudes, fourth and fifth ; distance 
 6". 3; colors, white and blue-green. 
 94
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN JUNE 
 Ursa, Minor 
 
 (CHART I) 
 
 Ursa Minor, the Lesser Bear, is the polar constella- 
 tion par excellence, and is seen on the meridian above 
 the pole in the evenings of June. Since its most con- 
 spicuous star marks very nearly the exact north pole 
 of the heavens, it has been an object of observation, 
 and more or less of veneration, in all the northern 
 hemisphere. As the figure of the imaginary bear is 
 always drawn, the North Star, Polaris, represents the 
 end of its long tail, by which it swings about the axis 
 of the sky. The stars in this figure form the outline 
 of a dipper with its handle bent the wrong way, and 
 this is often called the Little Dipper. Its bowl hangs 
 down towards the handle of the Great Dipper in Ursa 
 Major. The constellation contains two stars of the 
 second magnitude, one of the third, three of the 
 fourth, and four of the fifth. The pole-star is the 
 Alpha (a) of the constellation, but it is rivalled in 
 brightness by Beta (), or Kochab, in the bowl of 
 the Dipper and in the flank of the imaginary bear. 
 Alpha was called in Greece Phcenice, because the 
 Phoenicians used this star to guide them in naviga- 
 tion. Its virtually fixed position in space (it is now 
 less than one degree and a quarter from the true pole) 
 makes it a universal sign-post for wanderers both by 
 land and sea. 
 
 On thy un altering blaze 
 The half-wrecked mariner, his compass lost, 
 95
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EY] 
 
 Fixes his steady gaze, 
 
 And steers, undoubting, to the friendly coast; 
 And they who stray in perilous wastes by night 
 Are glad when thou dost shine to guide their footsteps righi 
 
 W. C. Bryant. 
 
 In the days of American slavery Polaris was th 
 star of stars for escaping slaves who sought to fm< 
 their way at night towards freedom and the Nortt 
 Although, in consequence of the Precession of the Equi 
 noxes, Polaris was more than twelve degrees from th 
 true pole in the days of Hipparchus, even then it serve 
 to indicate the north point. It is still approachin 
 the pole, and will be within half a degree of it les 
 than two centuries hence. After that it will recede 
 and in the course of some eleven thousand years wi' 
 be fifty degrees distant from the pole. While th 
 Phoenicians used Polaris, or perhaps the whole cor 
 stellation, for their guide at sea, the Greek sailor 
 seem to have employed Ursa Major for a similar pui 
 pose. Thus Aratus says : 
 
 The name of one is Cynosura, 
 Of the other Helice. By Helice Greek 
 Seafarers learn what way to steer their ships, 
 The other guides Phoenicians o'er the main. 
 
 Helice, it will be remembered, was the Create 
 Bear; Cynosura was the Lesser Bear. 
 
 The star Kochab, or Beta, in the bowl of the Littl 
 Dipper, is the rival of Polaris in brilliancy, but it di; 
 fers strikingly in color. Polaris is white, or yellowis 
 white, and Kochab is reddish. The nearest neighbc 
 to Kochab, Gamma, is of the third magnitude. Th 
 96
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN JUNE 
 
 stars forming the back part of the bowl and the handle 
 are of the fourth magnitude. 
 
 In Greek mythology Ursa Major and Ursa Minor 
 were sometimes regarded as the two bears fabled to 
 have nursed Zeus on Mount Ida. Zeus changed his 
 nurses into nymphs, and then, instead of marrying 
 them, translated them to the stars. 
 
 ... If tales are true, 
 
 Crete was their home ere, by great Zeus's will 
 They climbed the sky, because the baby Zeus 
 On Ida's mount, by aromatic Dictus, 
 In secret cavern they nurtured for a year. 
 
 Aratus. 
 
 In Babylonia it was called the Leopard, and in 
 Egypt the Jackal of Set, or Sati. In Scandinavian 
 mythology it was the Throne of Thor! The Finns 
 alone among Northern nations, Mr. Allen remarks, 
 called it the Little Bear. In China Polaris has been 
 from ancient times an object of worship. The Rev. 
 Joseph Edkins, in his Religion in China, quoted by 
 Dr. Warren in his Paradise Found (an attempt to 
 prove that the cradle of the human race was at the 
 north pole), says: 
 
 I met, on one occasion, a school-teacher from the neigh- 
 borhood of Chafoo. He asked if I had any books to give 
 away on astronomy and geography. . . . The inquiry was 
 pxit to him: "Who is the Lord of heaven and earth?" He 
 replied that he knew none but the Pole-star, called in the 
 Chinese language Teen-hwang-ta-te, the Great Imperial Ruler 
 of Heaven. 
 
 The North American Indians are said to have fig- 
 97
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 ured this constellation as a bear, but Dr. Seiss will 
 have no bear there. For him Ursa Minor is, and al- 
 ways has been, a sheepfold, and he tries to show that 
 such was the meaning of the ancient names given 
 to it. 
 
 Among the telescopic objects of Ursa Minor, Polaris 
 takes the first place. In the days of small telescopes 
 it was the universal test for the optical qualities of a 
 glass. One that would show the companion of the 
 pole-star could be accepted without question. The 
 component stars are of magnitudes second and ninth ; 
 distance, 18^.5; colors, yellowish white and dull blue. 
 The large star is a spectroscopic binary. 
 
 Draco 
 
 (CHART I) 
 
 Between the two Bears curls Draco, the great 
 Dragon of the North. It winds around three sides of 
 the pole, and consequently occupies several months 
 in crossing the meridian, for any fixed hour of the 
 night, but it may best be described in this chapter. 
 
 The head of the imaginary dragon is at this time 
 some 35 east of the pole, while the end of its tail is 
 about 10 southwest of it. Its leading star, Alpha (a), 
 or Thuban, is nearly on the meridian between the 
 bowl of the Little Dipper and the handle of the Great 
 Dipper. About 4650 years ago Thuban was the north 
 polar star, and much closer to the true pole than 
 Polaris is at the present time. Then the Dragon 
 whirled about the pole as if balanced at the centre 
 of its body. This star is now below the third magni- 
 98
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN JUNE 
 
 tude, but it is believed once to have been as bright 
 as Polaris. It possesses great interest because the 
 mysterious central passage in the great pyramid of 
 Cheops, which is 380 feet long and 4 feet by 3^ feet 
 in diameter, points to the place that it occupied in 
 the sky when it was the pole-star. It is thought that 
 the star could then be seen by day as well as by night 
 from the bottom of the passage, which is situated in 
 a small chamber carved out of the solid rock deep 
 beneath the foundation of the mighty pile. 
 
 The brightest star in Draco is now Gamma (7), or 
 Eltanin, in the head. Beta (#), or Rastaban, and Xi 
 (I), also in the head, are of the third magnitude, and 
 their neighbor, Nu (i/), is of the fourth. Starting with 
 the head, whose principal stars form a striking lozenge 
 or diamond shaped figure with the star Iota (i) in 
 Hercules, the eye can easily trace out the coiling 
 figure of the Dragon, running first northeastward, 
 then northward, then southward, then westward be- 
 tween the Bears, the end of the tail finally twisting 
 towards the pole from the northwest. Over this long, 
 winding course are distributed the third - magnitude 
 stars Delta (8), Zeta (f), Eta (77), Iota (*), Alpha (a), 
 Kappa (K), and Lambda (X). 
 
 There is, perhaps, no constellation to whose stars so 
 many individual names have been given. The Arabs 
 had names for all of its brighter stars, usually signi- 
 fying goats or camels. Gamma is the most interesting 
 because it was an object of temple worship in early 
 Egypt, where it was known under the name of Isis. 
 The temple of Hathor, at Denderah, and that of Mut, at 
 Thebes, were so oriented that this star shone through 
 99
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 their central passage into the "holy of holies." Long 
 afterwards it served for the orientation of the great 
 temple at Karnak. Seven other temples, according 
 to Lockyer, were oriented to it. At Karnak its slen- 
 der light-beam passed between magnificent walls and 
 columns extending over fifteen hundred feet in length 
 before it was led to the altar. When the precession 
 of the equinoxes shifted its place of rising, the posi- 
 tion of the axes of the temples was changed in order 
 still to escort its sacred ray. 
 
 In astronomical history Gamma Draconis is inter- 
 esting as having been the star which led Bradley to 
 his discovery of the aberration of light, a phenomenon 
 which first attracted his attention in 1725. As Lock- 
 yer has remarked, the Egyptian priests, in shifting 
 the axes of their massive temples to follow this star, 
 had evidence of the precession of the equinoxes, and 
 may be regarded as its discoverers long anterior to 
 Hipparchus. But, if so, they seem to have had no 
 scientific understanding of it. 
 
 Draco contains one star of near the second mag- 
 nitude ; nine of the third, or under ; six of the 
 fourth, or less ; and twenty - five of about the 
 fifth. 
 
 The religious importance of the constellation in 
 Egypt has already been indicated. In Greek my- 
 thology it was sometimes identified with the dragon 
 that guarded the golden apples of the Hesperides, 
 and sometimes as the dragon associated with the 
 Golden Fleece, which was killed by Cadmus, aided 
 by Athene, and whose teeth when sown sprang up 
 as armed men. Jason obtained some of these teeth,
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN JUNE 
 
 and, under the direction of Medea, first sowed and 
 then reaped them to win the Golden Fleece: 
 
 Then bent he his knees till supple they grew, and he filled 
 
 with might 
 His great heart, battle-aflame as a boar when he whetteth 
 
 for fight. 
 Now by this was the harvest of earth-born men over all that 
 
 field 
 Upspringing, and all round bristled with thronging shield on 
 
 shield, 
 And with battle-spears twy-pointed, and morions glorious 
 
 gleaming, 
 The garth of the death-dealing war god, the splendor thereof 
 
 upstreaming. 
 
 Apollon-ius, The Argonauts. 
 
 Yet another Greek legend averred that this was the 
 dragon that Athene whirled into the sky when the 
 Olympian gods made war on the earth-born giants, 
 and there it became entangled with the axis of the 
 heavens. Do not these antique tales take a stronger 
 hold on the imagination when the memory of them is 
 thus inscribed in the stars? As was quite to be ex- 
 pected, some have seen in Draco the Serpent that 
 tempted Eve, and Dr. Seiss avers that the constella- 
 tion was never meant to symbolize anything other 
 than the "Old Serpent" of the Scriptures, the general 
 enemy of mankind. 
 
 The star Mu (/i) is double; magnitudes, fifth and 
 fifth; distance, 2". 4 In the double Eta the com- 
 ponents are of the third and the tenth magnitudes; 
 distance, 4". 7. Epsilon (e) is double; magnitudes, 
 fifth and sixth; distance, 33".
 
 VIII 
 
 CONSTELLATIONS ON THE MERIDIAN IN JULY 
 
 Scorpio 
 
 (CHART XI) 
 
 THE ninth constellation of the zodiac, and one of 
 the most striking figures among the stars, Scorpio, 
 the Scorpion, trails alorig the southern horizon on a 
 clear summer night, stretching the stumps of its sun- 
 dered claws towards Libra, very conspicuous in the ab- 
 sence of full moonlight on account of the splendor of 
 its chief star, Antares, or Alpha (a) Scorpionis, one of 
 the reddest stars visible to the naked eye. Its color 
 is that of flame, and it differs in tint from both Betel- 
 geuse and Aldebaran. The flame-like character of 
 the light of Antares was recognized by the Chinese, 
 who called it the Great Fire. The name Antares has 
 been derived from the Greek avn-Kp^, denoting some 
 association, or contrast, with Ares, or Mars, the name 
 borne from antiquity by the ruddy planet that circles 
 between the earth and Jupiter. It is one of the four 
 "Royal Stars," which have already been mentioned. 
 It is generally represented as shining in the heart of 
 the Scorpion, or where the heart may be supposed to 
 lie, and its Arabian name was the Scorpion's Heart.
 
 = 2/5", (5 -+35". 
 
 .so .aw 
 
 OO .X0 CT.l 
 
 CT. 
 
 EC 
 
 
 20 
 
 /r 
 
 
 \\ 
 
 J . , * 
 
 I
 
 Chart VII 
 
 so xo so CT.I m oo no 2 50 a 
 
 \ .. \ .*">< \ * \ y x 
 
 
 Vv> 
 
 \ - -A X * \ 
 
 
 T ^V -\ 
 
 .TV . \x\- 
 
 M 
 
 
 
 40 
 
 1 * ? -4 r ' 
 
 v V" ^ ^ 
 
 
 ','' M ' 
 
 l/JU--~ 
 
 V> ' \ ^^P 
 
 CT. 
 
 ' * .. I -r^* 
 
 \ * \ \ *S ' V \ 
 
 'U 
 
 
 , \ \-i\- \ s^ \ 
 
 
 "I ! 
 
 ' \ ' * ^ \ ' *\>S \ 
 
 
 ^k .7. y . l 
 
 ' * \ A \ * * * ^\ \ 
 
 
 
 \ A >- l^r\ \ 
 
 
 Y ! \---\'-\^"'.\ .: -^ 
 
 ^/VJABKm^bjS /r 
 
 a 
 
 30 
 
 ? v^-& 
 
 \. \j * w \* ,v< 
 
 
 7HT> 
 
 V \ ^T4 
 
 
 r : .L 
 
 -. ; W r^V^A '*' 
 
 
 \ fr 
 
 
 
 
 * ^\^^' \ '?"*'> \ 
 
 
 r4^^ 
 
 n^ A^ \ \ 
 
 
 J 1 ^< I 
 
 *." \ 
 
 -A -V r*V 
 
 
 n '' 
 
 >J - \ ^Ma 
 
 
 m." .\ 
 
 _^V^.-v*--' \ 
 
 
 *L; L - H 
 
 * \ \ w% . \ 
 
 
 
 
 
 ^j|/ ^~ 
 
 . i/i ' \. \ . i- . 
 
 r* 
 
 ~^~4^' x 1 
 1 * * 
 
 r \ A / A ?V 
 
 10 
 
 
 \IA%V (// \ \ .^-Y~" 
 
 
 T-^ '^ 
 
 t" 
 
 
 
 
 i f ^^ y> \ 
 
 2T. 
 
 1~~ r 
 
 
 H 
 
 r ^ i " \ * ^ 
 
 
 -. ,- 
 
 i \ \ 
 
 
 m era 
 
 xo y/ m CT.JI 
 
 O 
 
 Varia,lilts. 
 
 *
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN JULY 
 
 Antares is rendered, if possible, more conspicuous 
 by two small stars standing like guardians, one on 
 either side of it. These stars, Sigma (<r) and Tau (T), 
 are of about the third magnitude. Two second-mag- 
 nitude stars northwest of Antares, Beta (yS), or Graf- 
 fias, and Delta (8), or Al Jabhab, with a third-magni- 
 tude one, Pi (TT), below them, mark the front of the 
 Scorpion's head. The tail, beginning with Epsilon 
 (e), drops down to the horizon, then turns eastward, 
 and finally curves upward again, terminating in a con- 
 spicuous pair of stars, Lambda (\) and Upsilon (u), 
 the first of the third and the other of the fourth mag- 
 nitude. All told, Scorpio has one star of the first 
 magnitude, two of the second, seven of the third, 
 eight of the fourth, and ten of the fifth. The eastern 
 part of the constellation is immersed in the Milky Way, 
 near its brightest portion, where it falls behind the 
 southern horizon in vast flaky clouds of pale luminosity. 
 
 Scorpio, in Greek fable, was the scorpion that stung 
 Orion's heel when he was battling with the Lernaean 
 monster. Aratus speaks of "the fiery sting of the 
 huge portent, Scorpio, in the south wind's bosom." 
 It may have been the color of Antares which led the 
 old alchemists to believe that iron could be trans- 
 muted into gold only when the sun shone in the sign 
 of Scorpio. But the astrologers did not regard it as a 
 fortunate sign; quite the contrary, indeed, for it was 
 said to have been the birthplace of the baleful planet 
 Mars, and his "house" 
 
 Bright Scorpio, armed with poisonous tail, prepares 
 Men's martial minds for violence and wars. 
 103
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 His venom heats and boils their blood to rage 
 And rapine spreads o'er the unlucky age. 
 
 Manilius. 
 
 From the "ancient mysteries" Dr. Seiss demon- 
 strates, to his satisfaction, that Scorpio was intended 
 to prefigure the great conflict for the salvation of man- 
 kind, and he tries to identify it with the mysterious 
 Chambers of the South of the Book of Job. 
 
 Scorpio offers a splendid object for the telescope 
 in Antares, a double star of singular beauty. The 
 magnitudes are first and seventh; distance, 3"; 
 colors, fiery red and bright emerald. I know no 
 more attractive object for a good telescope of four or 
 five inches' aperture. The astronomer O. M. Mitch- 
 ell once saw the little green star emerging from 
 behind the moon, during an occultation, ahead of its 
 great red comrade. Antares belongs to the third type 
 of stars, in which the absorbing envelopes have be- 
 come so dense that they are fast approaching ex- 
 tinction. Sigma is double; magnitudes, fourth and 
 ninth; distance, 22"; colors, white and plum-blue. 
 Beta is a very beautiful double; magnitudes, second 
 and sixth; distance, 13"; colors, white and pale blue. 
 The larger star is again double; distance, i" '. Xi () 
 is triple; magnitudes, fifth, fifth, and seventh; dis- 
 tances (1906), o".28 and 7". Nu (i>) is also triple; 
 magnitudes, fourth, seventh, and seventh; distances, 
 40" and i ".8. Rather less than half-way on a line 
 from Antares to Beta is a celebrated star cluster, 
 No. 4173 (80 M.). Herschel thought it the richest 
 mass of stars in the heavens. In 1860 a new star 
 appeared in this cluster, but lasted for only about a 
 month. It was bright enough nearly to extinguish 
 the cluster by its overpowering brilliancy, although it 
 104
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN JULY 
 
 never became brighter than the sixth magnitude. It 
 is a comparatively recent discovery that new and 
 variable stars are especially abundant in dense 
 clusters, suggesting the idea of collisions. On the 
 eastern side of this cluster is a starless spot in the 
 sky, which was the first "black hole" in the heavens 
 discovered by Sir William Herschel. Such openings 
 abound in the neighboring constellation of Sagit- 
 tarius, in the richest part of the Milky Way, and 
 have given rise to interesting speculations concerning 
 the "outer universe," where the blackest night seems 
 to reign. 
 
 Ophiuchus and Serpens 
 
 (CHART XI) 
 
 These two involved constellations, which are more 
 conveniently treated as one, cover a vast space in 
 the sky, north of Scorpio, the extreme length and 
 breadth being each about fifty degrees. They repre- 
 sent a giant grasping in .both hands the coils of an 
 enormous serpent, whose upraised head is seen just 
 under the Northern Crown. The right leg of Ophiu- 
 chus is immersed to the knee in a branch of the Milky 
 Way, above the tail of the Scorpio, while his left foot 
 is planted over Antares. The head of the giant is 
 marked by a lone star of the second magnitude, Al- 
 pha (a), or Ras Alhague. The third-magnitude stars 
 Beta () and Pi (?r) indicate the shoulders. Eta (?;), 
 in the right knee, is of near the second magnitude, 
 and Zeta () , in the left knee, of the third. Two third- 
 magnitude stars forming a conspicuous pair, Epsilon 
 (e) and Delta (8) , mark the left hand where it grasps 
 
 8 IO5
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 the serpent. Although Ophiuchus is not a zodiacal 
 constellation, a part of it lies across the ecliptic be- 
 tween the depressed tail of Scorpio and Sagittarius, 
 so that the sun is in this constellation in the latter 
 part of November and the beginning of December. 
 
 The head of Serpens is well marked by a group of 
 of five stars, one of the third, two of the fourth, and 
 two of the fifth magnitude, which form an irregular 
 quincunx. Below these are Delta (8), of the third 
 magnitude; Alpha (a), or Unukalhai, of rather less 
 than the second magnitude ; Epsilon (e) , of the third ; 
 and Mu (/*), of the third. The figure of the Serpent 
 then blends with that of Ophiuchus, reappearing east- 
 ward of the giant, where it has one star of the third 
 magnitude, Eta (77), and one of the fourth, Theta (0), 
 which indicates the end of the tail. Alpha is in the 
 Serpent's neck, and is sometimes called Cor Serpentis. 
 All told, Ophiuchus and Serpens contain three stars 
 generally ranked as of the second magnitude, twelve 
 of the third, twelve of the fourth, and thirty-four of 
 the fifth. Lying in a rich region of the heavens, they 
 possess numerous stars of the sixth magnitude. 
 
 In Greek mythology Ophiuchus was the great phy- 
 sician ^Ssculapius, to whom Socrates, about to die, 
 requested his friends to offer a cock. The legend 
 relates that Pluto, the god of the nether regions, be- 
 came alarmed at the cures of yEsculapius, who even 
 brought the dead to life, and persuaded Zeus to re- 
 move him from the earth to the sky, where he could 
 do no more harm. Not only the cock but the serpent 
 was sacred to ^sculapius in fact, the serpent was his 
 favorite ; hence the presence of Serpens with him in the 
 106
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN JULY 
 
 sky. In the Middle Ages, Ophiuchus was sometimes 
 regarded as symbolizing Moses with the Brazen Ser- 
 pent. Serpens was also identified with Eve's tempter 
 in the Garden of Eden. For Dr. Seiss, Ophiuchus 
 represents the Great Physician who was to heal the 
 woes of mankind. 
 
 Ophiuchus and Serpens contain many interesting 
 telescopic objects. The star 36 Ophiuchi is double; 
 magnitudes, fifth and eighth; distance, 4". 3; colors, 
 yellow and red. Lambda (\) Ophiuchi is a close doub- 
 le; magnitudes, fourth and sixth; distance, i". Tau 
 (r) Ophiuchi is double; magnitudes, fifth and sixth; 
 distance, i".8. The star 70 Ophiuchi is a binary, with 
 a period of 95 years. The magnitudes are fourth and 
 sixth ; distance (1907), 2" '.75. This star is one of those 
 whose parallaxes have been calculated with some de- 
 gree of accuracy. Its distance appears to be about 
 one and a quarter million times the distance of the 
 sun. Ophiuchus contains many small globular star- 
 clusters. The great new star of 1604 appeared in 
 this constellation. Beta Serpentis, of the third magni- 
 tude, has a ninth-magnitude companion, distant 30". 
 Reversing the usual order, the colors in this case are 
 bluish for the large star and yellowish for the small 
 one. Theta Serpentis is double; magnitudes, fourth 
 and four and a half; distance, 21". 
 
 Hercules 
 
 (CHART VII) 
 
 North of Ophiuchus, with his feet towards the pole 
 
 and his head towards the south, kneels Hercules, " one 
 
 of the oldest sky figures," says Mr. Allen, "although 
 
 not known to the first Greek astronomers under that 
 
 107
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 name." The ancients seem, indeed, to have felt that 
 there was an unexplained mystery connected with 
 this constellation : 
 
 Near to the Dragon's head, in toil-spent posture, 
 Revolves a phantom, whose name none can tell, 
 Nor what he labors at. They call him simply 
 The Man upon his Knees. His knees seem bent 
 In desperate struggle, while from both his shoulders 
 His hands are high uplifted and outspread 
 As far as he can stretch. His right foot's sole 
 Is planted on the crest of the coiled Dragon. 
 
 Aratus. 
 
 The constellation is not conspicuous by any es- 
 pecial brilliancy or striking arrangement of its stars, 
 yet it has borne many names among many nations 
 from the remotest antiquity. One is tempted to 
 think that some primeval legend was attached to it, 
 only indistinct memories of which have come down 
 into historic time and been preserved. Some have 
 thought that it represented the Chaldean Ishdubar, or 
 Nimroud, who slew the dragon Tiamat. In Phoenicia 
 it is said to have represented the god Melkarth. It 
 was also, at different times, identified with Ixion, 
 with Prometheus bound, and with Theseus. Finally 
 all the world settled down to the belief that it was 
 Hercules, or Herakles, translated to the stars. Era- 
 tosthenes seems to have been the first to fix this 
 name upon it. Some of the inventors of Bible star 
 myths supposed that it represented Adam. But 
 others made the twins in Gemini Adam and Eve. Dr. 
 Seiss says: 
 
 108
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN JULY 
 
 Here is the figure of a mighty man, down on one knee, 
 with his heel uplifted as if wounded, having a great club in 
 one hand and a fierce three-headed monster held fast in the 
 other, whilst his left foot is set on the head of the great 
 Dragon. Take this figure according to the name given it 
 in the Egyptian hieroglyphics, and you have a picture of Him 
 who cometh to bruise the Serpent and destroy the works 
 of the devil. In the head of this figure is a bright star, 
 the brightest in this constellation, which bears the name of 
 Ras-al-gethi, which means the Head of Him which Bruises, 
 whilst the name of the second star means The Branch Kneel- 
 ing. The Phoenicians worshipped this man five generations 
 before the time of the Greeks, and honored him as repre- 
 senting a Saviour. 
 
 The star Alpha (a) is, as Dr. Seiss says, named Ras- 
 al-gethi. It is of the third magnitude, and makes a 
 wide pair with Alpha Ophiuchi. Beta (ft), of rather 
 above the third magnitude, bears the name Korne- 
 phoros. The most striking figure in the constellation 
 is a large trapezium marked out by the stars Eta (77) , 
 Zeta (), Epsilon (e), and Pi (TT). 
 
 The constellation Hercules indicates the general 
 direction towards which the solar system is flying 
 through space at a speed of about twelve miles per 
 second. This motion, as far as has been ascertained, 
 is in a straight line, no proof of curvature having 
 been discovered. But Hercules is so distant that the 
 solar system, if its great journey should be unswerv- 
 ingly pursued, would require more than 125,000 years 
 to arrive in the neighborhood of the nearest star of 
 the constellation. 
 
 Nearly on a line between Eta and Zeta Hercules, 
 and about one-third of the distance from the former 
 109
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 to the latter, a faint speck, barely visible to a good 
 eye, but easily noticeable with a strong opera-glass 
 or field-glass, indicates the location of one of the 
 supreme wonders of the universe the Great Star 
 Cluster in Hercules (No. 4230, or M 13). Its glory, of 
 course, is only to be seen and appreciated with the 
 aid of a powerful telescope, but a knowledge of its 
 situation in space cannot but interest everybody. I 
 recall a night spent with Prof. E. E. Barnard under 
 the dome of the great Lick telescope, when we looked 
 into the heart of this amazing telescopic globule of 
 stellar atoms, and seemed to see it resolved into 
 separate but innumerable stars to its very centre. 
 
 There is no way to describe such a spectacle! It 
 arouses and at the same time daunts the imagination. 
 One can find no words for it. More than twice as 
 many stars as the sharpest eye can see in the whole 
 heavens northern and southern hemispheres both 
 included are there packed into a space so small to 
 our eyes that it would not make a visible speck on 
 the face of the moon. It is, perhaps, idle to speculate 
 on the way in which those thronging suns came to be 
 associated in that manner. There they are a per- 
 petual challenge to man to declare, if he knoweth, 
 "the ordinances of Heaven !" 
 
 Hercules is full of beautiful double stars. Kappa, 
 of the fifth magnitude, has a seventh - magnitude 
 companion at a distance of 31". The colors are light 
 yellow and pale red. In Gamma, another double, 
 the magnitudes are third and ninth; distance, 38''. 
 Alpha is a charming telescopic object; magnitudes, 
 third and sixth; distance, 4". 7; colors, orange and
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN JULY 
 
 green. Delta combines a pale green with a purple 
 star; magnitudes, third and eighth; distance, 19". 
 Zeta is a close binary; magnitudes, third and sixth 
 or seventh; distance (1907), i".2$. The period of 
 revolution of these stars is 35 years. Rho (p) is a 
 beautiful double; magnitudes, fourth and sixth; dis- 
 tance, 3^.7 ; colors, both green or blue, but differing 
 in tone. The double 95 is perhaps the most remark- 
 able of all in its colors. The magnitudes are fifth 
 and five and a half ; distance, 6" ; colors, according to 
 the Rev. T. W. Webb, light apple-green and cherry- 
 red.
 
 IX 
 
 CONSTELLATIONS ON THE MERIDIAN IN AUGUST 
 
 Sagittarius 
 
 (CHART XI) 
 
 T^O lie on the warm sands of a south-fronting sea- 
 1 coast, or on the deck of a transatlantic liner, 
 on an August evening, and watch the Milk Dipper 
 in Sagittarius ladling the golden flood of the Milky 
 Way, is a summer-night's pleasure which reserves its 
 full enjoyment for those who know the constellations. 
 Sagittarius, the Archer, is the tenth constellation of 
 the zodiac, and, like Scorpio, lies low on the southern 
 horizon when seen from median northern latitudes. 
 It has no star of the first magnitude, and only one 
 approaching the second, but the presence of the 
 Milky Way, branching on all sides in luminous deeps 
 and shallows, lends a certain splendor to the con- 
 stellation through which it flows. Sagittarius is full 
 of star-clusters, two of which are visible to the naked 
 eye M 24 and M 25. The former, which is two or 
 three times as broad as the full moon, resembles a 
 projection at the edge of the Milky Way. The Milk 
 Dipper, with its short handle, is outlined by the stars 
 Zeta (), Tau (T), Sigma (o-), Phi (</>), Lambda (X), 
 
 112
 
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 CONSTELLATIONS IN AUGUST 
 
 and Mu (^} . Zeta, Sigma, Lambda, and Delta (B) in- 
 dicate the upturned bowl of a larger dipper, of which 
 Gamma (7) may be taken for the stump of a handle 
 on the west. The figure of the Archer is not so evi- 
 dent. Sigma, the brightest star in the constellation, 
 shines in the shoulder, Zeta in the upper part of the 
 arm, while Delta and Gamma indicate an arrow about 
 to be shot westward from a bow, the outline of which 
 is traced by Lambda, Delta, and Epsilon (e). Eta 
 (77), below Epsilon, is in the lower half of the bow, 
 and Mu in its upper tip. Just above this tip glows 
 the splendid cluster M 24. The head of the Archer is 
 marked by a group of five stars ten degrees east of M 24, 
 of which the brightest, Pi (TT) , is of the third magnitude. 
 
 The Alpha (a) and Beta (/3) of the constellation, not 
 as bright as some of the stars in the Milk Dipper and 
 Bow, lie too far south to be seen from the United States. 
 For this reason a part of the hind-quarters and the 
 legs of the Centaur appear to be cut off in our figure. 
 
 This Archer is fabled to have been one of the Cen- 
 taurs who was killed by Herakles for attacking his 
 bride. Herakles had poisoned his arrow with the 
 blood of the Lernaean monster, so that the Centaur 
 could not recover from the wound, although Zeus was 
 his friend and ^Esculapius his physician. But Zeus 
 did not forget to translate him to the sky: 
 
 Midst golden stars he stands resplendent now, 
 And thrusts the Scorpion with his bended bow. 
 
 Ovid. 
 
 In China this constellation was figured as a tiger, 
 but the ancients in general regarded it as representing
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 a bowman. With the Jews it was the bow of Ephraim 
 and Manasseh. Dr. Seiss calls it " a pictorial prophecy 
 of our blessed Lord." There is another Centaur in the 
 southern hemisphere of the sky, the mythology of which 
 has sometimes been confused with that of Sagittarius. 
 The telescopic riches of Sagittarius are especially 
 remarkable, as already indicated, for the beautiful 
 star-clusters that they include. Some of these clus- 
 ters are more wonderful in photographs than they ap- 
 pear in the best telescopes. One of Barnard's photo- 
 graphs shows, in the cluster M 8 (also visible to the 
 naked eye as a glimmering speck), a strange black 
 hole opening out like a window into starless space 
 beyond. The cluster appears to be made up of a 
 curious assemblage of star-clouds and nebulae. 
 
 Scutum Sobieskii 
 
 (CHART XI) 
 
 The little constellation called Sobieski's Shield was 
 formed by Hevelius in honor of John Sobieski III., 
 King of Poland. It contains one fourth and five fifth 
 magnitude stars, which Hevelius regarded as "un- 
 claimed" by the ancient constellation - makers. It 
 lies between the head of Sagittarius and the tail of 
 Serpens, and is interesting only for its star - clusters 
 and for the brilliancy of the Milky Way within its 
 boundaries. Sir William Herschel estimated that it 
 contained more than 300,000 stars. 
 
 One of its star-clouds, visible to the naked eye, has 
 
 been photographed by Barnard, and its richness is 
 
 beyond all belief. It looks like a gathering of fiery 
 
 cirrocumuli, and yet it consists of nothing but stars. 
 
 114
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN AUGUST 
 Aquila 
 
 (CHARTS XI AND XII) 
 
 Northeast of Scutum Sobieskii flies Aquila the 
 Eagle. The lower part of this constellation is some- 
 times called Antinoiis, a name said to have been 
 given to it by the Emperor Hadrian in honor of his 
 favorite attendant, who was drowned in the Nile, 
 and in the representation of whose youthful beauty 
 sculptors afterwards contended so industriously that 
 they filled the Roman world with his statues, vying 
 in grace with some of the work of their masters, the 
 Greeks. Aquila is plainly marked for the naked eye 
 by its chief star, Altair, Alpha (a), and its two 
 attendants placed one on either side like those of 
 Antares. Altair is of near the first magnitude; one 
 of its attendants, Gamma (7), is of the third magni- 
 tude, and the other, Beta (/3), of the fourth. Two 
 other third-magnitude stars, Delta (8) and Lambda 
 (X), lie in a line extending towards Scutum Sobieskii. 
 Altair is in the neck of the eagle, and Zeta (), of the 
 third magnitude, in its tail. The star Theta (0), of 
 the third magnitude, is in one of the hands of An- 
 tinous. A more evident representation of a spread 
 eagle would be made by taking Altair for the head, 
 Zeta and Theta for the tips of the wings, and Delta 
 for the tail. The Milky Way is brilliant in Aquila. 
 
 Aquila appearing before the sun late in the year was 
 regarded by the ancients as a harbinger of tempests 
 
 . . . dangerous when he rises 
 
 Before the dawn, the eagle of the winds men call him. 
 
 Aratus.
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 This constellation and Lyra, on the other side of 
 the Milky Way, are associated with the curious Chi- 
 nese legend of the Spinning Damsel and the Magpie 
 Bridge, which is also found in Korea. The story 
 varies, but in substance runs as follows: A cowherd 
 fell in love with the Spinning Damsel. Her father, 
 in anger, banished them both to the sky, where the 
 cowherd became Aquila and the Spinning Damsel 
 Lyra. But with that tender regard for romance which 
 characterized the ancient powers that translated peo- 
 ple to the stars, the angry father decreed that the 
 lovers should meet once a year if they could con- 
 trive to cross the river the Milky Way. This they 
 were enabled to do with the aid of their friends, the 
 magpies, who still once a year, on the seventh night 
 of the seventh moon, congregate at the crossing-point 
 and form a bridge over which the lovers pass. At the 
 end of twenty-four hours the bridge breaks up, the 
 magpies return to earth, and the lovers must wait an- 
 other year before meeting again. In Korea, if a mag- 
 pie is seen about its usual haunts at this time, the 
 children stone it for shirking its duty when it ought 
 to be helping to form the bridge for the lovers in the 
 sky. 
 
 As Lafcadio Hearn found this story during his resi- 
 dence in Japan, it seemed to him to be the origin oi 
 the festival called Tanabata, always distinctively a 
 woman's holiday from the earliest times. The name 
 of the Spinning Damsel was Orihim6, another form oi 
 Tanabata, and her lover was a peasant lad who, driv- 
 ing an ox, one day passed her loom and instantly wor 
 her heart. In the sky the lovers are known as the 
 116
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN AUGUST 
 
 Herdsman and the Weaver, and the popular legend 
 associated with the Tanabata festival avers that their 
 meeting can be observed by anybody with good eyes, 
 for whenever it occurs the lovers' stars burn with five 
 different colors. That is why offerings of five colors 
 are made by the celebrants, and why the poems which 
 are composed for the occasion are written on paper 
 of five different tints. The legend goes on to say that 
 if rain falls on the seventh night of the seventh moon, 
 the meeting cannot occur, because the heavenly river 
 rises and becomes too broad to be spanned by the 
 Magpie Bridge. For this reason rain on the Tanabata 
 night is called the Rain of Tears. 
 
 In Greece and Rome, Aquila was the sacred bird of 
 Jove. Dr. Seiss, connecting it with the little constella- 
 tion of Sagitta the Arrow, close at hand, regards it as 
 symbolical of the Wounded Prince, or Christ suffer- 
 ing for mankind. 
 
 Pi (TT) Aquilas is double; magnitudes, sixth and 
 seventh; distance, i".6. Eta (77) is a remarkable 
 variable, changing from magnitude three and a half 
 to magnitude four and a half, and back again, every 
 seven days, four hours, and fourteen minutes. 
 
 Sagitta 
 
 (CHART VII) 
 
 The little constellation of the Arrow lies north of 
 Aquila, and consists of a striking row of fourth and 
 fifth magnitude stars running east and west about 
 ten degrees. Small as it is, Sagitta is an ancient 
 asterism known to the Greeks. Aratus, referring to 
 the arrow of the Archer, says: 
 117
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 Another arrow flies on high 
 
 Launched by no bow. Near it to the north 
 
 Flies the Bird. 
 
 This bird is not Aquila, but Cygnus, to be describee 
 later. Eratosthenes made Sagitta the arrow of Apol- 
 lo, but others before him had identified it with one 
 of the arrows of Herakles shot against the Stym- 
 phalian birds. Julius Schillerius, in the seventeenth 
 century, in his Cesium Stellatum Ckristianum, repre- 
 sented Sagitta as the Spear of the Crucifixion, which 
 recalls Dr. Seiss's idea about Aquila mentioned above 
 
 The star Delta (8) is double ; magnitudes, fifth and 
 ninth; distance, 8". 6. 
 
 Lyra 
 
 (CHART VII) 
 
 Just on the meridian northwest of Aquila shines one 
 of the most superb of all the first-magnitude stars, 
 Vega, or Alpha of the Lyre (Alpha Lyrae), of which 
 Burritt justly says: "The remarkable brightness oi 
 a Lyrae has attracted the admiration of astronomers 
 in all ages." 
 
 The constellation Lyra is not large, but there are 
 few which more quickly arrest the attention. 
 
 I saw, with its celestial keys, 
 Its chords of air, its frets of fire, 
 The Samian's great ^olian lyre, 
 Rising thro' all its sevenfold bars 
 From earth unto the fixed stars. 
 
 Longfellaiv, Occupation of Orion. 
 118
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN AUGUST 
 
 This refers to the old Greek legend associating the 
 harp in the stars with the magic instrument with 
 which Orpheus charmed stones and trees, and in- 
 vaded the infernal regions in search of his lost Euryd- 
 ice. With the Persians it was also a lyre. The an- 
 cient Britons called it King Arthur's Harp. 
 
 The principal star, Alpha (a), or Vega, derived 
 from Wega, a malformed Arabic word, first received 
 the name it now bears in King Alfonso's stellar tables. 
 In magnitude it equals Arcturus and Capella, being 
 only three -tenths of a magnitude below the zero 
 rank. The brilliancy of its blue-white rays is aston- 
 ishing, and their color is beautifully revealed in a 
 telescope. Perhaps it approaches nearer to the idea 
 of "a diamond in the sky" than any other star. Its 
 actual magnitude is very great, probably a hundred 
 times that of the sun. It belongs to the Sirian type, 
 being young in the order of evolution. Two little 
 stars of between the fourth and fifth magnitudes, 
 Epsilon (e) and Zeta (), form a beautiful little tri- 
 angle with Vega, by means of which the beginner 
 may always recognize the latter. Beta (yS) and Gam- 
 ma (7), about eight degrees below Vega, are of the 
 third magnitude, and mark the top of the strings of 
 the imaginary harp, whose base is towards the north. 
 
 About fourteen thousand years ago Vega was the 
 north polar-star, and, in consequence of the precession 
 of the equinoxes, it will occupy the same position 
 about eleven thousand years hence. It is now more 
 than fifty degrees from the pole. According to some 
 recent estimates, the apex of the Solar Way that is, 
 the direction of the motion of the solar system is 
 119
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 towards Lyra. In that case, half a million years from 
 now the earth may find itself in the presence of a 
 mighty blue- white sun, a hundredfold more brilliant 
 than its present orb of day. The parallax of Vega is 
 about o'.i, and the amount of light that it sends us 
 from its present distance is about one forty-thousand- 
 millionth of that received from the sun. 
 
 Lyra contains one star of the first magnitude, one 
 of the third, five of the fourth, and eight of the fifth. 
 
 The ancient mythology of Lyra has already been 
 indicated. In Dr. Seiss's system it symbolized the 
 rejoicing in heaven at the final victory over the 
 powers of evil, and, after his way, he traces this 
 meaning through all the antique legends concerning 
 the Harp. 
 
 Vega has a tenth-magnitude companion, distance, 
 48", which is a well-known test for telescopes of 
 moderate power. Epsilon is a celebrated quadruple 
 star. An opera -glass, and some eyes without op- 
 tical aid, separate it into two nearly equal stars al- 
 most touching each other. A small telescope divides 
 each of these into two, between 2" and 3" apart. A 
 more powerful glass shows two faint stars between 
 the pairs. These faint stars were called by Sir John 
 Herschel the debillissima. Zeta is also double ; mag- 
 nitudes, fourth and sixth; distance, 44". Beta is 
 variable, losing and regaining one entire magnitude 
 in a period of twelve days, twenty-one hours, and 
 forty-seven minutes. On a line between Beta and 
 Gamma, and about one-third of the distance from the 
 first to the second, is found the celebrated Ring 
 Nebula, which a three-inch telescope will show as a 
 faint, minute circle, like a little smoke ring. This ring 
 has about one-thirtieth the apparent diameter of the 
 
 120
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN AUGUST 
 
 full moon to the naked eye. Recent photographs of 
 this object reveal it as a most wonderful ring of in- 
 ter-twisted spirals. In the centre is a small star of 
 surprising actinic power, since it appears a hundred 
 times more conspicuous in a photograph than in a 
 telescope.
 
 CONSTELLATIONS ON THE MERIDIAN IN SEPTEMBER 
 
 Cap*icornus 
 
 (CHVRT XII) 
 
 CAPRICORN, the Goat, is the eleventh constella- 
 \^4 tion of the zodiac. Its two leading stars, Alpha 
 (a) , or Algiedi, and Beta (/3) , or Dabih, are seen just west 
 of the meridian at nine o'clock on the isth of Septem- 
 ber. Before the precession of the equinoxes had car- 
 ried the signs of the zodiac westward out of the con- 
 stellations with which they were formerly identified 
 (the motion amounts to a little more than 50" per 
 year), the sun was in Capricornus at the time of the 
 winter solstice. This is the origin of Aratus's lines 
 in the Phainomena : 
 
 . . . Capricorn, the goal that turns the sun. 
 Be it ne'er thy lot in that month to be tossed 
 On the mid-ocean ; neither by day 
 Far sailest thou, for few the hours of light, 
 Nor early on thy peril breaks the dawn, 
 For all thy invocations. Pitiless 
 Siroccos lash the main when Capricorn 
 Lodges the sun, and Zeus sends bitter cold 
 To numb the frozen sailors. 
 
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 CONSTELLATIONS IN SEPTEMBER 
 
 At present the sun does not touch the constellation 
 Capricornus until the middle of January, but the de- 
 scription of the kind of weather prevailing at sea 
 when the sun is in Capricornus will still hold good, 
 as transatlantic travellers know to their cost. Zeus 
 has not forgotten how to plague the sailors, and Nep- 
 tune is unabashed by turbines. 
 
 Capricornus is not very well marked out as a figure 
 among the stars. Alpha and Beta, of the third mag- 
 nitude, are in the head of the goat, and Delta (8), of 
 the same magnitude, is in the hind-quarters. There 
 are, besides, seven fourth and ten fifth magnitude 
 stars scattered over the constellation. 
 
 In Grecian "mythology Capricornus occupied a con- 
 spicuous place as the Gate of the Gods, it being fabled 
 that the souls of men passed through its stars on their 
 way to a better scene. Berosus, who, it will be re- 
 membered, predicted the destruction of the earth by 
 water, when all the planets should assemble in Cancer, 
 declared that the globe would be burned with fire 
 when a similar conjunction should take place in Capri- 
 corn. So Berosus, after the manner of his astrological 
 brethren, even to the present day, took good pains to 
 provide for contrary events in his prognostications. 
 He would not let mankind escape either way. 
 
 According to another legend, Capricornus represents 
 Pan, who one day, in a frolicsome mood, and he was 
 seldom long in any other, jumped into the Nile and 
 transformed himself, for the amusement of the on- 
 looking gods, into a kind of amphibious monster, the 
 part of his body under the water assuming a fish- 
 shape, while that above water looked like a goat. 
 123
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 Zeus was so delighted that he decreed that this form 
 should be translated to the stars, whence the ancient 
 representation of Capricornus as a cross between a 
 goat and a fish. But Dr. Seiss brings us back to a 
 serious view by averring that the Goat-Fish shines 
 among the stars as a symbol of sacrifice and atonement. 
 Both Alpha and Beta are naked -eye doubles at 
 least, Alpha is easily seen double, its two stars being 
 6' apart, while an exceptional eye may catch a glimpse 
 of the sixth-magnitude star within 3^' of Beta. Each 
 of the stars in Alpha is telescopically double. In a 1 
 the magnitudes are fourth and eighth (distance 44"), 
 and in a* third and tenth or eleventh (distance, 7". 4). 
 A little group of fifth and sixth magnitude stars be- 
 low Beta, in the mouth of the Goat, forms a pretty 
 sight. One of these, Rho (p), is an attractive double; 
 magnitudes, fifth and eighth; distance, 3". 8. Three 
 of the other stars in this group are also doubles. 
 
 Delphinus 
 
 (CHART XII) 
 
 A part of the next zodiacal constellation, Aquarius, 
 lies north of the eastern half of Capricornus, but we 
 shall come to this later. At present we lift our eyes 
 higher towards the north, where, just east of Sagitta, 
 we see the remarkable little constellation Delphinus 
 (the Dolphin), popularly known as Job's Coffin. Two 
 stars of the third, two of the fourth, and one of the 
 fifth magnitude crowded closely together mark out 
 an irregular oblong figure, which is prolonged towards 
 the south by another star of the fourth, one of the 
 fifth, and three of the sixth magnitude. The curved 
 124
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN SEPTEMBER 
 
 outline of a dolphin, with its head uppermost, is not 
 difficult to trace. 
 
 The tiny Dolphin floats o'er Capricorn, 
 His middle dusky, but he has four eyes, 
 Two parallel to two. 
 
 Aratus. 
 
 Greek fable asserted that this constellation repre- 
 sented the dolphin that bore Arion safe to land after 
 the sailors had thrown him overboard in the Gulf of 
 Corinth. The scene of this adventure was certainly 
 well chosen, for the Gulf of Corinth seems to swarm 
 with dolphins. I remember one sunshiny morning 
 entering the port of Itea on the way to Delphi, when 
 our litt!e steamer seemed to be escorted by dolphins, 
 whose graceful bodies, visible in the translucent sea 
 at a great depth, rose in an endless procession to 
 throw glittering curves on the surface of the water 
 at either side of the ship. 
 
 Another ancient myth associates Delphinus with 
 Amphitrite, the nereid whom a dolphin carried to 
 Neptune to become his bride. 
 
 The star Gamma (7) is a very charming double; 
 magnitudes, fourth and fifth; distance, n"; colors, 
 gold and emerald. Both Alpha and Beta have faint 
 companions, and the larger star in Beta is a binary 
 whose components are only separable with very pow- 
 erful telescopes. 
 
 Equuleus 
 
 (CHART XII) 
 
 The little constellation of Equuleus, the Foal, south- 
 east of Delphinus, is interesting to possessors of good 
 125
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 telescopes on account of its many close double and 
 triple stars; but to the naked eye it offers no attrac- 
 tion, having but one star as bright as the fourth mag- 
 nitude. It is, however, an ancient constellation, and, 
 lying close by the head of Pegasus, was mythological- 
 ly associated with the winged horse, some asserting 
 that it represented the brother of Pegasus, ridden by 
 Castor, and others that it was the horse that sprang 
 forth from the rock which Neptune struck with his 
 trident when he and Athene were trying to outdo 
 each other in Olympian magic. 
 
 Vulpecula. 
 
 (CHART VII) 
 
 North of Delphinus and Sagitta lies another small 
 constellation, Vulpecula, the Little Fox. It is one 
 of Hevelius's constellations, and is too inconspicuous 
 to deserve notice if it were not included in all celes- 
 tial charts and star catalogues. Although it is 35 
 long from east to west, and about 10 broad, it has 
 only one star approaching the fourth magnitude in 
 brightness. Telescopically it is interesting for con- 
 taining the celebrated Dumb-bell nebula first seen by 
 Lord Rosse with his gigantic six-foot reflector, but 
 much more fully revealed in modern photographs. Its 
 photographic appearance is rather that of an hour- 
 glass, and it looks as though two enormous masses 
 were gradually separating, very much as the moon 
 and the earth are supposed to have separated when 
 their originally combined mass was in a plastic state. 
 126
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN SEPTEMBER 
 Cygnus 
 
 (CHART VII) 
 
 Again we come to one of the great figures in the 
 stars which everybody can recognize at a glance the 
 Northern Cross in the constellation Cygnus, the Swan. 
 The form of the cross is evident; that of the swan 
 may be recognized as soon as the fact is pointed 
 out that the long beam of the cross indicates the 
 out-stretched neck of the bird, flying south westward, 
 while the branches of the cross-arm represent the 
 out-stretched wings. 
 
 Before the time of Eratosthenes (third century B.C.) 
 the name of this constellation among the Greeks was 
 simply the Bird. Thus Aratus wrote: 
 
 For heaven's floor has a fleet-winged Bird; 
 
 Airy his body, his wings roughened 
 
 With stars, not largest sized and yet not dim, 
 
 Exulting in the blue deeps of the sky, 
 
 Down the gale westward floating, his right pennons graze 
 
 The right hand of Cepheus, 
 
 His left the feet of prancing Pegasus. 
 
 Posters translation. 
 
 It was also called the Hen, and in some old celestial 
 charts is represented by the figure of a motherly barn- 
 yard fowl. 
 
 Its leading star, Alpha (a), or Deneb, is sometimes 
 ranked of the first magnitude, although its actual 
 brightness is considerably less than the standard. It 
 is a sun of the Sirian type and of great magnitude. 
 The star Beta (/3), or Albireo, in the foot of the cross, 
 127
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 or the beak of the swan, is one of the most beautiful 
 doubles known. It is a very easy object to view, 
 even a strong binocular or field-glass serving to re- 
 veal the fact that the star is duplicate. The smallest 
 telescope at once splits it up into a third and a sev- 
 enth magnitude star, 34" apart, the former light yel- 
 low, the latter deep blue. The color of the blue star 
 is so pronounced and the contrast is so beautiful that 
 the effect produced upon the eye recalls that of a pair 
 of skilfully combined gems. Albireo is a favorite show 
 object for all possessors of small telescopes who in- 
 vite their friends to look at the beauties of the heavens. 
 It resembles "a picture with a story" in a connois- 
 seur's collection everybody can appreciate it. 
 
 Another very famous object in Cygnus is the little 
 star 61, long known as the nearest star in the northern 
 hemisphere. Its parallax is about o".4, and, unlike 
 the other stars that we have compared in actual brill- 
 iancy with the sun, it is relatively insignificant. It 
 would take ten stars like 61 Cygni to equal the sun. 
 The components are both of the sixth magnitude, and 
 their distance apart is about 20", so that the smallest 
 telescope suffices to separate them. 
 
 The Milky Way passing through Cygnus adds to 
 the beauty of the constellation, and there are many 
 splendid fields for the opera-glass. In the space be- 
 tween Alpha, Gamma, and Epsilon there is a great 
 void in the Milky Way known as the Northern Coal 
 Sack, whose darkness is all the more striking on ac- 
 count of the fact that between Alpha and Gamma lie 
 streams of minute stars of astonishing richness and 
 beauty. Cygnus is also full of nebulous clouds, some 
 128
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN SEPTEMBER 
 
 of which, when photographed, exhibit the most ex- 
 traordinary forms and texture. Among them is one 
 appropriately called the Lace Nebula. Its delicate 
 streamers look like a tangle of gossamer threads 
 blown by the wind, with thousands of stars sprinkled 
 about them. A new star appeared in Cygnus in 1876, 
 afterwards apparently changing into a nebula. 
 
 Cygnus ha?, in all, one star of the second magnitude 
 approaching the first, five of the third, fifteen of the 
 fourth, and thirty -four of the fifth. Owing to its 
 position in the Milky Way, its sixth-magnitude stars 
 are very numerous, while for stars of telescopic mag- 
 nitudes there is no richer region in the heavens. 
 
 Among the telescopic objects of this constellation 
 besides Albireo and 61 Cygni, already described, may 
 be mentioned Delta (S), a double of magnitudes third 
 and eighth; distance, i".6. Psi (ijr) consists of a 
 white star of magnitude five and a half, combined 
 with a lilac star of magnitude seven and a half, the 
 distance being 3". Mu (/A), of magnitude five, has a 
 blue companion of magnitude six, at a distance of
 
 XI 
 
 CONSTELLATIONS ON THE MERIDIAN IN OCTOBER 
 
 Aquarius 
 
 (CHART XII) 
 
 FOR some reason all of the ancients imagined that 
 the part of the sky occupied by Aquarius, the 
 Waterman or Water-bearer, and its neighboring con- 
 stellations contained a celestial sea. Ideler has un- 
 dertaken to find a reason for this in the fact that 
 the sun passes through that part of the heavens dur- 
 ing the rainy season of the year. The constellation 
 Aquarius has been represented by virtually the same 
 figure from the days of ancient Babylon. A man is 
 seen pouring water from an urn. An Egyptian le- 
 gend averred that the floods of the Nile were caused 
 by the Water-bearer sinking his huge urn into the 
 fountains of the river to refill it. 
 
 Aquarius is the twelfth constellation of the zodiac, 
 lying immediately east of Capricornus, but curving 
 round on the north of the latter to the border of 
 Aquila. 
 
 The constellation is not remarkable to the eye, as 
 it contains no stars brighter than the third magnitude. 
 There are four or five of about that rank: Alpha (a), 
 130
 
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 Chart X 
 
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 GO
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN OCTOBER 
 
 or Sadalmelik; Beta 09), or Sadalsuud; Epsilon (e), 
 or Al Bali, and Delta (8), or Scheat. The larger part 
 of the constellation lies south of the ecliptic, and the 
 sun only passes through its narrower northern portion, 
 although through the centre of the figure. Alpha is 
 in the right shoulder, and Beta in the left, while 
 Gamma, with a group of smaller stars near it, marks 
 the overturned urn. These stars form a rather singu- 
 lar Y-shaped figure, or a triangle, with a relatively 
 bright star within it, by which the constellation may 
 readily be recognized. 
 
 In Greek mythology Aquarius represented Gany- 
 mede, the cup-bearer of the gods. It was also identi- 
 fied with Deucalion, who, like Noah, escaped from a 
 universal deluge and finally came to dry ground on 
 the top of Mount Parnassus. Aquarius is Dr. Seiss's 
 symbol in the stars of Him who said, " If any man 
 thirst let him come unto me and drink." 
 
 Zeta () Aquarii is a beautiful binary ; magnitudes, 
 fourth and fourth ; distance, 3" ; color of both stars, 
 pale green. Psi (-Jr) is double; magnitudes, fourth 
 and eighth ; distance, 50" ; colors, yellow and blue. 
 
 Piscis Australts, or Austrinus 
 
 (CHART XII) 
 
 Below Aquarius the eye is caught by a conspicuous 
 and lone first-magnitude star named Fomalhaut, or 
 Alpha (a) of Piscis Australis, the Southern Fish. This 
 fish is very distinctly marked out by Fomalhaut and 
 six or seven smaller stars arranged in a long oval on 
 the west. Fomalhaut is in the fish's mouth. It is 
 13*
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 one of the four Royal Stars, important to navigators, 
 and gains much by its solitary situation. Flaming 
 above the southern horizon on a chilly autumn night, 
 it attracts a degree of attention that would not 
 be paid to it if it occupied a place in some richer 
 region of the sky. It is like a distant watch-fire 
 gleaming in the midst of a lonely prairie. 
 
 In the traditional figure of this constellation the 
 fish is represented as drinking the water poured out 
 of the urn of Aquarius. Besides the two names given 
 at the head of this section, it is also sometimes called 
 Piscis Meridionalis and Piscis Notius. A Greek legend 
 associated it with the story of Venus' s adventure on 
 the banks of the Euphrates with the giant Typhon, 
 when, to escape, she changed herself and Cupid into 
 fishes. Dupuis identified it with the Syrian god 
 Dagon. Dr. Seiss sees in it a symbol of the mystic 
 union of Christ with His Church. 
 
 Pegasus 
 
 (CHARTS IV AND XII) 
 
 The great winged horse Pegasus is seen flying 
 westward through the sky above Aquarius and the 
 western fish in Pisces. This constellation, howev- 
 er, bears no resemblance to the outlines of a horse, 
 and strikes the eye only by a large quadrangular fig- 
 ure called the Great Square of Pegasus. Three of 
 its stars are of the second and one of the third 
 magnitude. Beginning at the lower western corner 
 of the square and running round towards the left, 
 132
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN OCTOBER 
 
 they are: Alpha (a), also called Markab; Gamma 
 (7), also Algenib; Delta (8), also Alpheratz; and 
 Beta ($), also Scheat. Delta, or Alpheratz, is com- 
 mon to the constellations Pegasus and Andromeda, 
 and is sometimes assigned to one and sometimes to 
 the other. When counted as an Andromede, it bears 
 the Greek letter alpha (a), implying its leadership in 
 that constellation. This star, with Gamma, or Al- 
 genib, to the south, and Beta Cassiopei to the north, 
 forms the line of the Three Guides, thus named be- 
 cause they lie very nearly on the prime meridian of 
 the heavens, which passes through the vernal equi- 
 nox, or first point of Aries, about 15 south of Al- 
 genib. The broad area of sky included within the 
 square seems singularly devoid of stars. In a space 
 of more than two hundred square degrees there are 
 only six stars as bright as the fifth magnitude. But 
 the square, large as it is, covers only the eastern 
 third of the constellation. The nose of the imaginary 
 horse is forty degrees west of Alpheratz, outstretched 
 as if to touch the foal Equuleus. The star marking 
 the nose, Epsilon (e), bears the name Enif, derived 
 from an Arabic word for nose. 
 
 The mythology of Pegasus is associated with one 
 of the most interesting of the ancient legends of 
 Greece that of the birth of a white-winged horse 
 from the blood of Medusa dropping into the ocean. 
 This horse became the favorite of the Muses because 
 from his hoof -print gushed their fountain on Mount 
 Helicon. On another occasion when he touched the 
 earth his magic hoof left a fountain called the Hip- 
 pocrene; on the rocky hill of Acrocorinthus, and mod-
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 ern travellers may still see this fountain full of wa- 
 ter on the very crest of the vast rock which towers 
 eighteen hundred feet above the neck of the Isthmus 
 of Corinth. The figure of Pegasus is found on Corin- 
 thian coins five hundred years before the Christian 
 era. Longfellow represents the magic horse as pay- 
 ing an unexpected visit to a quiet New England vil- 
 lage and being put into the pound as an astray: 
 
 And the curious country people, 
 Rich and poor and young and old, 
 
 Came in haste to see this wondrous 
 Winged steed, with mane of gold. 
 
 On the morrow, when the village 
 
 Woke to all its toil and care, 
 Lo! the strange steed had departed, 
 
 And they knew not when or where. 
 
 But they found upon the greensward, 
 Where his struggling feet had trod, 
 
 Pure and bright a fountain flowing 
 From the hoof-marks in the sod. 
 
 Pegasus in Pound. 
 
 One of the old legends asserts that Pegasus, while 
 visiting the earth, was caught by Bellerophon, who 
 rode him through the air when he went to slay the 
 Chimaera. This angered Zeus, who hurled Bellero- 
 phon from his seat after the conquest of the Chimaera, 
 and never permitted Pegasus to stray earthward again 
 until the time of Longfellow, when there were no 
 longer any heroes to ride him and when only poets 
 could appreciate him. Dr. Seiss assures us, with
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN OCTOBER 
 
 learned comments on the ancient names of this con- 
 stellation and its stars, that Pegasus was meant to 
 signify the Messenger of Glad Tidings. 
 
 The star Epsilon is double; magnitudes, second 
 and eighth; distance, 138"; colors, yellow and violet. 
 Sir John Herschel discovered a curious telescopic ex- 
 periment which may be tried with Epsilon Pegasi. 
 When the star is on the meridian the small component 
 is below the brighter one. If, then, the tube of the 
 telescope is swung a little from side to side, the small 
 star will appear to vibrate like the bob of a pendulum. 
 The suggested explanation is that the relative faint- 
 ness of the small star causes it to affect the sense of 
 vision less promptly than the bright one above it, so 
 that it lingers behind in the apparent motion, and 
 thus it seems to be swinging to and fro with reference 
 to the other. 
 
 Lacerta 
 
 (CHART IV) 
 
 Directly north of Pegasus, and just on the me- 
 ridian, we find the small constellation Lacerta, the 
 Lizard. Hevelius formed it in the seventeenth cen- 
 tury. It contains two stars of the fourth magnitude 
 and ten of the fifth, but, although retained on all celes- 
 tial charts, it possesses almost no interest, even for 
 astronomers. 
 
 Cepheus 
 
 (CHART II) 
 
 Between Lacerta and the pole lies the first of a 
 series of . constellations, sometimes called the Royal
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 Family, and which commemorates the most roman- 
 tic of all the legends of ancient times inscribed in the 
 stars the story of Andromeda and her rescue from 
 the sea-monster. 
 
 This constellation, which contains no star much 
 above the third magnitude, has, nevertheless, attract- 
 ed attention from the beginning of recorded history. 
 
 Nor shall blank silence whelm the harassed house 
 Of Cepheus. The high heavens know their name, 
 For Zeus is in their line at few removes. 
 Cepheus himself by she-bear Cynosure, 
 lasid king, stands with uplifted arms. 
 
 Aratus. 
 
 The adjective "lasid" refers to lasion, the son of 
 Zeus and Electra, from whom Cepheus was supposed 
 to be descended. Cepheus was the King of Ethiopia, 
 his wife was the celebrated Cassiopeia, and his daugh- 
 ter was the still more celebrated Andromeda. Their 
 story will better be told in the next chapter. An 
 association has been suggested, through the simi- 
 larity of names, between Cepheus and Cheops, the 
 builder of the Great Pyramid. Allen says that in 
 China the Inner Throne of the Five Emperors was 
 located somewhere in this constellation. For Dr. 
 Seiss the story of Cepheus and his constellation rep-i 
 resents the coming of the Redeemer as king. 
 
 The star Alpha (a), of between the second andj 
 third magnitudes, bears the name Alderamin, and! 
 marks the right shoulder. This will be the north-pole 
 star for our descendants about 5600 years hence. 
 
 Beta (/3), Alfirk, is a telescopic double; magni- 
 136
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN OCTOBER 
 
 tudes, third and eighth: distance, 13"; colors, white 
 and blue. Delta (8) is double ; magnitudes, four and 
 a half and seventh; distance, 41"; colors, yellow and 
 cerulean blue In the double Xi () the magnitudes 
 are fifth and seventh; distance, 5" 8; colors, white 
 and blue or lilac. The star Mu (^) is famous as Sir 
 William Herschel's "garnet star." Its color, evi- 
 dent with a glass, is sensible to the naked eye. It 
 is a variable, changing from the fourth to the sixth 
 magnitude in a period of five or six years. Many 
 small meteors radiate from Cepheus during the mid- 
 dle and latter part of June.
 
 XII 
 
 CONSTELLATIONS ON THE MERIDIAN IN NOVEMBER 
 
 Pisces 
 
 (CHARTS IV, VIII, AND XI) 
 
 PISCES, the Fishes, is the leading constellation of 
 the zodiacal circle, the precession " of the equi- 
 noxes having brought it into the position originally 
 occupied by the first sign of the zodiac viz., Aries. 
 The vernal equinox, or the point where the sun crosses 
 the equator coming northward in the spring, is situated 
 in Pisces. This is the "Greenwich of the sky," from 
 whose longitude the right ascension of all the stars 
 is reckoned. It is, of course, a crossing-point of the 
 ecliptic and the equator, but this important spot is 
 not marked by any conspicuous star, nor even by any 
 noticeable grouping of stars. 
 
 It may be well to say here that usually a distinction 
 is observed in speaking of the zodiacal signs and the 
 zodiacal constellations, the former, notwithstanding 
 their westward drift, indicating the true divisions 
 of the zodiac, while the constellations change their 
 places on this framework. Reckoned in this way, 
 Pisces is the first constellation of the zodiac, since it 
 13*
 
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 CONSTELLATIONS IN NOVEMBER 
 
 now occupies the place of the first sign; Aries is the 
 second, Taurus the third, Gemini the fourth, Cancer 
 the fifth, Leo the sixth, Virgo the seventh, Libra the 
 eighth, Scorpio the ninth, Sagittarius the tenth, Capri- 
 cornus the eleventh, and Aquarius the twelfth. 
 
 The constellation Pisces is inconspicuous to the 
 eye, but it occupies an enormous territory, some fifty 
 degrees from east to west, and more than thirty de- 
 grees in its extreme north and south extension. The 
 two fishes are represented as tied by the tails to the 
 ends of a long ribbon, the course of which is fairly 
 well marked by streams of stars, only one of which, 
 occupying a knot near the middle of the ribbon, rises 
 to the third magnitude. This is the Alpha (a), or 
 leader, of the constellation, and is often called Al 
 Rischa, and sometimes Nodus. There are eleven 
 fourth-magnitude stars in the constellation, and eigh- 
 teen of the fifth magnitude. Professor Sayce thinks 
 that the double form of this constellation owes its 
 origin to the extra month which was inserted into the 
 Babylonian calendar every six years to make up for 
 the fact that the year was divided into three hundred 
 and sixty days. Like Piscis Australis, this constella- 
 tion was associated with the story of Venus changing 
 herself and Cupid into fishes to escape the pursuit of 
 Typhon. Aratus's description of Pisces indicates that 
 in his time the representation of the two fishes was 
 the same as in our charts : 
 
 Westward, and further in the south-wind's path, 
 The Fishes float; one ever uppermost 
 First hears the boisterous coming of the north. 
 Both are united by a band. 
 139
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 Their tails point to an angle 
 
 Filled by a single goodly star, 
 
 Called the Conjoiner of the Fishes' Tails. 
 
 The Phainowiena. 
 
 Three conjunctions of the planets Jupiter and 
 Saturn took place in Pisces in the year which was 
 formerly assigned as that of the birth of Christ, and 
 this has led to much mystical speculation concerning 
 the Star of Bethlehem. Mr. Allen remarks that the 
 conjunctions just spoken of strikingly agree in some 
 of their details with St. Matthew's account of the 
 mysterious star. Kepler, and Encke long after him, 
 advocated the idea that this was in reality the celes- 
 tial sign followed by the magi, but the revision of 
 the Christian era throws the date of the conjunctions 
 four years out. In 1881 Jupiter and Saturn were again 
 in conjunction in Pisces, and the fact was not lost 
 sight of by those (and they were not few, even in this 
 age of science) who thought that that year was the 
 epoch of the new dispensation and the sign of the 
 millennium. Piazzi Smyth's curious measurements in 
 the passages and chambers of the Great Pyramid, and 
 the still more curious conclusions that he drew from 
 them, added force to the superstition with which the 
 advent of the year 1881 was greeted. Dr. Seiss 
 avers that Pisces symbolizes " the two-foldness of the 
 Church." 
 
 The star Alpha is a beautiful double; magnitudes, 
 fourth and fifth ; distance, 3" ; colors, greenish- white 
 and blue. The star 55 is double; magnitudes, fifth 
 and eighth; distance, 6". 6; colors, yellow and deep 
 blue. Psi (i/r) consists of two fifth-magnitude stars; 
 140
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN NOVEMBER 
 
 distance, 30". In the double Zeta () the magnitudes 
 are fifth and sixth; distance, 24". 
 
 Andromeda 
 
 (CHART IV) 
 
 Lifting our eyes directly overhead, we see the 
 Chained Maiden, Andromeda. The constellation is 
 centrally on the meridian at nine o'clock in the mid- 
 dle of November. If Orion is the most brilliant of the 
 constellations, Andromeda is the most romantic. It 
 requires some effort to recognize the form of the 
 celebrated heroine among the stars, but her story 
 shines by reflection in all literatures. 
 
 The fact has already been mentioned that the star 
 Alpheratz, in the northeastern corner of the Great 
 Square of Pegasus, indicates the head of Andromeda. 
 Three other conspicuous stars, the first of the third 
 magnitude and the other two of the second, stretch- 
 ing in a long row northeastward from Alpheratz, 
 mark the central line of the constellation. The first of 
 these stars, Delta (8), is in the left breast; the second, 
 Beta OS), or Mirach, is in the girdle; and the third, 
 Gamma (7), or Almaak, marks the left foot, or left 
 knee, according as the figure is drawn. A group of 
 three fourth - magnitude stars and one of the fifth 
 magnitude, about fifteen degrees north-northwest of 
 Alpheratz, shows the right hand chained to the rock, 
 while the left elbow is indicated by a fourth-magni- 
 tude star about eight degrees below Delta. North- 
 west of Mirach are two fourth-magnitude stars, also 
 in the girdle, which serve as pointers to the glori- 
 141
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 ous Andromeda nebula, which may be caught as a 
 mere wisp of light by the naked eye. It is near the 
 northernmost of the two stars. Photographs of this 
 nebula present a spectacle that defies description. 
 It consists of a vast oblong central mass, the outer 
 portion of which shows longitudinal gaps, and in one 
 part a breaking -up into cumuli, while all around 
 are ranged, ring within ring, great luminous ellipses, 
 some of which seem to be contracting into globular 
 forms. If Laplace could have seen these photographs 
 he would have thought that the heavens had pro- 
 duced for him an irrefragable witness to the truth 
 of his nebular hypothesis of the origin of worlds. 
 More truly descriptive of this nebula than of the con- 
 stellation (although he did not know it) is Kingsley's 
 line 
 
 Spreading thy long white arms all night in the heights of the 
 ether. 
 
 A new star blazed out in the nebula in 1885, and 
 remained visible with telescopes for a year. 
 
 Although the Greek poetess Sappho referred to 
 Andromeda, and although both Euripides and Soph- 
 ocles wrote dramas about her, we must probably, 
 says Mr. Allen, seek her origin far back of classical 
 times, in the valley of the Euphrates. 
 
 The myth of Andromeda relates that she was the 
 daughter of Cepheus and Cassiopeia, king and queen 
 of Ethiopia. Cassiopeia offended Neptune by boast- 
 ing herself as fairer than the sea -nymphs, and he 
 sent a sea-monster to ravage the kingdom. An ap- 
 peal was made to the oracle of Zeus at Ammon, but 
 142
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN NOVEMBER 
 
 the only relief obtained was a decree that the king- 
 dom should be saved if the Princess Andromeda were 
 given as a prey to the sea-monster. She was taken to 
 the sea-shore and chained to a rock. The location is as 
 fleeting as that of Shakespeare's island in " The Tem- 
 pest," but Josephus declared that in his time the marks 
 of Andromeda's chains were to be seen on the rocks 
 near Joppa, and that near by on the shore the bones 
 of the sea-monster were still shown. Awaiting her 
 fate, and abandoned by her royal relatives, Androm- 
 eda remained by the shore until a rushing sound 
 and the flight of frightened birds told her that the 
 monster was approaching. She hid her eyes, trem- 
 bling, when suddenly, 
 
 Like peal of thunder from unclouded sky, 
 A sudden neighing rolls and echoes nigh. 
 Her eyes unclose ; horror and joy are one, 
 
 For she beholds, in whirling flight and free, 
 The winged horse, upbearing Zeus's son, 
 
 Throw his vast shade of azure on the sea. 
 
 It was Perseus, mounted on Pegasus, returning 
 from the conquest of the Gorgon Medusa. His dia- 
 mond-hilted sword glittered as he darted upon the 
 monster and transfixed him. But, according to some 
 accounts, he only gained the victory by holding before 
 the eyes of the monster the bleeding head of Medusa, 
 the sight of which, with its snaky locks, froze all who 
 looked upon it into stone. 
 
 The sea -monster having been destroyed, Perseus 
 unchained the maiden and conducted her back to 
 her father's court. The reward of his valor was the
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 traditional one in all such cases he received the 
 hand of the rescued maiden in marriage. 
 
 When the happy lives of all the actors in this drama 
 were ended, Zeus, not sorry, perhaps, to thwart Nep- 
 tune, played his customary part by translating them 
 to the stars : 
 
 And there, a woful statue form, is seen 
 
 Andromeda, parted from her mother's side. Long, I trow, 
 
 Thou wilt not seek her in the nightly sky, 
 
 So bright her head, so bright 
 
 Her shoulders, feet, and girdle. 
 
 Yet even there she has her arms extended, 
 
 And shackled, even in heaven; uplifted, 
 
 Outspread eternally, are those fair hands. 
 
 Aratus. 
 
 But other poets assert that Zeus was so delighted 
 with the triumph of his son that he did not wait for 
 death in this case, so that Perseus and Andromeda 
 had the peculiar happiness of seeing their new-made 
 constellations blazing overhead, as, on Pegasus's 
 back, they flew away from the scene of the encounter. 
 
 The splendent winged horse in noiseless flight, 
 From out his nostrils blowing clouds of fume, 
 Bears them, with quivering of his every plume, 
 Across the starry ether and blue night. 
 Like two enormous cloaks the wind swells wide 
 The pinions, which, as through the stars they glide, 
 Keep the clasped lovers nested from the cold, 
 While as their throbbing shadows they descry, 
 From Aries to Aquarius they behold 
 Their constellations flaming in the sky. 
 
 Jos6 M. Heredia ( Taylor's trans.). 
 144
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN NOVEMBER 
 
 Having thus, as it were, seen their own obituaries 
 spread upon the evening edition of The Universe by 
 the hand of Jove himself, they retired to Queen Cas- 
 siopeia's court, and to their first-born was given the 
 name Perses, from whom the proud Persian kings, 
 many centuries afterwards, boasted their descent. 
 
 In Dr. Seiss's mythology Andromeda and Cassiopeia 
 were both intended for prophetic symbols of the Chris- 
 tian Church. 
 
 The star Gamma, in the maiden's foot, is perhaps 
 the most beautiful triple star in the heavens. Any 
 fairly good telescope shows that it consists of a golden 
 yellow and a deep-blue star, of magnitudes third and 
 sixth, 10" apart, but a very powerful glass shows 
 that the smaller star is itself double, having an eighth- 
 magnitude companion, which has sometimes been 
 described as green. This is a binary pair, and the 
 distance, in 1907, was o".48. In 1893 it was only 
 o".i 7 . 
 
 Cassiopeia 
 
 (CHART II) 
 
 Zeus gave to Andromeda's mother a more beautiful 
 constellation than that which he assigned to her. It 
 lies between the constellations of Andromeda and her 
 father, Cepheus, and is conspicuously marked by five 
 bright stars forming an irregular letter " W," with the 
 open part turned towards the pole. It is situated on 
 the opposite side of the pole from the Great Dipper, 
 so that when one rises the other sinks, and vice versa. 
 These stars are Alpha (a), Beta (/8), Gamma (7), 
 Delta (8), and Epsilon (e). A straight line drawn
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 from Zeta () Ursas Majoris through Polaris hits 
 Delta Cassiopeiae. The true pole is situated about a 
 degree and a quarter from Polaris on the side towards 
 Ursa Major. Thus the position of the pole can be 
 ascertained with approximate accuracy at any hour 
 of the night. 
 
 Some of the Greeks called the constellation the 
 Laconian Key, from the peculiar shape of the figure 
 already described. This is the origin of Aratus's de- 
 scription : 
 
 Heaven-troubled queen, with scanty stars, 
 
 But lustrous in the full-mooned night, sits Cassiopeia. 
 
 Not numerous, nor double-rowed, 
 
 The gems that deck her form, 
 
 But like a key which through an inward-fastened 
 
 Folding-door men thrust to knock aside the bolts, 
 
 They shine in single zig-zag row. 
 
 The Phainomena. 
 
 Several of the stars in the "W," or the Key, have 
 individual names. Alpha is Schedar, Beta is Caph, 
 and Delta is Ruchbar. Theta (0) in the queen's el- 
 bow is Marfak. The fourth-magnitude star Kappa 
 (K) is interesting as indicating the place in the sky 
 (about i north of Kappa) where the famous new 
 star of Tycho Brahe suddenly blazed out in the year 
 1572. This was one of the most brilliant temporary 
 stars on record, and attempts have been made to 
 associate it with the Star of Bethlehem, on the sup- 
 position that it appeared in 945 and 1264, and has, 
 therefore, a period exceeding three centuries, so that 
 one of its epochs of visibility would fall about the 
 146
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN NOVEMBER 
 
 time of the birth of Christ. But it has never been 
 seen since it faded from sight in Tycho's day, al- 
 though a small telescopic star close to the place which 
 it occupied has been suspected of identity with it. 
 This star is the Al Aaraaf of Edgar Allan Poe's poem: 
 
 Dim was its little disk, and angel eyes 
 Alone could see the phantom in the skies 
 When first Al Aaraaf knew her course to be 
 Headlong thitherward o'er the starry sea. 
 
 Beta and Gamma are of the second magnitude; 
 Alpha, Delta, and Epsilon of the third. In all, Cas- 
 siopeia contains two stars of the second magnitude, 
 three of the third, six of the fourth, and twenty-one 
 of the fifth, or near. 
 
 The constellation is rich in telescopic objects. 
 Sigma (?) consists of two stars, one blue, the other 
 greenish; magnitudes, fifth and seventh; distance, 
 3". Eta (77), of magnitudes fourth and seventh, con- 
 sists of a white and a purple component; distance, 
 5". Iota (t) is a beautiful triple; magnitudes, fourth, 
 seventh, and eighth; distances, 2" and 7". 5. There 
 are many telescopic star-clusters in the constellation.
 
 XIII 
 
 CONSTELLATIONS ON THE MERIDIAN IN DECEMBER 
 
 Aries 
 
 (CHART IV) 
 
 A^IES, the Ram, is the second constellation of the 
 zodiac. As before remarked, Aries is the first sign, 
 and this sign has now drifted back into the constella- 
 tion Pisces. The Ram is a small constellation, only 
 some twenty-five degrees in its extreme length, lying 
 between the northern fish of Pisces and the Pleiades 
 in Taurus. Two stars in the head, Alpha (a), or 
 Hamal, and Beta (ft), or Sheratan, are its only con- 
 spicuous brilliants. They are in the western part of 
 the constellation. Gamma (7), or Mesarthim, a lit- 
 tle below Sheratan, is of the fourth magnitude. The 
 tail is indicated by a group of three fourth and two 
 Tifth magnitude stars about ten degrees south of west 
 fiom the Pleiades. 
 
 In mythology this was the ram of the Golden 
 Fleece. 
 
 The princely Ram, glittering in golden wool. 
 
 Maniliits. 
 
 He flew from Colchis with Phrixus and his sister 
 Helle on his back, but Helle's head was giddied by 
 148
 
 
 
 340 CT.ir 330 
 
 
 rscES 
 
 10 
 
 
 *
 
 m cxif. m 
 
 SU, 
 
 
 Chart XII 
 
 w 
 
 HEll| 
 
 
 
 i 
 
 F 
 
 r 
 
 -I 
 
 UARRJS 
 
 
 
 Vanabiles
 
 CONSTELLATIONS 
 
 the swift motion, and she fell off and was drowned 
 in the narrow sea now called the Hellespont. Aries 
 has also been associated with the story of the ram into 
 which Zeus changed himself to escape the pursuit of 
 the giants. He fled to Egypt, and there the con- 
 stellation was called Jupiter Ammon. But in Chal- 
 dea, where it is supposed to have had its origin, this 
 celestial ram was simply representative of the favorite 
 animal of the shepherds, and was selected as the 
 leader of the zodiac, a position which he has ever 
 since retained. The star Sheratan marked the vernal 
 equinox in the time of Hipparchus. Aries bore many 
 titles indicative of its rank as leader of the year in 
 ancient times. It was called Prince of the Zodiac, 
 Prince of the Celestial Signs, and Leader of the Host 
 of the Zodiac. The history of the constellation ap- 
 pears to run far back of the time when the preces- 
 sion of the equinoxes had placed it at the head of the 
 monthly signs. Berosus, who was priest of Belus at 
 Babylon in the time of Alexander the Great, and 
 whose predictions about the destruction of the world 
 we have noticed, said that the ancients i. e., those 
 who were ancient to him believed that the world 
 was created whqn the sun was in the constellation 
 Aries. This was long before Aries had assumed the 
 leadership which (as a constellation, not as a sign) 
 it has since lost. Dr. Seiss naturally finds in Aries 
 a symbol of the Lamb of the World. What he says 
 of the ancient worship of Aries is interesting: 
 
 The Egyptians celebrated a sacred feast to the Ram upon 
 the entrance of the sun into the sign of Aries. They pre- 
 pared for it before the full moon next to the spring equinox, 
 149
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 and on the fourteenth day of that moon all Egypt was in 
 joy over the dominion of the Ram. The people crowned 
 the lamb with flowers, carried him with extraordinary pomp 
 in grand processions, and rejoiced in him to the utmost. 
 The ancient Persians had a similar festival of Aries. For 
 all this it is hard to account except in connection with what 
 was prophetically signified by Aries. 
 
 The star Gamma, or Mesarthim, was the first double 
 star discovered. Robert Hooke, following a comet 
 with his telescope in 1664, happened to pass over 
 Mesarthim, and was astonished to see it double. The 
 magnitudes are fourth and fourth; distance, 8". 5. 
 Lambda is a wide double; magnitudes, fifth and 
 eighth; distance, 37"; colors, white and lilac. Epsi- 
 lon is a close double; magnitudes, fifth and sixth; 
 distance, i".25. 
 
 Triangulum 
 
 (CHART IV) 
 
 The little constellation called the Triangle, north- 
 west of Aries, and near the feet of Andromeda, is very 
 ancient. Aratus calls it Deltoton, from its resem- 
 blance to the Greek delta (A). The corners of the 
 elongated triangle are marked by the stars Alpha, 
 Beta, and Delta. Beta is of the third magnitude, 
 and Alpha and Delta are of the fourth. Alpha, no 
 doubt, has faded. The first asteroid to be discovered, 
 Ceres, was found in Triangulum in the year 1801. 
 
 Perseus 
 
 (CHARTS II AND IV) 
 
 The constellation Perseus brings us back to the 
 Royal Family of the sky. 
 
 150
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN DECEMBER 
 
 He in the north-wind stands gigantic, 
 
 His right arm stretched towards the throne 
 
 Where sits the mother of his bride. As one bent on some 
 
 high deed, 
 Dust-stained he strides over the floor of heaven. 
 
 Aratus. 
 
 The dust that sparkles on the hero's armor consists 
 of the powdered starlets of the Milky Way, which is no- 
 where richer than here. Perseus was a celebrated hero 
 before he rescued Andromeda. His conquest of the 
 Gorgon Medusa is one of the finest stories of Greek 
 mythology. The son of Zeus and Danag, he became 
 the favorite of the gods. When others were contend- 
 ing with rare gifts for the favor of King Polydectes, at 
 whose court he lived, Perseus sought to outdo them 
 all by bringing the head of Medusa to throw at the 
 king's feet. It was an adventure worthy of Hercules, 
 and to undertake it with any chance of success he 
 had to borrow the helmet of invisibility from the god 
 of the lower world, the sandals of swiftness from 
 Hermes, and the buckle of wisdom from Athene. 
 Furnished also with a magic sword set with dia- 
 monds, and, according to some, riding Pegasus, loaned 
 by Zeus, he hastened to the encounter. Even then 
 he would have failed, and have been turned to stone 
 by the petrifying glances of the Gorgon, had not 
 Athene's polished buckle served as a mirror in which 
 he could see his enemy without facing her. With a 
 backward stroke he severed Medusa's terrible head, 
 with its hissing snakes for hair, and was on his way 
 to bestow the dreadful gift upon King Polydectes, 
 when he chanced to espy Andromeda in her plight,
 
 ASTP.ONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 and stopped for another and a more romantic ex- 
 ploit. 
 
 Perseus still carries Medusa's head, which is repre- j 
 sented in the sky by a group of five or six stars, the 
 largest of which is the celebrated Algol, the so-called 
 Demon Star, or the Winking Demon, which every two 
 days, twenty hours, and forty-nine minutes suddenly ! 
 begins to fade away, until, in the course of three or 
 four hours, it loses four-fifths of its light. A fewj 
 minutes later it begins to brighten, and in the course I 
 of the next three or four hours it regains all of its 
 former brilliancy. When at its brightest, Algol is 
 nearly of the second magnitude; when faintest, it is 
 not far above the fourth. The cause of these singular j: 
 variations has been shown to be an enormous darkj 
 body, as large as our sun, revolving around Algol at a 
 distance of only about three million miles, and regu- 
 larly eclipsing it, as seen from the earth. The en- 
 tire course of the changes undergone by Algol can be 
 watched with the naked eye. 
 
 Among the Hebrews, Algol was said to represent 
 Adam's mysterious first wife, Lilith, but it is only a 
 matter of guesswork that this identification had any 
 connection with the star's strange variability. 
 
 On February 22, 1901, a marvellous new star 
 discovered by Dr. Anderson, of Edinburgh, not very 
 far from Algol. No star had been visible at that point 
 before. Within twenty-four hours the stranger haq 
 become so bright that it outshone Capella. In 
 week or two it had visibly faded, and in the course ojj 
 a few months it was hardly discernible with the naked 
 eye. Its decline continued, and by the end of th<)
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN DECEMBER 
 
 year it could only be seen with telescopes. The next 
 year the star underwent a wondrous transformation. 
 Its spectrum assumed the nebular type, and great 
 nebulous rings or spirals were photographed around 
 it. Still later it resumed the stellar type, and it is 
 still (1908) visible as a star of the ninth or tenth 
 magnitude. The career of this star recalls that of 
 Tycho which blazed out in Cassiopeia in 1576. In 
 both cases the collision hypothesis has been suggested 
 to account for the marvel. The eccentric changes 
 undergone by Nova Persei, alternately fading and 
 brightening while, upon the whole, losing light 
 have been regarded by some as indicating that a star 
 had run into a nebula or a vast cloud of meteoric 
 matter, the successive collisions producing the out- 
 bursts of light. Like all variable and temporary 
 stars, Nova Persei turned red as it faded. 
 
 Algol bears the Greek letter beta (/3) in the con- 
 stellation Perseus. The Alpha of the constellation is 
 situated about ten degrees northerly from Algol, in 
 the midst of a curved row of stars embedded in the 
 Milky Way and marking the armor-clad body of the 
 hero. Alpha's distinctive name is Algenib. Follow- 
 ing the course of the Milky Way towards Cassiopeia, 
 the eye is caught by a sparkling patch which an opera- 
 glass will resolve into a swarm of minute stars. This 
 indicates the hand in which Perseus bears the dia- 
 mond-hilted sword. This object is sometimes called 
 Chi (%) Persei. In reality it consists of two clusters 
 of stars like two swarms of bees encountering in mid- 
 air. They have excited the admiration of all astron- 
 omers. "These two gorgeous clusters," is Webb's
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EY1 
 
 descriptive phrase ; " The glories of ^ Persei," i 
 Proctor's tribute; "One of the most brilliant ob 
 jects in the heavens," wrote Admiral Smyth. Si 
 William Herschel here tried one of his famous "sta 
 gauges," but with his most powerful telescope h 
 could not reach the bottom of what seems to hav 
 been regarded by him as a sort of well filled witl 
 stars, for he thought that it extended out into spao 
 to a depth far greater than its width. I remembe 
 once showing this object with a small telescope to < 
 person who had never before looked into an astro 
 nomical glass, and his sudden start and exclamatioi 
 of amazement were a tribute to the wonder-stirring 
 power of the starry universe. 
 
 The mythology of this constellation has already 
 been sufficiently indicated. No one will be surprisec 
 that Dr. Seiss makes Perseus the symbol of the Re 
 deemer of mankind and the slayer of the Evil One 
 the latter being represented by Algol. He derive: 
 the name Perseus from a root signifying the Breaker 
 and, summing up the old myths, he says: 
 
 No natural events in the seasons or in the history of mat 
 could ever serve as a foundation for such a story as this 
 Here is a divine-human son, begotten of a golden shower fron 
 the Deity, a child of affliction and persecution from his ver] 
 birth, but predestined by the heavenly powers to live anc 
 triumph. . . . He is winged, and given a diamond sword, ai 
 Heaven's messenger and herald, to undo the powers of evi 
 and administer deliverance and prosperity. 
 
 The double star Eta (77) has components of magni 
 tudes fourth and eighth; distance, 28"; colors, white 
 and pale blue. In Epsilon (e) the magnitudes are
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN DECEMBER 
 
 third and eighth; distance, 9". The eighth-magni- 
 tude star is variable, and some observers have said 
 that its color changes from blue to red as it fades. 
 
 Cettts 
 
 (CHART VIII) 
 
 The great constellation of Cetus, the Whale, is now 
 mostly past the meridian in the south, the head, 
 which is turned eastward, lying just under Aries. The 
 constellation is about fifty degrees in length from east 
 to west, and nearly as much in its greatest exten- 
 sion north and south. Its leading star, Alpha (a), or 
 Menkar, in the head, is of less than the second magni- 
 tude. Gamma (7), six degrees west of it, in the di- 
 rection of Alpha Piscium, is of the third magnitude. 
 Some twenty-five degrees southwest of Menkar four 
 third - magnitude stars, in the body of the Whale, 
 mark the outlines of the upturned bowl of a dipper. 
 Farther west and south is a second-magnitude star, 
 Beta (/3), in the tail, which is also called Denib Kaitos. 
 Much of this constellation is comparatively a blank, 
 owing to the absence of conspicuous stars. Heis as- 
 signs to Cetus two second-magnitude, six third-mag- 
 nitude, seven fourth-magnitude, and twenty-four fifth- 
 magnitude stars, but all of them, as is usual, vary 
 much from the standard. 
 
 Cetus was identified by Aratus with the sea-monster 
 sent to devour Andromeda: 
 
 And yonder, distant from her cowering form, 
 The on-coming monster scares Andromeda. 
 155
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE -NAKED EYE 
 
 She in the blasts of Thracian Boreas 
 
 Is stationed, while the south-wind brings her foe. 
 
 The Phainomena. 
 
 In earlier times it seems to have been regarded as 
 some kind of leviathan without connection with the 
 story of Andromeda. Allen suggests that it may 
 have represented the ferocious Tiamat of the Chaldean 
 myths. The creature seems about to plunge into the 
 waters of the river Eridanus. In the seventeenth 
 century it was considered to be a symbol of Jonah's 
 whale, and also of Job's leviathan. It is hardly neces- 
 sary to say that Dr. Seiss finds in it the Apocalyptic 
 Dragon, "the Old Serpent which is the Devil and 
 Satan." 
 
 The most interesting star in Cetus is Omicron (o), 
 celebrated by the name Mira, the first variable star 
 ever recognized as such. Its changes were noticed 
 with great astonishment by David Fabricius, an 
 amateur astronomer of Germany, in 1596. Mira 
 when brightest sometimes exceeds the second magni- 
 tude (this occurred in December, 1906), and when 
 faintest it is far beyond the range of the naked eye. 
 Its average period is about three hundred and thirty- 
 one days, but this period is variable to the extent of 
 nearly a month. Sometimes the star fails to brighten 
 when expected to do so. In the seventeenth century 
 it once remained invisible for four years. General- 
 ly when at maximum it does not exceed the third 
 or fourth magnitude; its occasional outbursts are, 
 therefore, all the more surprising. Its color, especial- 
 ly when fading, is red, and its spectrum shows blaz- 
 156
 
 CONSTELLATIONS IN DECEMBER 
 
 ing lines when its light is gaining. The semblance to 
 a gigantic conflagration is startling. The cause of 
 the variations of Mira remains unknown, but the 
 phenomena most closely resemble those observed in 
 temporary stars like Nova Aurigae and Nova Persei. 
 Some think that Mira represents the closing stages of 
 sunspottedness. 
 
 Zeta is a wide double; magnitudes, third and 
 ninth; distance, 185". Gamma is a very beautiful 
 double ; magnitudes, third and seventh ; distance, 3" ; 
 colors, straw-color and blue.
 
 XIV 
 
 THE SOUTHERN CONSTELLATIONS 
 
 Argo Natis 
 
 Sternward she glides, like to a ship whose helm 
 Her crew have turned to landward, 
 Coining to anchor. All the oars back water, 
 Au4 lapping surges splash upon the strand. 
 Thus sternward Jason's Argo makes her way, 
 Spectral her frame, and starless from the prow 
 To the central mast, but radiant all her after-hull. 
 
 Aratus. 
 
 IN Chart XIII the whole southern hemisphere of 
 the heavens is represented. The inner circle is 
 placed about thirty-five degrees below the equator, 
 and the constellations below or within this circle 
 are circumpolar for the inhabitants of the southern 
 hemisphere, and are not observable from median north- 
 ern latitudes. Inasmuch as these stars are invisible 
 for the majority of the readers of this book, the con- 
 stellations are not represented by outlines, but their 
 places and principal stars are shown. Parts of those 
 lying close to the circle are visible from the Southern 
 United States and Southern Europe, and they can be 
 recognized by observing their position with reference 
 158
 
 CHART XIM 
 
 THE SOUTHERN* CONSTELLATIONS.
 
 THE SOUTHERN CONSTELLATIONS 
 
 to the well-known constellations bordering the zodiac 
 and the equator. 
 
 Thus the brilliant Canopus, in Argo Navis, which 
 can be seen from the Gulf States, lies about thirty- 
 five degrees south of Sinus, in Canis Major. In Greek 
 mythology, Argo Navis represented the ship built by 
 Argo for Jason when he sailed in search of the Golden 
 Fleece. Its bow is said to have been lost in passing 
 through the Bosporus, and in the sky the ship is rep- 
 resented without a bow. A considerable portion of 
 Argo Navis is above the horizon for Northern observ- 
 ers, but the more important part of the constellation 
 lies far south. It is so extensive that astronomers, for 
 purposes of reference, have divided it into three parts 
 viz., Carina, the Keel; Puppis, the Stern; and Vela, 
 the Sail. Canopus, the Alpha (a) of the whole con- 
 stellation, is in the part called Carina. This star, 
 which is second to Sirius only in brilliancy, and which 
 has even been thought by observers in the southern 
 hemisphere to outshine the Dog Star, has attracted a 
 great deal of attention recently on account of the 
 enormous actual magnitude that its brightness, com- 
 bined with its vast distance, shows that it must pos- 
 sess. Professor Newcomb places it in what he has 
 called the X class i. e., stars whose intrinsic brilliancy 
 exceeds the sun's at least ten thousand times! Rigel, 
 in Orion, is another star falling into this rank, but it 
 does not follow that Rigel and Canopus are anything 
 like equal. If Canopus is ten thousand times more 
 brilliant than the sun, it is two hundred and fifty times 
 more brilliant than Sirius, which equals only forty 
 suns. .Sirius outshines Canopus to our eyes simply
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 because it is much nearer to us. Basing the specu- 
 lation on the immense magnitude of Canopus, some 
 have suggested that it may be the actual centre of the 
 universe, but there are no good grounds for such a 
 belief. Canopus belongs to the same stellar type as 
 Sirius, and shines with the same electric blue-white 
 beams. 
 
 Canopus has been worshipped in many countries, 
 such as Chaldea, Egypt, and China. Carlyle speaks 
 of its worship by the Arabs in Mohammed's time, and 
 finds an excuse for his hero to follow the example of 
 his countrymen in the "wild, blue, spirit-like bright- 
 ness " which the star exhibits when seen glittering 
 above the sandy deserts of the South. It was Mo- 
 hammed's star, as Venus seen by daylight is said to 
 have been Napoleon's. 
 
 In Egypt, Lockyer has found many temples at 
 Edfu, Philse, and elsewhere oriented to Canopus 
 when it rose just before sunrise at the autumnal equi- 
 nox. Other temples as, for instance, two at Karnak 
 pointed to its place of setting. Like Sirius, it has 
 been identified with the Egyptian Osiris. 
 
 The other conspicuous stars of Argo Navis are far- 
 ther east, lying in and along the Milky Way. Of these 
 the star Gamma (7), of the second magnitude, is 
 notable as being the only bright star in the heavens 
 which shows the Wolf-Rayet type of spectrum *. e., 
 a continuous spectrum crossed by brilliant white in- 
 stead of dark lines. It would seem that the atmos- 
 phere of such stars must be brilliantly incandescent. 
 Another notable star is Eta (?;), a most wonderful 
 variable. Sometimes it becomes as brilliant as Sirius, 
 160
 
 THE SOUTHERN CONSTELLATIONS 
 
 at other times it is invisible to the naked eye. Its 
 period of change extends over many years, and is 
 very erratic. Eta is surrounded by a strange nebula, 
 called by Sir John Herschel, from its shape, the Key- 
 hole Nebula. This, too, like the wonderful star in- 
 volved in it, appears to be variable. 
 
 The South Pole 
 
 Between Canopus and Lepus, below Orion, lies the 
 little constellation Colomba, the Dove, or Noah's 
 Dove, mentioned in a preceding chapter. This, like 
 most of the southern constellations, is of modern 
 origin. Some of these, such as the Flying Fish, the 
 Chameleon, the Air - Pump, and the Octant, are in 
 themselves hardly worth mentioning for our purposes ; 
 but the Octant is interesting as being the antarctic 
 equivalent of Ursa Minor, since it surrounds the south- 
 ern pole of the heavens. There is, strictly speaking, 
 no south polar-star, the nearest naked -eye star to 
 the pole being hardly above the sixth magnitude. It 
 is interesting, however, to know that when the brill- 
 iant Vega becomes the North Polar Star, about eleven 
 thousand years hence, Canopus will be sufficiently 
 near the south pole of the heavens to serve as a south- 
 ern Polaris. Another curious fact associating these 
 two brilliant stars is that the point in space from 
 which the proper motion of the solar system is car- 
 rying us is situated not many degrees from Canopus, 
 while the point towards which we are travelling is 
 equally near to Vega. 
 
 161
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 The Southern Cross 
 
 This world-famous constellation lies exactly south 
 of Crater, at a distance of about thirty degrees from 
 the south pole. The precession of the equinoxes is 
 carrying the Cross slowly southward, and it is a 
 curious fact, to which Mr. Allen has called attention, 
 that this constellation was last seen on the horizon 
 of Jerusalem about the time of the Crucifixion. The 
 Southern Cross did not receive its name, however, un- 
 til after it had attracted the attention and excited 
 the admiration of the early circumnavigators. It 
 seems to have been named early in the sixteenth cen- 
 tury. Dante's lines in the first canto of the " Purga- 
 tory " have often been supposed to refer to this con- 
 stellation (not then called the Cross), because of its 
 four bright stars : 
 
 To the right hand I turned and fixed my mind 
 On the other pole, attentive, where I saw 
 Four stars ne'er seen before save by the ken 
 Of our first parents. Heaven of their ray, 
 Seemed joyous. O, thou northern site, bereft 
 Indeed, and widowed, since of these deprived. 
 
 Carey's translation. 
 
 Amerigo Vespucci, on his first voyage, saw the 
 Cross, and exultingly wrote that he had beheld 
 Dante's "four stars." As other navigators pressed 
 into the Southern seas, the fame of the Croce maravi- 
 gliosa, as Pigafetta called it, spread over the world. 
 Pigafetta thought it more glorious than all the other 
 constellations. It appeared on a celestial globe by 
 162
 
 THE SOUTHERN CONSTELLATIONS 
 
 Mollineux in 1592. Acosta, in his history of the 
 West Indies, published in 1590, told how the Span- 
 ish settlers were accustomed to use the Southern 
 Cross as a clock, reckoning the hour by its inclina- 
 tion to the horizon. Readers of the romance of Paul 
 and Virginia will recall a reference to this use of the 
 constellation of the Cross. The intensity of religious 
 feeling in the time of the great geographical discov- 
 eries no doubt added immensely to the interest felt 
 in the Southern Cross, as well as to the appreciation 
 of its beauty by those lucky enough to see it. Its 
 splendor lost nothing in their descriptions, and it 
 soon captured the imagination of all Christendom. 
 Yet its stars had been known to the ancients when 
 the constellation shone over the middle northern 
 latitudes, and they had not, apparently, given it a 
 separate name. It was a part of the constellation 
 Centaurus in Hipparchus's time. Essentially it is a 
 constellation associated with the days of discovery 
 and early conquest in America. 
 
 Thou recallest the ages when first o'er the main 
 My fathers unfolded the ensign of Spain, 
 And planted their faith in the regions that see 
 Its imperishing symbol ever blazoned in thee. 
 
 Mrs. Hemans. 
 
 Its renown is still so wide that few travellers visit 
 the southern hemisphere without recording their first 
 impressions of this constellation. 
 
 The Southern Cross consists essentially of four 
 bright stars arranged as if at the ends of the two 
 sticks of a kite, somewhat awry. The larger beam, 
 163
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 about six degrees in length, points to the pole. The 
 four stars are, respectively, of the first, second, second, 
 and third magnitudes. The largest star, Alpha (a), 
 is at the base of the figure. Gamma (7) , of the second 
 magnitude, at the top of the cross, is orange-colored. 
 The other stars are white. Alpha is a beautiful tele- 
 scopic double. 
 
 A famous telescopic object in the Southern Cross is 
 the colored cluster surrounding the little star Kappa 
 (/c). Sir John Herschel, the discoverer of this ob- 
 ject, compared it to "a gorgeous piece of fancy 
 jewelry," on account of the many colors displayed. 
 There are several red stars, and others imitating em- 
 eralds, sapphires, and topazes. Different observers 
 since Sir John Herschel's time have been differently 
 impressed by this curious cluster, some describing it 
 as exquisitely beautiful, and others finding that the 
 only colors especially noticeable are the reds. I have 
 noticed a surprising difference in the eyes of persons 
 observing star colors. Some, apparently not color 
 blind in ordinary circumstances, can see little or no 
 color in a star where it is perfectly obvious to others. 
 
 Centaurus 
 
 There is a second Centaur in the southern sky, 
 who, although he lacks the distinction enjoyed by 
 his rival Sagittarius of belonging to the zodiacal 
 twelve, makes upon the whole a more notable figure, 
 although situated too far south to be seen from our 
 latitudes. The constellation Centaurus surrounds the 
 Southern Cross on three sides, and extends north of it 
 to the coils of Hydra. It faces eastward, and is rep- 
 164
 
 THE SOUTHERN CONSTELLATIONS 
 
 resented as charging, with a levelled lance, either at 
 the Wolf, just ahead of it, or at the more formidable 
 Scorpio, farther east and north. The constellation 
 is fabled to represent the Centaur Chiron, who was 
 the best of his race, the favorite of Apollo and Diana, 
 and the instructor of ^Esculapius in medicine and the 
 chase, of Jason, and of the young Achilles, who was 
 brought up under his care in a cave on Mount Pelion. 
 Chiron tried to make peace between Hercules and 
 the other Centaurs. Being struck by a poisoned ar- 
 row, he magnanimously offered to die in the place of 
 Prometheus, and the gods accepted his sacrifice and 
 put him among the stars. In antiquity, Chiron was 
 believed to have invented the constellations. 
 
 Centaurus is ospecially interesting for containing 
 the nearest to us of all the stars, the celebrated Alpha 
 Centauri. This is a very brilliant star of nearly the 
 zero magnitude, ranking next to Canopus. Its paral- 
 lax is only o".75, equivalent to a distance of four and 
 one-third light years, or, say, twenty-six millions of 
 millions of miles. Alpha Centauri is a binary, the 
 smaller star being itself almost of the first magnitude. 
 Taken together, the intrinsic brilliancy of the two 
 stars is four times that of the sun. The spectrum 
 indicates a stage of evolution between that of Sirius 
 and that of the sun. Alpha Centauri was a prominent 
 object of temple worship in Egypt. 
 
 Alpha and Beta Centauri, the latter of the first 
 magnitude, make a noble pair, only about five degrees 
 apart, and they are sometimes called the Southern 
 Pointers, since they indicate the position of the 
 Southern Cross.
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 Ara 
 
 Directly south of the tail of Scorpio stands the 
 celestial altar, Ara. 
 
 About that Altar ancient Night, 
 Pitying human woes in ocean storms, 
 Has raised a beacon. 
 
 Aratus. 
 
 The poet refers to the ancient importance of this 
 constellation as a weather portent. When black 
 clouds were seen at nightfall forming like smoke above 
 its stars, the sailors took warning and stayed in har- 
 bor. But for its antiquity the constellation would 
 hardly demand notice, for its stars are few and small. 
 The prominence of the name in ancient times has led 
 to the suspicion that some other group of stars was, 
 at first, called the Altar. Yet the constellation de- 
 scribed by Aratus is the same one that bears the name 
 at the present time. 
 
 The Triangle 
 
 The Southern Triangle is a much more conspicuous 
 object in the sky than its northern namesake near 
 Andromeda. It is an invention of the sixteenth cen- 
 tury, like the Southern Cross, and Bayer called it the 
 Three Patriarchs. One of its stars is of the second, 
 and the other two of the third magnitude. In the 
 Northern Triangle the brightest star is of the third 
 magnitude. The Southern Triangle w r as much no- 
 ticed by the early navigators in southern seas. 
 1 66
 
 THE SOUTHERN CONSTELLATIONS 
 Grus and Toucan 
 
 South of Capricornus and the Southern Fish is a 
 group of modern constellations, including Grus the 
 Crane, Toucan, Pavo the Peacock, and the Indian, of 
 which Grus is worthy of special mention because its 
 most conspicuous star, Alpha (a), of the second mag- 
 nitude, can be seen from our lower latitudes flam- 
 ing southwest of Fomalhaut. In former times Grus 
 was a part of the Southern Fish, and then the star 
 Alpha bore the name of the Bright One. Some of the 
 early Spanish navigators called Grus the Flamingo, 
 and they imagined it flying and striking with its long 
 bill at the Southern Fish. 
 
 Toucan contains two notable star clusters. One 
 of these was described by Sir John Herschel as the 
 richest and largest object of the kind in the heavens. 
 A later observer, Professor Bailey, of the Cambridge 
 Observatory, has counted 2235 stars in the centre of 
 the cluster, several of them being variables. Variable 
 stars are numerous in many other clusters. 
 
 The second cluster in Toucan was described by Sir 
 John Herschel as containing a nuclear mass of ruby 
 stars at the centre, surrounded by white ones. Later 
 observers have not noted the difference of color re- 
 marked by Herschel. 
 
 The Phoenix 
 
 Southeast of Fomalhaut, and just above the hori- 
 zon in the latitude of New York in the middle of 
 November, may be seen the bright second-magnitude 
 167 
 
 SIATEMORMALSaaiMJL, 
 
 ZxOS
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 star Alpha (a), in the constellation Phoenix. The 
 Arabs associated this constellation with the ostrich, 
 but Bayer gave it the name of the Phoenix in 1603. 
 Its principal star lies very close to the equinoctial 
 colure, and is on the meridian with the sun at the 
 opening of spring. On this account Mr. Allen thinks 
 that the name Phcenix was very appropriately be- 
 stowed, since the fabled Phcenix renewed its life at 
 the opening of the Great Year of the ancients, begin- 
 ning at noon of the day when the sun entered Aries, 
 and thus the astronomical symbolism of the constella- 
 tion names is, in this instance, preserved. 
 
 The Southern Eridanus 
 
 In describing the constellation Eridanus, the starry 
 river which takes its rise from the begemmed sandal 
 of Orion, it was remarked that the chief star of the 
 constellation is not visible from northern latitudes. 
 It is found southeast of the Phoenix, about thirty- 
 two degrees from the south pole, and is one of the 
 most brilliant stars in the sky, equal to Rigel, Capella, 
 Vega, and Arcturus. It bears the name Achernar, 
 from the Arabic, meaning the End of the River. It is 
 another star of the Sirian type, and, having a very 
 small parallax, must be of enormous intrinsic brillian- 
 cy. In early times Eridanus was sometimes called the 
 Ocean, and sometimes the River of Ocean. It has 
 also at different times been identified with various 
 famous rivers other than the Po. Aratus knew it 
 only as the River. Thus, describing the rising of 
 Cetus, he says: 
 
 168
 
 THE SOUTHERN CONSTELLATIONS 
 
 And now the River-flood's first winding reach, 
 The becalmed mariner may see in heaven 
 As he watches for Orion, to espy if he hath aught to say 
 Of the night's measure or the slumbering winds. 
 
 The Phainomena. 
 
 In Egypt it was associated with the Nile, and in 
 Chaldea with the Euphrates. 
 
 The Magettanic Clouds 
 
 Almost directly south of Achernar, and about half- 
 way to the pole, in the constellation called Hydrus, or 
 the Watersnake, lies the smaller of the famous Ma- 
 gellanic Clouds, or Cape Clouds. This is the Nu- 
 becula Minor. Its greater companion, the Nubecula 
 Major, is seen in the constellation Dorado, the Gold- 
 fish, half-way to Canopus. These luminous clouds, 
 which resemble detached portions of the Milky Way, 
 from which they are, however, far removed, excited 
 the astonishment of early navigators of the southern 
 oceans and shared attention with the Southern Cross. 
 
 The Nubecula Minor is the brighter of the two, 
 covering about ten square degrees on the sky. Flam- 
 marion enumerates in it 37 separate nebulae, 7 star 
 clusters, and 200 individual stars. The Nubecula 
 Major, which is very faint in the presence of the full 
 moon, contains, according to the same authority, 291 
 separate nebulae, 46 star clusters, and 582 individual 
 stars. It covers an area of about forty square de- 
 grees. All around these singular clouds the sky is 
 curiously dark and vacant, as if its contents had 
 been swept into these heaps. 
 169
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 The name Magellanic Clouds, or Magellan's Clouds, 
 was given to them because of the description which 
 the great circumnavigator furnished of these phe- 
 nomena on his voyage. But they were known before 
 his day, and were called the Cape Clouds on account 
 of being seen by those who visited or rounded the 
 Cape of Good Hope. Humboldt thought that the 
 larger cloud was probably the White Ox of the Arabs, 
 and he remarks that in Southern Arabia, especially 
 in the interior of the country, where the atmosphere 
 is very dry and the sky of a deep azure, the Magellanic 
 Clouds must be notable phenomena. The singular idea 
 was once entertained that these clouds were parts of 
 the Milky Way which had been broken off and drifted 
 away, and the gaps which they had left were even 
 pointed out. There is no ground whatever for this 
 notion. In their intermingling of nebulae and star 
 clusters they resemble certain regions of the Milky 
 Way that have been photographed by Barnard in 
 the constellation Sagittarius. Photographs of the 
 two clouds made by Russell in 1890 show that both 
 are spiral in their general structure. In this respect 
 they recall the enormous spiral nebula (invisible to 
 the eye) which envelops the constellation Orion.
 
 XV 
 
 THE MILKY WAY 
 
 T^HE true "river of the sky" is the Galaxy, or 
 1 Milky Way. Even the most brilliant stars have 
 not affected the imagination of mankind as has this 
 mysterious circle of soft, glowing light surrounding 
 the entire firmament. Its appearance on a clear, 
 moonless night is calculated to impress the most 
 thoughtless observer with a sense of awe and mystery, 
 which becomes wonder at the illimitable extension 
 of the universe when we reflect that this path 
 round its borders consists of hundreds of millions of 
 stars. 
 
 The first scientific demonstration of the stellar 
 character of the Milky Way was given by Galileo's 
 telescope, but ages before his time philosophers had 
 guessed that the great luminous band was composed 
 of stars. Pythagoras thought that it consisted of 
 distant stars, and Democritus was of the same opin- 
 ion. Aristotle followed their ideas in this, but im- 
 agined that the Milky Way was the birthplace of 
 comets. This conception of the stellar nature of the 
 Milky Way even found its way into poetry centuries 
 before Galileo. Yet, until his time, nobody knew for 
 certain what was the composition of the Galaxy. 
 171
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 Galileo's description of the appearance of the Milky 
 Way in his little telescope is interesting : 
 
 The next object which I have observed is the essence, or 
 substance, of the Milky Way. By the aid of a telescope any 
 one may behold this in a manner which so distinctly appeals 
 to the senses that all the disputes which have tormented 
 philosophers through so many ages are exploded at once 
 by the irrefragable evidence of our eyes, and we are freed 
 from wordy disputes upon this subject, for the Galaxy is 
 nothing else but a mass of innumerable stars planted to- 
 gether in clusters. Upon whatever part of it you direct the 
 telescope, straightway a vast crowd of stars presents itself 
 to view. Many of them are tolerably large and extremely 
 bright, but the number of small ones is quite beyond de- 
 termination. 
 
 As soon as one begins to observe the Milky Way 
 with the least care, it becomes evident that it varies 
 immensely in brilliancy in different places, and that 
 its borders are very irregular, although upon the 
 whole it pursues a fairly straight course inclined at 
 an average angle of about twenty-five degrees to the 
 axis of the equator. Owing to this inclination, the 
 Milky Way lies in a long band along the northern 
 horizon in the evenings of May, stretching from the 
 western to the eastern points, while in October, No- 
 vember, and December it crosses the sky between 
 the zenith and the north pole like a vast arch. In 
 the latter part of January this luminous arch springs 
 from the horizon in the southeast, passes through the 
 zenith, and reaches the horizon again in the north- 
 northwest. In the middle of March it runs parallel 
 with the meridian on the west, and at the end of 
 172
 
 THE MILKY WAY 
 
 July it occupies a similar position east of the meridian. 
 It is at this time that its most conspicuous reaches, 
 running from Cassiopeia through Cygnus and Aquila 
 to Sagittarius and Scorpio, are best seen. The half 
 of the Milky Way that lies south of the equator is, 
 upon the whole, the most brilliant. 
 
 The immense amount of detail that the Milky Way 
 presents, and the striking variations in its appear- 
 ance at different points along its course, make it well 
 worth while to trace it throughout its whole extent. 
 In fact, it is necessary to do so if we would form an 
 idea of the "architecture of the heavens," for the 
 Milky Way enters as the foundation and frame of the 
 entire structure. It indicates not only the general 
 shape, but the skeletal details of the vast organic whole 
 which we call the universe. Sir William Herschel's 
 original idea was that the Milky Way showed that the 
 stellar system was shaped like a disk, the sun being 
 somewhere near the centre, so that when we look out 
 in the direction of the plane of the disk we see in- 
 numerable stars, while when we look at right angles 
 to that plane our vision ranges out into the open 
 space on either side, where but few stars are to be 
 seen. It was with this idea in mind that he devised 
 his method of star gauging, reaching deeper and deep- 
 er into space with his telescopic plummets as the size 
 and power of his instruments increased. Later he 
 modified his views, and approached more to the mod- 
 ern idea, that the stars are not distributed uniform- 
 ly inside the circuit of the Milky Way, but that the 
 latter is, in reality, what it looks to be, a vast ring or 
 spiral of distant stars surrounding the entire sys- 

 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 tern, and enclosing a relatively empty space. Through 
 this relatively empty space our sun, with its atten- 
 dant planets, is journeying. If its course has always 
 been a straight one, and if it is to continue the same 
 in the future, then it must once have been near the 
 edge of the Milky Way in the south, and eventually 
 it will approach the opposite edge of the Milky Way 
 in the north. 
 
 The idea that the Milky Way is a ring of stars, 
 made up of subsidiary spirals, is borne out by the 
 varied aspects which it presents at different points 
 along its course. I cannot too strongly urge, even 
 upon the naked -eye observer, the utility and the 
 charm of studying the Milky Way in detail. No more 
 delightful occupation can be imagined for a summer's 
 night, when the moon is absent, when the heavens 
 are clear and serene, and when the observer finds him- 
 self at a distance from the smoke and blaze of towns 
 and cities. It is useless to try to see the Milky Way 
 where the atmosphere is impure and the air filled 
 with the diffused light of electric lamps. It is one of 
 Nature's phenomena which she exhibits in full glory 
 only to those who love to be alone with her. 
 
 There is a line of constellations which may be called 
 the Milky Way constellations, since they are all to a 
 greater or less extent involved in it. Beginning near 
 the north pole, and following the order of right as- 
 cension, these constellations are: Cassiopeia, Per- 
 seus, Auriga, Gemini (the feet), Orion (the club), 
 Monoceros, Canis Major (the head), Argo Navis, the 
 Southern Cross, Centaurus (the feet), Ara, Scorpio 
 (the tail), Sagittarius, Scutum Sobieskii, Aquila, Cyg-
 
 THE MILKY WAY 
 
 nus, and Cepheus, which brings us back again to the 
 neighborhood of the north pole. 
 
 In Cassiopeia, where its width varies from five to 
 ten degrees, the Galaxy passes through the body and 
 chair of the imaginary figure, and is, in general, of 
 the second order of brightness, according to Heis's 
 estimate. But the brightness varies in different spots, 
 and faint branches extend in various directions, one 
 running nearly to Polaris. In leaving Cassiopeia the 
 stream narrows and loses brilliancy, but brightens 
 again after entering Perseus, and is very brilliant 
 around the wonderful double-cluster in the "Sword- 
 hand." There are many offshoots here interspersed 
 with dark spaces. One of these involves Algol, and 
 passes far beyond; another, still larger, passes the 
 Triangle and reaches the head of Aries. 
 
 Nearly the whole constellation of Auriga is in- 
 volved in winding branches of the Milky Way. The 
 brightest portions are between Capella and El Nath 
 in the northern horn of Taurus. One vast loop is 
 thrown out to the Pleiades, although its course is not 
 brilliant ; another, similar, reaches and surrounds the 
 Hyades. 
 
 Passing between Gemini and Orion, the stream 
 with its side-currents becomes very broad, although 
 faint in many places. It is bright around the feet 
 of Gemini, and a curtain of faint light spreads almost 
 to the heads of the Twins, Castor and Pollux, lying 
 near its edge. A vast extension, but one not readily 
 seen except in a very clear sky, involves the belt of 
 Orion. . Otto Baeddicker, who, at Lord Rosse's obser- 
 vatory in Ireland, has made very elaborate studies
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 of the Milky Way, represents a most singular bend 
 setting off from the main stream between Taurus and 
 Orion, and running in a long, narrow curve through 
 the rows of stars that form the "lion's hide," which 
 Orion is represented as carrying for a shield on his 
 left arm. The genesis of all this part of the heavens 
 is evidently recent. It is full of a peculiar type of 
 stars, called the Orion stars, in a relatively early 
 stage of development; it is marked by some of the 
 most singular offsets from the Milky Way, apparently 
 associated with notable rows of stars ; and it contains 
 the most unique nebulous objects, connected with 
 groups and clusters of stars, like the nebulae in the 
 Pleiades and around Orion's belt. One might call 
 it the New World of space, where the more ancient 
 parts of the starry universe may see their history 
 re-beginning and developing on a grander plan, with 
 more magnificent details. 
 
 In Monoceros and Canis Major the Milky Way is 
 faint; in Argo Navis it spreads into broad shallows, 
 but on approaching the Southern Cross it suddenly 
 narrows to a lune-shaped strait, which immediately 
 afterwards expands into a vast luminous cloud com- 
 pletely enveloping the lower part of the Cross and 
 extending on into Centaurus. Between the Cross 
 and Alpha and Beta Centauri appears, in the very 
 midst of the brightest part of the stream, a phe- 
 nomenon which drew almost as much attention from 
 the early navigators of the South Seas as the Cross 
 itself, and which Mr. J. Ellard Gore says is consid- 
 ered by some observers to be the most extraordinary 
 feature of the southern sky. This is a black, pear- 
 176
 
 THE MILKY WAY 
 
 shaped spot about eight degrees long by five degrees 
 wide, bearing the name of the Coal Sack. Some of 
 the first explorers of the southern hemisphere seem 
 to have thought that it was a real object among the 
 stars, and this was the opinion of the sailors, who 
 looked upon it with more or less awe. It is, in fact, 
 an opening in the Milky Way, containing but one 
 star visible to the naked eye, and that a very faint 
 one, while its borders are sharply defined by rich 
 banks of stars. The telescope shows other faint 
 stars within the opening, but they are too scat- 
 tered to make any impression on the eye, so that 
 the effect of contrast causes the Coal Sack to ap- 
 pear distinctly blacker than any other part of the 
 sky. 
 
 After passing Centaurus the Milky Way splits in 
 two, the larger and brighter stream passing through 
 Ara into Sagittarius, while the other enters the east- 
 ern end of Scorpio and finally fades away in Ophiu- 
 chus after throwing out one or two cross - streams 
 which connect it with the main current in Sagittarius. 
 This portion of the Milky Way, which lies just above 
 the southern horizon, as seen from our middle lati- 
 tudes in summer, is very striking in appearance. On 
 a dark night it suggests vast sheets of heat lightning 
 arrested and motionless. But brilliant as this part 
 of the Milky Way appears to us, it is far more brilliant 
 when seen from tropical latitudes on either side of the 
 equator. A vivid description of its appearance in 
 the dry air of the uplands of South Africa is quoted 
 by Mr. Gore from Colonel Markwick, an English army 
 officer : 
 
 177
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 Certainly the Milky Way about the neighborhood of 
 Lupus, Ara, and Norma is a wonderful spectacle, full of a 
 mysterious weirdness with its delicate cloud-like wisps of 
 light and dark passages twining in and out among the star 
 mist. To my mind there is no part of the northern Milky 
 Way to compare to this. 
 
 In Sagittarius and Scutum Sobieskii there are spots 
 which look like luminous knots to the naked eye. 
 The stream is also very bright in Aquila, and won- 
 derfully so in Cygnus, where its long, winding reaches 
 and cross-currents involve the entire figure of the 
 Northern Cross. From Cygnus it passes into Cassio- 
 peia, the point from which we began. 
 
 One cannot study the Milky Way without observ- 
 ing that the great majority of the first-magnitude 
 stars are arranged in, or close along, its course. These 
 are Sirius, Canopus, Alpha Crucis, Alpha and Beta 
 Centauri, Antares, Altair, Vega, Capella, Aldebaran, 
 Betelgeuse, Procyon, and Rigel. The only first -mag- 
 nitude stars which are situated at a great distance 
 from the Milky Way are Arcturus, Regulus, Spica, 
 Achernar, and Fomalhaut. Stars of lesser magnitude 
 also increase in number as the Milky Way is ap- 
 proached, and a very notable circumstance is that the 
 curving wisps and rays that set off from the Milky 
 Way are almost invariably accompanied by accord- 
 ant curves of stars. 
 
 The great circle of first-magnitude stars with, of 
 course, many of the second magnitude among them 
 to which attention has just been called, has often 
 been the subject of remark, and Sir John Herschel and 
 Dr. Gould thought that it indicated the existence of 
 178
 
 THE MILKY WAY 
 
 a flat, disk-shaped cluster of comparatively near-by 
 stars, to which our own sun belongs, placed within the 
 ring of the Milky Way with its plane inclined to the 
 latter at an angle of about twenty degrees. 
 
 The distance of the Milky Way is appalling. Only 
 most uncertain estimates can be made of it, but there 
 seems to be no question that it must exceed twenty 
 thousand millions of millions of miles. Light would 
 require between three and four thousand years to dart 
 over such a distance. If the solar system is travelling 
 from one side of the Milky Way to the other, across 
 the central opening, the whole journey will consume 
 about fifty millions of years. 
 
 "" The mythology of the Milky Way extends through 
 the literature of all nations. Naturally it has always 
 been regarded as a road or path, and the most beauti- 
 ful legends have been associated with it. All of the 
 early nations connected it with the abode of their gods 
 and of translated spirits. It was the pathway of the 
 supernal powers, or that pursued by the dead on their 
 way to brighter realms. The North American Ind- 
 ians, with a delicacy of imagination not inferior to 
 that of the Greeks, saw in the string of brilliant stars 
 that follows the line of the Galaxy the camp - fires 
 lighted along the pathway of the spirits on their 
 journey to the Happy Hunting Grounds. The Greeks, 
 the Hindoos, the Chaldeans, the Egyptians, the Norse- 
 men, the savage tribes of Africa and of Australia, all 
 regarded it as a celestial pathway. 
 
 One of the Greek legends connected it with the 
 story of Phaeton and his unfortunate adventure with 
 the Chariot of the Sun, when the horses, taking fright 
 179
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 at the spectacle of the monsters of the zodiac, and 
 feeling no longer the hand of Apollo upon the reins, 
 bolted from their road, set the heavens on fire, and 
 came near burning up the earth. The scorched track 
 of their runaway was marked by the Milky Way. 
 Another story said that the gods trod this way. In 
 ancient England the Milky Way was sometimes called 
 Watling Street, leading to Asgard; also the Asgard 
 Bridge, a name likewise given to the rainbow. 
 
 Often, however, the idea of a river was associated 
 with the Milky Way, and it must be said that this 
 is more in accord with its appearance. The Chinese 
 and the Japanese regarded it as a stream, and had a 
 beautiful legend that the silvery fishes sporting in its 
 waves were frightened and hid themselves at the sight 
 of the new moon, the shape of which suggested a hook/ 
 a very good way of accounting for the fact that the 
 star-clouds of the Galaxy almost disappear in the 
 presence of moonlight. The Greeks also sometimes 
 called it the Ocean Stream. 
 
 But returning to the idea of a pathway, the Bush- 
 men of South Africa, like the American Indians, as- 
 sociated it with the thought of lights illuminated in 
 the night to guide wandering spirits. It was a line 
 of glowing ashes and embers, they said, by which 
 benighted travellers might find their way. Other 
 savage tribes regarded it as a road along which their 
 dead friends were hunting ostriches. Mr. Allen as- 
 cribes this belief to the Patagonians. 
 
 Lafcadio Hearn, writing of the romance of the 
 Milky Way among the Japanese, and particularly of 
 the story which we have already referred to in con- 
 180
 
 THE MILKY WAY 
 
 nection with the constellations of Aquila and Lyra 
 Chapter IX), says, in his eloquent way: 
 
 In the silence of transparent nights, before the rising of 
 the moon, the charm of the ancient tale sometimes descends 
 upon me out of the scintillant sky, to make me forget the 
 monstrous facts of science and the stupendous horror of 
 Space. Then I no longer behold the Milky Way as that aw- 
 ful Ring of the Cosmos, whose hundred million suns are 
 
 FtseT t? ^ ghte r f^ AbySS ' bUt aS the Ver ^ Amanogawa 
 itself-the Rrver Celestial. I see the thrill of its shining 
 
 stream the mists that hover along its verge, and the water- 
 grasses that bend in the winds of autumn. White Orihime 
 ** a \her starry loom, and the Ox that grazes on the 
 farther shore-and I know that the falling dew is the spray 
 of the Herdsman's oar.
 
 XVI 
 
 THE ZODIACAL LIGHT 
 
 THIS mysterious phenomenon is not, strictly speak- 
 ing, a stellar object, although it is unquestionaably 
 connected with a star our own sun. Like the con- 
 stellations and the Milky Way, it has long attracted 
 a great deal of attention, although it is too indefinite 
 to have any mythological associations, and even yet 
 its nature is not well understood. The general opin- 
 ion at present is that the Zodiacal Light is a faint ex- 
 tension of the sun's corona. It is generally described 
 as a cone - shaped or lenticular light, rising above 
 the western horizon after sunset and above the east- 
 ern horizon before sunrise, but not to be seen at all 
 seasons. It is especially a naked-eye object, for it is 
 too diffuse to be observed with a telescope, and at- 
 tempts to photograph it are not very successful. 
 
 The light lies in, or very near, the plane of the eclip- 
 tic, and consequently is best seen when the ecliptic 
 makes the steepest angle with the horizon. For our 
 latitudes this occurs in the evening during February, 
 March, and April, and in the morning during Sep- 
 tember and October. It can be traced in a clear sky, 
 and in the absence of moonlight to a distance of about 
 sixty degrees from the sun. Of course, it cannot be 
 182
 
 THE ZODIACAL LIGHT 
 
 seen while the sun is above the horizon, and not im- 
 mediately after sunset or before sunrise. It is some- 
 times confounded with twilight, but its distinct nature 
 may be immediately recognized from its shape. 
 Naturally it is best seen in equatorial regions, and 
 Lieutenant Jones, who made a special study of it 
 many years ago, traced it past the zenith, and be- 
 lieved that he could follow it completely across the 
 sky. It ought, indeed, to be thus visible, under 
 favorable circumstances, if it be what it is supposed 
 to be a nebulous envelope surrounding the equa- 
 torial part of the sun, and extending beyond the orbit 
 of the earth. But there is great uncertainty concern- 
 ing the light seen in that part of the sky opposite to 
 the sun, and many observers think it is not a portion 
 of the true Zodiacal Light. This light, opposite the 
 sun, is known as he Gegenschein, and has been par- 
 ticularly studied by Barnard. It is extremely faint, 
 and few have ever seen it. 
 
 I have already, in Chapter I., referred to a view 
 of the Zodiacal Light which I once had in an early 
 autumn morning from the bare cone of Mount Etna, 
 when it shone with a brilliancy that greatly surprised 
 me. M. Du Chaillu has given a picturesque descrip- 
 tion of its appearance as he saw it during his gorilla 
 hunts in Equatorial Africa: 
 
 As if to give a still grander view to the almost enchanting 
 scene, the Zodiacal Light rose after the sun had set, increas- 
 ing in brilliancy, of a bright yellow color, and rising in a 
 pyramidal shape high in the sky, often so bright that it 
 overshadowed the brightness of the Milky Way and the rays 
 of the moon, the beautiful yellow light diminishing towards 
 183
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 the apex. It cast a gentle radiance on the clouds around it, 
 and sometimes formed almost a ring, but never perfect, 
 having a break near the meridian; at times being reflected 
 in the east with nearly as much brilliancy, if not as much as 
 in the west, and making one almost imagine a second sun- 
 rise. 
 
 The Zodiacal Light in its brightest part is more 
 brilliant than the Milky Way. It is brightest along 
 its central line, and gradually fades away at the sides. 
 It has at times been supposed to be variable in brill- 
 iancy. Humboldt says that in Europe several suc- 
 cessive years elapsed during which it was affirmed 
 that scarcely any Zodiacal Light could be seen. He 
 this describes his observations of it during a voyage 
 from Lima to the western coast of Mexico : 
 
 For three or four nights, between 10 and 14 north lat- 
 itude, the Zodiacal Light has appeared in greater splendor 
 than I have ever observed it. An hour after sunset it was 
 seen in great brilliancy between Aldebaran and the Pleiades. 
 Narrow, elongated clouds are scattered over the beautiful 
 deep azure of the distant horizon, flitting past the Zodiacal 
 Light as before a golden curtain. 
 
 These observations were made about the middle 
 of March. 
 
 Professor Wright, of Yale, has found that the spec- 
 trum of the Zodiacal Light is continuous, indicating 
 that it is simply reflected sunlight, and Professor 
 Young apparently favored the view that the phenom- 
 enon was caused by the existence of myriads of small 
 meteoric bodies revolving around the sun nearly in 
 the plane of the ecliptic, and "forming a thin, flat 
 sheet like one of Saturn's rings, and extending far 
 184
 
 THE ZODIACAL LIGHT 
 
 beyond the orbit of the earth." This recalls a re- 
 mark of the Russian astronomer Struve, that, in all 
 probability, Saturn's rings viewed from that planet 
 itself would not look as they do to us, but would ap- 
 pear only as a shimmering wreath surrounding the 
 planet, and perhaps no brighter than the Milky Way. 
 Sir John Herschel, who entertained a similar idea of 
 the nature of the Zodiacal Light, suggested that the 
 presence of this phenomenon might give the sun, as 
 viewed from distant space, the appearance of a neb- 
 ulous star. He also expressed the opinion that the 
 Zodiacal Light might be "no other than the denser 
 part of that medium which, we have some reason to 
 believe, resists the motion of comets ; loaded perhaps 
 with the actual materials of the tails of millions of 
 those bodies of which they have been stripped in their 
 successive perihelion passages." 
 
 But the whole subject is still involved in obscurity, 
 and a generally acceptable theory of the origin and 
 nature of the Zodiacal Light remains to be found.
 
 XVII 
 
 THE PLANETS 
 
 THE distinction between the stars and the planets 
 as they appear in the sky is one which is never 
 popularly made. For all except astronomers and per- 
 sons accustomed to view the heavens, the planets are 
 simply stars. There is an unquestionable difference to 
 a ***ained eye between the light of a planet and that 
 of a star, the first being steadier and less affected by 
 the phenomenon known as scintillation, but to most 
 eyes this difference is not readily apparent, although 
 everybody recognizes it when once it has been point- 
 ed out. The fact is the stars are so distant that, 
 notwithstanding their immense actual magnitude, 
 they appear, even with the telescope, as mere points, 
 while the planets are near enough to present sensible 
 disks. Moreover, the stars shine with a piercing light 
 of their own, while the planets are luminous only with 
 reflected sunlight. 
 
 Nevertheless, a very large planet, like Jupiter, or 
 one of moderate size, like Venus, which comes rela- 
 tively near to us, outshines even the most brilliant of 
 the stars. Venus has often been distinctly seen in the 
 daytime with the naked eye, and its light is at times 
 sufficiently bright to cast a shadow. Even Mercury 
 1 86
 
 THE PLANETS 
 
 and Mars, except when the latter is in the more dis- 
 tant parts of its orbit, are brighter than standard 
 stars of the first magnitude, and Mars in opposition, 
 with its startlingly red light, overpowers the most 
 brilliant stars that lie along its path. 
 
 For the ordinary observer of the heavens the cease- 
 less changes of place which the planets undergo make 
 their identification more or less difficult. Since, like 
 the earth, they all travel regularly around the sun, 
 it is manifest that they must appear continually in 
 motion against the background of the starry sky, 
 which is spread like a spangled curtain behind them. 
 The rapidity of their changes depends upon their 
 distance from the sun. The nearer ones, travelling 
 at a higher speed and having shorter orbits, go ro* id 
 in a relatively brief time, while the more distant ones, 
 moving more slowly and having much larger orbits, 
 require long periods to complete their circuits. Two 
 of the planets, Mercury and Venus, being nearer the 
 sun than the earth is, never appear to us at a point 
 in the sky opposite to the sun, but are always seen 
 on one side or the other of it sometimes on the east 
 side after sunset, and sometimes on the west side 
 before sunrise. They are the true Morning and Even- 
 ing stars. The other planets, being all more distant 
 than the earth from the sun, may be seen in any part 
 of the sky along the zodiacal circle at any hour of the 
 night, their visibility at any particular time depending 
 upon their positions in their orbits, and also upon the 
 position of the earth with reference to the sun. They 
 maybe behind the sun as viewed from the earth, or they 
 may be in the quarter of the sky opposite to the sun. 
 187
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 But the apparent perplexity involved in the effort 
 to follow the planets through the sky, which seems 
 hopeless to those who have never undertaken to solve 
 the problem for themselves, disappears as soon as 
 they have once been recognized, and their places at 
 any given time have been ascertained. After that, 
 from a knowledge of their orbital movements, they 
 can be found at any subsequent time. 
 
 We shall concern ourselves here with only five of 
 the planets Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Sat- 
 urn because the other two, Uranus and Neptune, are 
 too faint on account of distance to be studied with 
 the naked eye. A diagram has been made to aid the 
 reader in tracing the places of the three outer planets 
 named. In this diagram the positions of the twelve zo- 
 diacal constellations are shown, and within the circle 
 of the constellations three other circles are drawn one 
 for Saturn, one for Jupiter, and one for Mars ; and on 
 these circles the positions of the respective planets are 
 marked in twelve successive years, from 1908 to 1920, 
 covering a complete revolution of Jupiter. Simply for 
 convenience of reference, the positions are shown at 
 the opening of each year. For Jupiter, and more es- 
 pecially for Saturn, these positions change very little 
 in the course of a few months, but Mars travels much 
 more swiftly. By noting in what constellation the 
 planet appears, as shown in the outer circle, its ap- 
 proximate place among the stars may be ascertained. 
 When once it is known that Jupiter, Saturn, or Mars 
 is to be seen within the borders of any given constella- 
 tion, no difficulty will be found in recognizing the 
 planet concerned, especially after the reader has be- 
 188
 
 THE PLANETS 
 
 come a little familiar with the grouping of the stars 
 in each constellation, for then the presence of a large 
 planet among the well-known stars proclaims itself. 
 
 The recognition of the planets is rendered so much 
 the easier by the fact that their orbits are all con- 
 fined within the limits of the zodiacal band, which ex- 
 tends eight degrees on each side of the ecliptic, or the 
 apparent path of the sun. Accordingly they are al- 
 ways to be found in one or another of the zodiacal 
 189
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 constellations. They all advance from west to east, 
 although when they are nearest to the earth they ap- 
 pear for a relatively short time to move slowly back- 
 ward, an effect of the more rapid motion of the earth 
 in passing them. 
 
 It will be found that the position of a planet at 
 the beginning of any particular year may be so close 
 to the sun that the planet cannot readily be seen at 
 that time, for the sun makes the round of the zodiac 
 once every year, passing each of the planets in succes- 
 sion. The reader may allow for this, and may esti- 
 mate when the planet will be far enough from the sun 
 to be visible by simply noting that in January the sun 
 passes from Sagittarius into Capricornus, in February 
 from Capricornus through Aquarius, in March from 
 Aquarius through Pisces, in April from Pisces through 
 Aries, in May through Taurus, in June from Taurus 
 into Gemini, in July from Gemini through Cancer, in 
 August from Cancer through Leo, in September from 
 Leo into Virgo, in October through Virgo into Libra, 
 in November through Libra into Scorpio, and in De- 
 cember from Scorpio into Sagittarius. 
 
 The constellations, as before explained, have, in con- 
 sequence of the precession of the equinoxes, drifted 
 out of connection with the framework of the zodiac 
 which is formed with the signs as a basis. Thus the 
 sign Aries is now in the constellation Pisces, the sign 
 Taurus covers the constellation Aries, etc. In the al- 
 manacs the course of the sun and planets it traced by 
 the zodiacal signs, but since it is the constellations 
 and not the signs which are visible in the sky, I have 
 used the constellations for reference in indicating the 
 190
 
 THE PLANETS 
 
 places of the planets. The chief disadvantage arises 
 from the fact that while the signs are all exactly thirty 
 degrees in length, the constellations are of various 
 lengths, and have more or less arbitrary boundaries. 
 Yet their distinguishing star groups render them al- 
 ways recognizable, and so they may serve for sign- 
 posts in naked-eye observation to indicate the move- 
 ments of the planets. 
 
 For the two inner planets, Mercury and Venus, no 
 diagram covering any considerable period of time is 
 practicable. But many almanacs show when they 
 are to be seen as morning and evening stars, and 
 those who wish to trace their apparitions in advance 
 may do so with the aid of the " Barritt-Serviss Star 
 and Planet Finder." The period of Mercury from 
 one conjunction to the next is about one hundred and 
 sixteen days, and that of Venus is about five hundred 
 and eighty-four days. 
 
 To the ancients, watching the constant movements 
 of the planets, as well as of the sun and the moon, 
 these movements being superposed upon the appar- 
 ent annual revolution of the entire heavens, the 
 celestial system appeared extremely complex, and 
 hence arose the old Ptolemaic theory that the earth 
 was the common centre of the whole, while the 
 periodic backward movements of the planets were 
 produced by motion in epicycles. But ages before 
 Ptolemy the geocentric idea had prevailed, and upon 
 it was based the poetically beautiful conception of 
 the Music of the Spheres. Each planet, including the 
 sun and the moon, was supposed to be carried in a 
 transparent crystalline sphere, and the motion of 
 191
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 these spheres rotating one within another was con- 
 ceived to give rise to a celestial harmony audible to 
 the gods, but beyond the range of human ears: 
 
 There's not the smallest orb which thou behold'st 
 But in his motion like an angel sings, 
 Still quiring to the young-eyed cherubims. 
 Such harmony is in immortal souls, 
 But whilst this muddy vesture of decay 
 Doth grossly close in it we cannot hear it. 
 
 Merchant of Venice, Act V., Scene i. 
 
 An elaborate scale of harmony was invented repre- 
 senting the tones of the various spheres. Cicero was 
 delighted with these old Greek ideas, and gave them 
 elegant expression. He thought that the moon should 
 be regarded as the bass singer in this heavenly choir, 
 while the fixed stars furnished the higher notes. Kep- 
 ler, who spent as much time in such dreams as in 
 scientific study of the universe, gave the bass notes 
 to Jupiter and Saturn, the tenor to Mars, the con- 
 tralto to the Earth and Venus, and the soprano to 
 Mercury. 
 
 Mercury 
 
 The five naked-eye planets were naturally the only 
 ones known to the ancients, and of these Mercury, 
 the nearest to the sun, was probably the last to be 
 recognized. The time of his first discovery is un- 
 known, but there is extant an observation of him made 
 sixty years after the death of Alexander the Great, 
 and a Chinese observation in the year 118 B.C. He 
 must have been seen at a much earlier date, alter- 
 192
 
 THE PLANETS 
 
 nately in the morning and the evening sky. At first 
 he was supposed to be two independent planets, and 
 accordingly received two names. As a morning star 
 the Egyptians called him Set, and as an evening 
 star Horus. The corresponding names among the 
 Hindoos were Buddha and Rauhineya, and among the 
 Greeks Apollo and Mercury. Finally the fact was 
 recognized that the supposed two planets were really 
 one, and the name Mercury was universally bestowed 
 upon it in the Greco-Roman world. This name after- 
 wards became associated with our fourth day of the 
 week, which appears as Wednesday in English, de- 
 rived through the Saxon Wuotan, but which was 
 Mercurii dies in Latin, whence the French Mercredi. 
 
 Cercury (Rp^i)? in Greek) was the messenger of 
 gods, and himself a god, who especially pat- 
 ronized orators, merchants, travellers, and thieves. 
 He was the first of thieves, a very Olympian Tweed, 
 for he feared nobody when the itch for possession 
 seized him. He stole Jove's sceptre, Mars's sword, 
 Neptune's trident, and Venus's girdle. He could 
 assume any shape, and nobody could trust him; and 
 yet the gods loved him. He was the personification 
 of shrewdness. If myth-making were in fashion now 
 there would be no difficulty in finding a prototype for 
 Mercury. 
 
 Astronomers have to acknowledge that their science 
 was born as astrology, and the astrologers based their 
 system of celestial influences mainly upon the planets 
 (including the sun and the moon). They adopted the 
 ancient ideas about the character of Mercury. Says 
 old William Lilly:
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 We may not call him either masculine or feminine, for he 
 is either one or the other as joined to any planet, for if in 
 conjunction with a masculine planet he becomes masculine, 
 if with a feminine then feminine ; but of his own nature he is 
 cold and dry, and therefore melancholy. With the good he 
 is good, with the evil planets ill. He is author of subtlety, 
 tricks, devices, perjury. Being well dignified, he represents 
 a man of a subtle and political brain and intellect, an ex- 
 cellent disputant and logician, using much eloquence in his 
 speech ... a searcher into all kinds of mysteries and learning, 
 sharp and witty, naturally desirous to travel, a man of un- 
 wearied fancy, curious in the search for any occult knowledge, 
 able by his own genius to produce wonders, given to divination. 
 If he turn merchant no man exceeds him in way of trade or 
 invention of new ways whereby to obtain wealth. ... If ill- 
 dignified he is a troublesome wit, a kind of phrenetic man, 
 his tongue and pen against every man, a great liar, boaster, 
 tattler, busybody, a tale-carrier, addicted to wicked acts, 
 easy of belief, an ass or very idiot, constant in no place or 
 opinion, cheating and thieving everywhere. If he prove a 
 divine, then a mere verbal fellow, frothy, of no judgment, 
 easily perverted. . . . He generally signifies all literary men, 
 philosophers, mathematicians, astrologians, merchants, sculp- 
 tors, poets, orators, advocates, schoolmasters, ambassadors, 
 artificers; sometimes thieves, grammarians, tailors, usurers. 
 
 Perhaps the most curious thing in connection with 
 this is that astrology still survives, and I do not 
 know how many thousands of men and women yet 
 think, or allow themselves to be persuaded, that if 
 Mercury presided over their birth they must partake 
 of these qualities, according as his protean nature 
 may have been affected at the time by the influence 
 of other planets. These things, however ridiculous 
 they may be, have played far too great a part in 
 human history to be ignored. Even Kepler was af- 
 194
 
 THE PLANETS 
 
 fected by astrological superstition, and Tycho cast 
 horoscopes when royalty commanded and he couldn't 
 refuse. Galileo, to banish the fears of the wife of the 
 Grand-Duke Ferdinando I., who was very ill, recast 
 his horoscope, and predicted that he had yet many 
 years to live. But, alas! for Galileo's skill in astrology, 
 Ferdinando died within twenty-two weeks. 
 
 As a naked-eye object Mercury is very brilliant 
 when he can be seen, which is not very frequently. 
 He never gets more than about twenty-eight degrees 
 from the sun less than the length of one zodiacal sign. 
 As a morning star he is best seen, from our latitudes, 
 in the autumn, and as an evening star in the spring. 
 At his greatest elongation he never sets or rises much 
 -more than two hours after, or before, the sun. It is 
 a legend in astronomical history that Copernicus 
 never succeeded in seeing Mercury. Mr. Hind, the 
 distinguished English astronomer, never saw Mercury 
 with the naked eye but once in his life. On account 
 of his shy habits he excites curiosity, and it is very 
 well worth anybody's while to get a glimpse of him 
 when he is well placed. He glows in the twilight with 
 great brilliancy, although far inferior in brightness 
 to Venus when she is near. Occasionally the two 
 planets may be seen in conjunction, in the morning 
 or evening sky, and the spectacle is always an inter- 
 esting one. The light of Venus is whiter and more 
 dazzling, probably owing to the dense clouds in her 
 atmosphere. Mercury sometimes presents a slightly 
 reddish tint. Owing to his rapid movements, he soon 
 disappears in the sun's rays, only to emerge again a 
 few weeks later on the other side. Perhaps the sur-
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 prise experienced by the eye in seeing Mercury so 
 bright in the retreating or the on-coming daylight 
 adds to the effect that he produces. To the eye of 
 fancy he resembles a gem pinned upon the curtain of 
 the evening, and the Greeks often spoke of Mercury 
 by the name of The Sparkler. 
 
 Mercury has given his name to a metal which, in 
 some respects, is not unlike the planet, being very 
 sparkling in appearance and very shifty in conduct, 
 running away and hiding itself whenever the chance 
 offers. The old alchemists originally bestowed the 
 name of Mercury upon all volatile metals, but since 
 their time it has been restricted to "quicksilver," a 
 word derived from the Latin argentum vivum. It is a 
 singular fact that, according to recent determinations, 
 the density of the planet is about equal to that of 
 the metal mercury. 
 
 The ancient idea that Mercury was the patron of 
 travellers may have been suggested by the rapid 
 movements of the planet. Being, in round numbers, 
 only 36,000,000 miles from the sun, his mean orbital 
 velocity amounts to twenty-nine miles per second, 
 while when he is travelling at his highest speed he goes 
 thirty-five miles per second. The difference in his 
 velocity at different times arises from the great eccen- 
 tricity of his orbit. When in perihelion he is only 
 28,500,000 miles from the sun, while at aphelion this 
 is increased to 43,500,000. In other words, his dis- 
 tance from the sun varies to the extent of 15,000,000 
 miles, and this in a period of only about six weeks! 
 On the average he receives from the sun nearly six 
 and three-quarters times as much heat and light as 
 196
 
 THE PLANETS 
 
 the earth does, but this amount is so variable that 
 it is more than twice as great in perihelion as in 
 aphelion. 
 
 Mercury's period of revolution, or his year, is three- 
 quarters of an hour less than eighty-eight days, and 
 he comes into conjunction with the earth once in 
 about one hundred and sixteen days. From the 
 earth his distance varies from about 57,000,000 miles 
 at inferior conjunction to about 129,000,000 miles at 
 superior conjunction. If the orbit of Mercury lay in 
 the same plane as that of the earth, he would be seen 
 crossing the disk of the sun as a round black spot 
 three times every year i. e., every time he is in in- 
 ferior conjunction with the earth. But his orbit is, 
 in fact, so inclined to that of our globe that these 
 transits across the sun are relatively rare. On the 
 average, there are thirteen of them every one hun- 
 dred years, and they always occur either in May or 
 November. The latest transit of Mercury occurred 
 in November, 1907, and the next four will occur No- 
 vember, 6, 1914; May 7, 1924; November 8, 1927; and 
 May 10, 1937. 
 
 Mercury is the smallest of the planets, the asteroids 
 being left out of consideration. His diameter is only 
 three thousand miles, so that his surface is but one- 
 seventh as great as that of the earth. Nevertheless, 
 as already remarked, his density is very great, amount- 
 ing, according to the estimates of Backlund, to near- 
 ly 12.5, that of water being seven. This is nearly 
 the density of the metal mercury. This extraordinary 
 density may be regarded as an indication that the 
 planet is entirely metallic in its constitution. Esti- 
 197
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 mates of the density vary widely, but they are all 
 high. Being situated so near the centre of the solar 
 system, there are reasons why Mercury might natural- 
 ly be composed of materials of greater mean density 
 than those found in the earth. The heaviest sub- 
 stances would, in the process of condensation from a 
 nebulous state, seek the centre. Being nearer than 
 the earth to the sun, Mercury presents in succession 
 all the phases which are shown by the moon, but these 
 can only be seen with the aid of telescopes. 
 
 The question of the presence or absence of life al- 
 ways arises in connection with the planets, and it can 
 only be answered in a general way by appealing to 
 our knowledge of their physical condition, as well as 
 of their situation with respect to the sun, which is 
 the universal source of light, heat, and radiant energy 
 of all kinds. For such information we are partly 
 dependent upon telescopic observation. This is diffi- 
 cult on account of the planet's nearness to the sun, 
 and in recent times many such observations have 
 been made in full daylight when Mercury is high 
 above the obscuring mists and confusing atmospheric 
 currents of the horizon. The results are not very 
 encouraging. Few of the surface features of the 
 planet can be clearly discerned. There is nothing to 
 indicate the presence of oceans and continents, al- 
 though some observers have thought that they found 
 evidence of the existence of extremely lofty moun- 
 tains. The general impression at present is that Mer- 
 cury's surface is altogether barren as far as life is con- 
 cerned, and that it more nearly resembles the moon 
 than the earth. 
 
 198
 
 THE PLANETS 
 
 Schiaparelli, Lowell, and other observers believe 
 that they have found permanent markings upon 
 Mercury of an unknown character (Lowell's drawings 
 show many of them in the form of narrow lines cross- 
 ing one another like the "canals" of Mars), and upon 
 observation of these markings has been based the 
 startling conclusion that Mercury does not revolve 
 rapidly upon his axis, like the earth, as all the older 
 observers supposed, but turns only once in the course 
 of a revolution around the sun. The result, of course, 
 is that the little planet lies in a predicament with re- 
 gard to the sun, precisely like that of the moon with 
 regard to the earth. He keeps always the same face 
 towards the sun, from which it follows that one half 
 is exposed to perpetual day, while the other half is 
 plunged in unending night. The effect upon any 
 forms of life existing on his surface may be left for 
 the imagination to trace. Owing, however, to the 
 great eccentricity of his orbit, there must be a zone, 
 perpendicular to the equator and reaching from pole 
 to pole, over which the sun appears to rise and set 
 once in the course of a revolution. This zone is about 
 fourteen hundred miles in breadth at the equator, 
 diminishing to zero at the poles. But the existence 
 of this zone does not help much in favoring the hy- 
 pothesis of the possible presence of organic life. 
 
 The cause of the coincidence in the rotation and 
 revolution periods is believed to be "tidal friction," 
 a subject mathematically developed by Professor 
 George Darwin, and summed up by him in his book 
 on The Tides. 
 
 Another thing inimical to life on Mercury is his 
 199
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE^ 
 
 nearness to the sun. We have already seen that, on 
 the average, he gets nearly six and three-quarter times 
 as much solar light and heat as comes to the earth. 
 This in itself would seem to prohibit the presence of . 
 beings resembling ourselves, for it must make the 
 mean temperature of the planet's surface far above 
 that of boiling water, so that no liquid can exist on it. 
 On the other hand, there is little evidence of the 
 existence of any clouds or any watery vapor on Mer- 
 cury. But the situation is made still more difficult 
 by the fact of the great and rapid changes of tempera- 
 ture which Mercury undergoes on account of the 
 eccentricity of the orbit. When he is nearest to the 
 sun he receives two and a quarter times as much light 
 and heat as when he is farthest from the sun, and the 
 change from one position to the other occupies only 
 six weeks. This is to be plunged from the frying-pan 
 into the fire with a vengeance! The only thing in 
 which the surface condition of Mercury approaches 
 close to that of the earth appears to be the force of; 
 gravity, which is five-sixths of that on our globe. Ac- 
 cordingly there would not be much difference in the 
 weight of a man on Mercury and on the earth. 
 
 Upon the whole, then, it may be said that Mercury 
 cannot be regarded as a habitable globe, and it is 
 exceedingly doubtful if he has ever had any inhabi- 
 tants. If so, they must have differed very widely from 
 the creatures of the earth. So we must dismiss, with 
 an indulgent smile, the speculations of delightful old 
 Thomas Dick concerning the number of intellectual 
 beings in the solar system, in which he assigned just 
 8,960,000,000 inhabitants to the planet Mercury!
 
 THE PLANETS 
 Venus 
 
 Gem of the crimson-colored even, 
 Companion of retiring day, 
 Why at the closing gates of heaven, 
 Beloved star, dost thou delay? 
 
 Campbell. 
 
 The zenith of poetic suggestion and association 
 among celestial objects is unquestionably occupied by 
 the planet Venus. The singers of all ages and all peo- 
 ples have chanted her praises, and almost universally 
 she has been associated with the goddess of love : 
 
 Etoile qui descend stir la verte colline, 
 Triste larme d'argent du manteau de la nuit, 
 Toi que regarde au loin le patre qui chemine 
 Tandis que, pas a pas, son long troupeau le suit, 
 Etoile! ou t'en vas-tu dans cette nuit immense? 
 Cherches-tu sur la rive un lit dans les roseaux? 
 Ou t'en vas-tu, si belle a 1'heure du silence, 
 Tomber comme une perle au sein profond des eaux? 
 Ah! si tu dois mourir, bel astre, et si sa tete 
 Va dans la vaste mer plonger tes blonds cheveux, 
 Avant de nous quitter un seul instant arrete: 
 Etoile d'amour ne descends pas des cieux! 
 
 Lamartine . 
 
 It is unnecessary to say how Venus got her name. 
 Homer, who has mentioned no other planet, could not 
 ^omit her. HisJer^tTfe^fer Venus is "the Beautiful." 
 Like Mercury, Venus appears in succession as morn- 
 ing and as evening star, and, like Mercury, she was 
 at first supposed to be two stars; and she received 
 two distinct names Phosphorus in the morning, and
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 Hesperus in the evening sky/ Pythagoras is sup- 
 posed to have been the first to identify Hesperus 
 with Venus. The earliest recorded observation of 
 Venus was made 686 B.C., but she must have been 
 watched with admiration from the beginning of hu- 
 man history. Some have identified her with Isaiah's 
 "Lucifer, Son of the Morning." The Arabs called her 
 El Zorah, the "Splendor of Heaven." Sirius himself 
 pales to insignificance in comparison with Venus when 
 she is near inferior conjunction with the earth. To 
 many persons unfamiliar with the sky she then ap- 
 pears incredibly brilliant for a star, and since the 
 development of electric lamps she has often been 
 mistaken for an aerial signal sent aloft in the night, 
 ^rago relates that in 1797, when Napoleon returned 
 to Paris after his campaigns in Italy, he was aston- 
 ished to see the crowds around the palace of the 
 Luxembourg fixing their eyes upon the sky. Then he 
 looked up himself and saw Venus gleaming there in 
 full daylight. The people enthusiastically applauded 
 the apparition as his star. In fact, it is not difficult to 
 see Venus by day if one knows exactly where to look/ 
 when she is nearest to the earth, and when her dis- 
 tance is reduced to about 26,000,000 miles. Her 
 light then is about ^one-thousandth of that received 
 from the full moon, but, being concentrated almost 
 in a point, it impresses the eye with dazzling efful- 
 gence. 
 
 The reason why Venus, like Mercury, cannot be 
 seen in the midnight sky, but only before or after 
 the sun, in the morning and the evening, has already 
 been sufficiently explained. But while Mercury, on
 
 
 THE PLANETS 
 
 account of his nearness to the sun, can be observed 
 only with some difficulty, Venus, whose average dis- 
 tance from the sun is 67,000,000 miles, goes far enough 
 away from him, first in the east and then in the west, 
 to become very conspicuous. At her greatest elon- 
 gation she may appear as far as forty-seven degrees 
 from the sun. She returns to inferior conjunction 
 every 584 days. Her conjunction in 1908 occurs 
 July 6th. With this as a basis her future movements 
 can readily be estimated. Her orbital period, or time 
 of revolution around the sun, is 225 days. That, of 
 course, represents the length of her year. 
 
 The astrologers have not been less attentive to 
 Venus than to Mercury, and of course they have 
 recognized her "qualities" in her conventional char- 
 acter as the representative of Aphrodite. I quote 
 again from Lilly: 
 
 She is a feminine planet, temperately cold and moist; 
 nocturnal, the lesser fortune, author of mirth and cheerful- 
 ness. She signifies, when well dignified, a quiet man, not 
 given to law, quarrel, or wrangling, not vicious, pleasant, 
 neat, and spruce, rather drinking much than gluttonous; 
 often entangled in love matters, zealous in affections, mu- 
 sical, delighting in amusement, easy of belief, not given to 
 labor, or to take any pains; a right virtuous man or woman, 
 often jealous, yet without cause. When ill-dignified, a riot- 
 ous, expensive person, wholly given to dissipation, lewd, 
 fantastical, a mere skip-jack, of no faith, a mere lazy com- 
 panion, nothing careful of the things of this life or anything 
 religious. . . . She signifies musicians, gamesters, silkmen, 
 mercers, painters, jewellers, players, lapidaries, embroider- 
 ers, choristers, fiddlers; when joined with the moon, ballad- 
 singers, perfumers, seamstresses, engravers, upholsterers, 
 glovers, -and such as sell those commodities which adorn 
 203
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 women, either in body, as clothes, or in face, as complex- 
 ion waters. Her cities are Vienna and Turin. 
 
 The old astrologer avers that "a right Venus per- 
 son is a pretty, complete, handsome man or woman." 
 And another astrologer adds that those who have 
 Venus strong in their nativities invariably have dim- 
 ples in the cheek or chin. It is comforting to be assured 
 of so agreeable a mark of identification, bestowed by 
 so winning a member of the old Olympic conclave. 
 
 From Venus is derived the name of the sixth day 
 of the week, Veneris dies ; in French, Vendredi. 
 
 In astronomical history Venus is celebrated for 
 having furnished to Galileo, during his first observa- 
 tion with the telescope in 1610, a crushing refutation 
 of the old Ptolemaic, or geocentric, system. Venus, 
 like Mercury, exhibits phases similar to those of the 
 moon as she moves through her orbit. When she is 
 on the opposite side of the sun from the earth, she 
 appears round like the full moon; when she moves 
 between the sun and the earth, she passes through 
 the various crescent and waning phases. These 
 Galileo discovered with his little telescope. But it 
 was dangerous in his day to upset received opinions, 
 and he kept the discovery to himself for a while, 
 simply confiding to his friend Giulio de' Medici an 
 enigmatic announcement of it, to which he himself 
 later furnished the clew. For reference it may be 
 well to give Galileo's Latin anagram, as he sent it in 
 September, 1610, and his explanation of it, sent in 
 January, 1611: 
 
 HCBC immatura, a ine, jam jrustra, leguntur. 0. Y. 
 204
 
 THE PLANETS 
 
 Neglecting the superfluous letters 0. Y., this reads 
 in English: "These unripe things are read as yet in 
 vain by me." 
 
 The explanation was made by simply transposing 
 the letters of the Latin anagram so that it now reads : 
 
 Cynthia figuras cemulatur Mater Amorum. 
 
 This means in English: "The Mother of Loves 
 imitates the shapes of Cynthia." By the "Mother 
 of Loves," of course, he meant Venus, and by "Cyn- 
 thia" the moon. 
 
 The smallest modern telescope easily shows the 
 phases of Venus, which, at first, were imperfectly re- 
 vealed by Galileo's instrument. 
 
 Like Mercury, also, Venus at certain times passes 
 across the disk of the sun. These transits of Venus 
 are both more rare and more important than those 
 of Mercury. For reasons arising out of the relations 
 between the orbital movements of Venus and the 
 earth, the transits occur in pairs, and always either 
 at the beginning of June or the beginning of Decem- 
 ber. The two transits constituting a pair occur eight 
 years apart, while the successive pairs are separated 
 by an interval of one hundred and twenty-two years. 
 The latest transits of Venus occurred in December, 
 1874, and December, 1882. The next pair is due in 
 June, 2004, and June, 2012. The present reader will 
 hardly take an expectant interest in the statement 
 that when in transit Venus can be seen with the naked 
 eye (protected by a dark glass), and that the perfect 
 roundness of her figure and the inky blackness of her 
 silhouette make the spectacle surprisingly attractive. 
 205
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 The transits of Venus have held a high rank among 
 astronomical phenomena on account of the oppor- 
 tunity which they afford to measure the parallax, 
 and hence the distance, of the sun. But since 1882 
 other and better methods have been developed, so 
 that for our descendants of the twenty-first century 
 these transits will probably possess only such interest 
 as their picturesqueness and their historic importance 
 may lend to them. 
 
 There are many circumstances which make Venus 
 particularly interesting from the point of view of the 
 problem of habitability. In the first place, she is 
 very nearly the twin of the earth in size. Her diam- 
 eter is 7700 miles, and her surface is only 5 per cent, 
 less in area than that of our globe. Her density 
 is somewhat less than the earth's, so that the force 
 of gravity on her surface is about 85 per cent, of ter- 
 restrial gravity. Anything that weighs 100 pounds 
 on the earth would weigh 85 pounds if removed to 
 Venus. As far as this influences living beings, we 
 might suppose that they would be perceptibly larger 
 on Venus than on the earth. 
 
 In the next place, Venus possesses an abundant 
 atmosphere, charged with watery vapor. Both tele- 
 scopic and spectroscopic observations prove the cor- 
 rectness of this statement. In fact, the atmosphere 
 of Venus appears to be decidedly more dense than 
 the earth's, or at least more cloudy, and this may 
 possibly be an important agent in ameliorating the 
 climatic condition of the planet. Being so much 
 nearer the sun, she gets about twice as much solar 
 light and heat as we do; but, on the other hand, her 
 206
 
 THE PLANETS 
 
 orbit is the most nearly circular of any in the solar 
 system, so that, unlike Mercury, she experiences very 
 slight changes in the amount of radiant energy poured 
 down upon her by the sun. A peculiar composition 
 of the atmosphere, or an unbroken canopy of clouds, 
 may modify the heat and the light to a surprising 
 degree. But even without any modification, it is 
 not certain that the doubling of the solar radiation, 
 as compared with its intensity on the earth, would 
 be prohibitive of life. It might be unbearable to us, 
 but agreeable to beings constituted to meet it. We 
 may imagine Venus as the tropics of the solar system, 
 a world of intense heats, brilliant colors, sensuous en- 
 joyments, and luxuriant abundance of life. 
 
 One of the evidences of the density and probable 
 cloudiness of Venus's atmosphere is furnished by her 
 brilliancy. She is so dazzling in the telescope that 
 hardly any of her features are discernible. The best 
 observations are those made by daylight, when some 
 of the glare is taken off. Mr. Lowell has made the 
 most elaborate drawings of Venus that we possess, 
 and, as in the case of Mercury, they exhibit in some 
 respects a striking resemblance to telescopic pictures 
 of Mars, consisting largely of narrow lines arranged 
 on a system of intersections. Taken by itself, this 
 might be regarded as a suspicious circumstance sug- 
 gesting possible deception of the observer's eyes. At 
 any rate, the markings on Venus are indistinct, and 
 astronomers in general are not yet disposed to accept 
 the conclusion based upon them, originally by Schia- 
 parelli, and later by Lowell, that Venus, like Mercury, 
 rotates only once on her axis in the course of one of 
 207
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 her years, thus keeping the same face always sun- 
 ward. If it should finally turn out that this view is 
 well founded, then, it must be confessed, the theory 
 of the habitability of Venus would be much more 
 difficult to maintain. A world half day and half 
 night, with its absolute contrasts of climate, physical 
 conditions, scenery, and race would offer a marvellous 
 field for the play of the imagination, but sober science 
 would not concern itself greatly about animated ex- 
 istence on such a planetary monstrosity. 
 
 Brilliant beyond comparison as Venus appears to 
 us, the earth must be far more brilliant when it 
 shines in the midnight sky of Venus. When Venus 
 appears brightest to our eyes, only about one-quarter 
 of her surface, as seen from the earth, is illuminated 
 by the sun. At the same time, nearly the whole sur- 
 face of the earth appears illuminated as seen from 
 Venus. A short time afterwards, when Venus be- 
 comes lost to us in the solar rays, the earth crosses 
 her meridian at midnight in the form of a full moon, 
 and, as observations of the phases both of the moon 
 and of the interior planets prove, the gain in light 
 reflected from a fully illuminated globe is far greater 
 than that indicated by the increase in the area of the 
 reflecting surface. It has been shown, for instance, 
 that the full moon sends us nine times as much light 
 as the half-moon. When the earth is in its full phase, 
 as seen from Venus, it must be a phenomenon of 
 truly amazing splendor, while the attractiveness of 
 the spectacle is singularly increased by the visibility 
 at the same time of the moon, slowly circling about 
 the earth. If the desire to find a means of com- 
 208
 
 THE PLANETS 
 
 municating with the other worlds visible in our sky 
 has seized imaginative minds among us, how much 
 more intense should that desire be among the inhabi- 
 tants of Venus (if they exist), when they behold this 
 great, round earth magnificently pouring her beams 
 upon their heads ! When we gaze with admiration at 
 Venus in her glory, it is a captivating thought that 
 to her we present a spectacle far more glorious still. 
 It is true that the intensity of the sunlight received 
 on the earth is only half as great as on Venus, but 
 that hardly affects the comparison. Consider how 
 brilliant Mars appears in opposition, although he re- 
 ceives only about half as much solar light as comes 
 to the earth. 
 
 There is one other circumstance affecting the con- 
 dition of Venus considered as a habitable globe which 
 should not go unnoticed. Many observations seem 
 to prove that her axis is remarkably upright, nearly 
 perpendicular to the plane of the ecliptic. If this is 
 true, she cannot have the marked succession of sea- 
 sons, with winter and summer chasing each other to 
 and fro across the equator, from one hemisphere into 
 the other, that occurs on the earth, but her climates 
 must rather be arranged in zones always summer in 
 the equatorial and tropical belt, a changeless spring 
 temperature in higher latitudes, and unbroken winter 
 in the polar regions. 
 
 Mars 
 
 The immense literature that has grown up about 
 the planet Mars within the past ten years, and the 
 209
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 acerbity of some of the disputes concerning it, demon- 
 strate the hold that the question of the habitability 
 of other worlds possesses not only upon the popular 
 imagination, but upon the minds of many who are 
 engaged in scientific study of the celestial bodies. 
 But long before it became possible to discuss this 
 question on any other basis than that of pure hy- 
 pothesis, Mars had attracted universal attention. 
 Never so bright as Venus or Jupiter, his startling 
 color, his frequent returns to a prominent position in 
 the sky, and his enormous changes of brightness have 
 always excited a great deal of interest. When he 
 beams like a red signal-lantern in the midnight heav- 
 ens, Mars fixes the eye like no other celestial object. 
 There is a kind of insistent assertiveness about his 
 appearance which piques curiosity, and at the same 
 time defies it. 
 
 In ancient times Mars received everywhere names 
 based upon his ruddy aspect. The Chinese called 
 him, plainly, the Red Planet; the Hindoos, the 
 Ember; the Hebrews, the Burning One; the Egyp- 
 tians, the Red Horus; the Greeks, the Fiery. He 
 was also invariably associated with the god of war, 
 whatever the particular name of that deity might be. 
 The name which has clung to the planet is that of the 
 Greek Ares, transformed into the Roman Mars. There 
 is a somewhat uncertain Chinese record of an observa- 
 tion of Mars made about 2441 B.C. With the astrolo- 
 gers Mars has always been a malign planet, the " lesser 
 infortune," author of quarrels and strife. When well 
 dignified, says old Lilly, he makes those born under 
 him invincible in feats of war and courage, lovers of
 
 THE PLANETS 
 
 honor, boastful yet prudent, and, when ill dignified, he 
 turns them into murderers, thieves, prattlers, traitors, 
 and oppressors. Besides soldiers, Mars denotes sur- 
 geons, physicians, chemists, thieves, hangmen, smiths, 
 bakers, barbers, cooks, carpenters, tanners. The red 
 stars, such as Antares, were supposed to partake of 
 the nature of Mars, and Lilly's famous prediction of 
 the great fire in London in 1666 was based on the 
 ascendency of one of these Mars-like stars in the 
 horoscope of the city. He was summoned before the 
 House of Commons to explain his prophetic powers, 
 but he left his hearers as ignorant as he found them. 
 
 Mars stands for the third day of the week, Martis 
 dies; in French, Mardi. 
 
 Mars is the first planet outside the earth, his mean 
 distance from the sun being 141,500,000 miles. The 
 relative distance of Mars from the earth varies more 
 ^han that of any other planet. When he is on the 
 opposite side of the sun, this distance amounts, on the 
 average, to 234,000,000 miles, and when he is in op- 
 position to the sun it diminishes to only 47,000,000 
 miles. But his orbit being eccentric, he may some- 
 times be as far away as 267,000,000 miles, and as 
 near as 35,500,000 miles. The effect upon his ap- 
 parent brightness is, of course, very great. His or- 
 bital period, or the length of his year, is 687 days. 
 The oppositions of Mars to the sun, which afford the 
 best opportunities for the study of his surface, occur 
 once every 780 days. Those oppositions which hap- 
 pen near the end of August or the beginning of Sep- 
 tember are the most favorable, because, as they 
 occur in- that quarter of the sky where Mars's peri-
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 helion point is situated, the distance between him 
 and the earth is reduced to the least possible amount. 
 The opposition of 1909 will be one of this kind. 
 
 In size Mars ranks between Mercury and the earth. 
 His diameter is 4200 miles, and his surface area about 
 28 per cent, of the earth's. Gravity on his surface 
 is 38 per cent, of terrestrial gravity. A body weighing 
 100 pounds on the earth would weigh but 38 pounds 
 if transported to Mars. Very important suppositional 
 consequences have been drawn from this, as we shall 
 see later. 
 
 The first thing that seized the attention of tele- 
 scopic observers of Mars was his white polar caps. 
 These both look and behave exactly as we should ex- 
 pect caps of snow and ice to do. The seasons of Mars 
 are very like those of the earth, except that each is 
 nearly twice as long as ours, and, just as with our 
 globe, the sun shines in succession upon the two poles. 
 The inclination of Mars's axis is 24 50', only a trifle 
 greater than that of the earth's axis. Thus the effect 
 of the sun rising upon his poles must, other things 
 being equal, closely resemble its effect in the case of 
 the earth. Moreover, Mars's rotation period is won- 
 derfully close to ours, his day and night together 
 covering twenty-four hours and thirty-seven minutes. 
 Consequently, we should expect the general effect of 
 the alternation of sunshine and darkness on Mars to 
 resemble that upon the earth. His atmosphere, how- 
 ever, is very deficient, and this undoubtedly has im- 
 portant results in the distribution and retention of 
 solar heat. In fact, the atmosphere of Mars does not 
 appear to be more dense than that found on the sum- 
 
 212
 
 THE PLANETS 
 
 mits of our loftiest mountain-peaks, and the spectro- 
 scopic evidence touching the presence of watery va- 
 por is unsatisfactory. It has been suggested that a 
 slight excess of carbonic acid in Mars's atmosphere 
 would serve to keep the planet's temperature suffi- 
 ciently high to enable both plant and animal life to 
 flourish on his surface. 
 
 However this may be, the behavior of the polar 
 caps seems to indicate that they are composed of 
 snow and ice alternately frozen and dissolved. They 
 regularly and slowly diminish in extent as summer 
 advances, and sometimes one and then the other 
 nearly disappears, as if the whole winter deposit had 
 been melted away. 
 
 Synchronously with this disappearance of the polar 
 caps, the famous "canals," first clearly observed by 
 Schiaparelli in 1879, make their appearance. These 
 objects are far beyond the reach of ordinary telescopes, 
 but they have been studied and drawn by a number 
 of observers, notably Schiaparelli and Lowell, and 
 hundreds of them have been mapped. They cover 
 the whole face of the planet, a few of them even 
 traversing the polar regions. They are perfectly 
 straight, and they meet and cross in scores of places, 
 sometimes as many as a dozen coming together at 
 one point, and almost invariably where two or more 
 of these dusky lines cross a sort of knot is seen, like 
 the knots in a spider's web. 
 
 The general telescopic aspect of Mars is that of a 
 spotty globe, the surface being divided between light 
 and dark regions, the former of a reddish or ochrish 
 tint, and the latter having a dusky green or blue 
 213
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 tinge. These were formerly called, respectively, con- 
 tinents and oceans, but at present it is believed that 
 no large bodies of water can exist on Mars. The 
 "canals" traverse these variously colored regions with 
 indifference, although they are much more numerous 
 in the light, or reddish, areas. There is one spot, 
 sometimes called the "Eye of Mars," which bears no 
 little resemblance to the hub of a wheel, conspicuous 
 "canals" radiating from it, with striking regularity, 
 on all sides. 
 
 The prevailing theory in regard to these objects 
 (it is only a theory, and is not "scientifically" ac- 
 cepted by astronomers in general) is that of Mr. 
 Percival Lowell, who thinks that they are probably 
 irrigated lands watered by innumerable canals made 
 by the inhabitants of Mars, who, owing to the de- 
 siccated state of their planet, are compelled to de- 
 pend for a supply of water sufficient to keep vege- 
 tation alive upon the annual liquidation of the polar 
 snows. The fact that the "canals" begin to appear 
 soon after the polar caps begin to diminish, and 
 grow darker as the caps become smaller, is perhaps 
 the strongest general argument in favor of the view 
 that the "canals" indicate the existence of water 
 which is alternately withdrawn and re-supplied. The 
 visibility of the canals is ascribed not to the water 
 but to the vegetation whose growth it stimulates. 
 
 If it were granted that this gigantic irrigation sys- 
 tem really exists on Mars, the most insistent question 
 would be: How can any imaginable race of beings 
 have performed such a labor? The reply that hasj 
 been suggested is based upon the small force of 
 214
 
 THE PLANETS 
 
 gravity on Mars. We have already seen that this 
 force is only 38 per cent, of terrestrial gravity. This 
 may work to advantage in two ways. In the first 
 place, animal forms might attain a far greater size 
 upon Mars than upon the earth, with coincidently 
 greater muscular strength, without being oppressed 
 by their own weight. In the second place, since 
 all bodies are relatively light on Mars, mechanical 
 powers could be much more efficiently applied there 
 than here. Thus a race of powerful giants on Mars 
 might be able to achieve public works hopelessly be- 
 yond the range of man's capacity on the earth. 
 
 That the theory is fascinating no one will deny, 
 but confessedly it lies beyond the limits of positive 
 demonstration, and some astronomers prefer to be- 
 lieve that the "canals" of Mars are some kind of 
 natural phenomena arising from the effects of fracture 
 in the crust of a cooling and contracting globe. That 
 they are not illusions or deceptions of the observer's 
 eye seems to be demonstrated by the fact that dur- 
 ing the opposition of Mars in 1907 many of the more 
 conspicuous "canals" were photographed, at least in 
 part, by Mr. Lowell and his assistants. 
 
 Mars possesses two minute moons, revolving with 
 great rapidity at a very close range, but, since they 
 lie beyond the reach even of the majority of telescopes, 
 and since they are not important bodies in them- 
 selves, they need not long detain our attention. They 
 were first detected by Professor Asaph Hall in 1877, 
 and they were named Deimos and Phobos, or Flight 
 and Fear, which is a return to mythology, Flight and 
 Fear having been the horses that drew the chariot of 
 215
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 the war god of Olympus. Deimos revolves around 
 Mars at a distance of 15,000 miles in 30 hours 10 
 minutes, and Phobos at a distance of 6000 miles in 
 7 hours 39 minutes. These distances are from the 
 centre v of the planet. Neither of these toy satellites 
 probably exceeds ten miles in diameter. 
 
 Jupiter 
 
 The ancients reasoned well when they gave the 
 name of the chief of the gods to the planet Jupiter. 
 Although Venus, when at her brightest, far outshines 
 Jupiter, yet there is no planet which can rival him 
 in the unfailing stateliness of his appearance. His 
 slow, majestic movement along the zodiac (he requires 
 twelve years to make the circuit of the sky) adds to 
 his impressiveness. He is by far the largest of all 
 the planets, although those who named him were 
 unaware of that fact. Observations of Jupiter are, 
 found in Chinese records several thousand years be- 
 fore our era. The Chinese called him the Regulator, 
 and also the Planet of the Year. Flammarion has 
 suggested that the latter name may have been derived 
 either from the fact that he takes twelve years for a 
 revolution, equal to the number of the months, or^ 
 from the fact that he is conspicuously visible for a 
 large part of every year. The Egyptians knew him 
 as Horus, the Guider of the Sphere. The Hindoos 
 and the Greeks both regarded Jupiter as the chief of 
 the planets. Astrologically Jupiter was the " Greater 
 Fortune." When well aspected, says Lilly, he is 
 magnanimous, faithful, bashful, aspiring in an hon- 
 216
 
 THE PLANETS 
 
 orable way at high matters, a lover ot fair dealing, 
 doing glorious actions, honorable and religious, won- 
 derfully indulgent to wife and children, full of char- 
 ity and godliness, just, wise, prudent, and virtuous. 
 But when Jupiter is afflicted by malign planets, says 
 the astrologer, he wastes his patrimony, is hypocriti- 
 cally religious, obstinate, ignorant, careless, gross, dull, 
 abasing himself. We need not be surprised to hear 
 that he signifies judges, senators, councillors, bish- 
 ops, priests, cardinals, chancellors but why woollen- 
 drapers ? 
 
 The fifth day of the week takes its name from 
 Jupiter, Jovis dies ; in French, Jeudi. 
 
 Jupiter's average distance from the sun is 483,000,- 
 ooo miles, more than five times the distance of the 
 earth. This is variable to the extent of 21,000,000 
 miles. From the earth his distance varies between 
 369,000,000 and 576,000,000 miles. On the average, 
 says Professor Young, he is about five times as bright 
 as Sirius. His oppositions to the sun occur once in 
 every 399 days. His colossal globe is 88,000 miles 
 in diameter, measured through the equator, and 
 83,000 miles measured through the poles, so that the 
 polar flattening is very evident in telescopic views. 
 This has no doubt originated from his swift rotation 
 on his axis, a single turn requiring five minutes less 
 than ten hours. Day and night, accordingly, flit 
 over his surface with astonishing speed, and in a few 
 hours, watching with a telescope, the effect of his ro- 
 tation becomes very evident. 
 
 His four principal moons (three very minute ones 
 have been discovered since 1892) add immensely to 
 
 JS 217
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 the interest of Jupiter. It has been alleged that these 
 moons can sometimes be seen, under exceptional 
 circumstances, and by eyes of extraordinary power, 
 without optical aid. The discovery of these moons 
 by Galileo, in 1610, made a great sensation. These 
 were Galileo's "Medicean stars," named in honor of 
 the brothers Cosimo, Francesco, Carlo, and Lorenzo 
 de' Medici. Mr. Fahie, in his Life of Galileo, gives an 
 amusing instance of the competition which immediate- 
 ly arose among some of the crowned heads of Europe 
 for the honor of having their names put in the sky 
 by the great discoverer. Within about three months 
 after his discovery of the Medicean stars, Galileo re- 
 ceived a letter from the French court, saying : 
 
 In case you discover any other fine star, call it by the name 
 of the Great Star of France, as well as the most brilliant of 
 all the earth, and, if it seems fit to you, call it rather by his 
 proper name, Henri, than by the family name Bourbon. 
 Thus you will have an opportunity of doing a thing due and 
 proper in itself, and, at the same time, of rendering yourself 
 and your family rich and powerful forever. 
 
 It was the great Henri IV. in whose behalf this ap- 
 plication was made ; but as the king was assassinated 
 two months later, Galileo had no opportunity to take 
 the bribe, even if he had been disposed to accept it. 
 Needy astronomers in our time have no such chances 
 offered to them of becoming wealthy and powerful, the 
 magnates who now rule the world being less ambitious 
 to shine in the heavens. 
 
 For all who possess telescopes -the satellites of 
 Jupiter are a ceaseless source of joy. Their move- 
 218
 
 THE PLANETS 
 
 ments are so rapid that in the course of a single even- 
 ing they can be watched crossing his disk, preceded 
 or followed by their round shadows, as distinct as 
 little circles of ink, and can be seen disappearing in 
 his shadow at one edge and reappearing at the op- 
 posite edge. Their shifting configurations with each 
 other and with Jupiter are always fascinating to 
 watch. 
 
 Dr. Thomas Dick gave Jupiter (in imagination) the 
 enormous allotment of 6,967,520,000,000 inhabitants, 
 verily an appalling "yellow peril" if a "war of the 
 worlds" should ever arise; but Jupiter is certainly 
 innocent of any such over-population, and, indeed, 
 of any population whatever. All careful observations 
 show that this immense globe consists principally, if 
 not entirely, of vapor. Its surface is streaked, paral- 
 lel to the equator, with broad cloud zones, which 
 change continually in color, shape, and arrangement. 
 It is a most picturesque sight with a telescope, and 
 when looking at it I always recall the vivid descrip- 
 tion of the appearance of Jupiter in Piazzi Smyth's 
 telescope, which he carried up on the peak of Ten- 
 eriffie in 1856: 
 
 One could not gaze long without acquiring the impression 
 of looking at a windy sky. The whole zone of vapor seemed 
 to be in motion, while from its ragged edges portions were 
 torn off and were driving along, some of them rolling over 
 and over, and others pulled out in length and rearing up 
 towards the forepart like a sailing boat scudding before a 
 gale. Owing, perhaps, to the effects of perspective, the polar 
 zones appeared quiet and level, and the equatorial band was 
 somewhat more calm, more inclined to strati and cirrostrati 
 than the 'tempestuous cumulostrati of the tropics. 
 219
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 Piazzi Smyth was unaware of what we now know 
 that Jupiter's surface has many different rates of ro- 
 tation, the clouds travelling faster near the equator 
 than towards the poles. Moreover, there is evidence, 
 as Professor Hough has shown, that Jupiter is a many- 
 storied world of clouds, the lower strata travelling at 
 a different rate from those above; and at times the 
 sight seems to range down into depths that may meas- 
 ure a thousand miles. 
 
 About the only feature approaching permanence 
 of form on Jupiter is the famous Red Spot, which lies 
 at about thirty-five degrees south latitude, and which 
 has been visible with varying distinctness since 1878. 
 In that year I had the good-fortune to catch sight of 
 it, almost at the earliest-known date of apparition, 
 with a three-inch telescope, the first that I ever owned. 
 At times this spot assumes a deep-red color ; at other 
 times it fades away as if covered by a veil; but al- 
 ways its location is indicated by a deep scallop lying 
 exactly alongside of it in the great south equatorial 
 cloud belt. The spot measures not less than 30,000 
 miles in length, by 7000 in its greatest breadth. It 
 is oval in outline. The cause and nature of this won- 
 derful spot have been much discussed, but the mys- 
 tery remains unsolved. 
 
 Additional evidence of the unsolidified state of 
 Jupiter is furnished by his low mean density. This 
 is only about one-quarter of the earth's density, or, 
 say, one-third greater than the density of water. It 
 is possible, if not probable, that there may be a solid 
 nucleus, but if so it must be intensely heated and in- 
 candescent. Owing to his enormous collective mass,
 
 THE PLANETS 
 
 the force of gravity on the visible surface of Jupiter is 
 2.64 times as great as on the earth. He exceeds the 
 earth 1300 times in volume and 316 times in mass, 
 or weight. About a thousand bodies of the size of 
 Jupiter would make a globe equal to the sun. The 
 probability is that Jupiter only recently, as time is 
 measured in such things, passed out of the condition 
 of a star, or a subsidiary sun, shining with its own 
 radiance, and began to enter upon the earlier stages 
 of planetary condensation. When he shone with his 
 own light he appeared from outer space as a little 
 companion of the sun, the two forming a binary star 
 whose components differed eight or nine magnitudes 
 in brightness. 
 
 Saturn 
 
 The most distant of the planets known to the an- 
 cients received from the Greeks the name Chronos, 
 equivalent to the Latin Saturn. As the name indi- 
 cates, it was associated with the idea of time, or du- 
 ration, and no doubt the application to the planet 
 Saturn arose from that planet's exceedingly slow 
 movements. It requires nearly thirty years to make a 
 single circuit of the heavens. Names having a similar 
 meaning were bestowed upon the planet by other early 
 peoples. Saturn's aspect accords with the deliberate- 
 ness of his movements, and recalls Keats's picture of 
 the dethroned father of the gods in his hidden retreat: 
 
 Deep in the shady sadness of a vale, 
 Far sunken from the healthy breath of morn, 
 Far from the fiery noon and eve's one star, 
 Sat gray-haired Saturn, quiet as a stone, 
 Still as the silence round about his lair.
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 The seventh day of the week takes its name from 
 Saturn, Saturni dies ; in French, Satnedi. 
 
 The astrologers found reasons satisfactory to them 
 for making Saturn the exact opposite of Jupiter, call- 
 ing him the "Greater Infortune," while Jupiter was 
 the "Greater Fortune." Malefic though he be, ac- 
 cording to their system, nevertheless they ascribed 
 many admirable qualities to Saturn, which he was 
 capable of imparting to those born under his rule 
 when he was "well dignified." "He is profound in 
 imagination," says Lilly, "in his acts severe, in words 
 reserved, in speaking and giving very spare, in labor 
 patient, in arguing or disputing grave, in obtaining 
 the goods of this life studious and solicitous, in all 
 manner of actions austere." This is a very good de- 
 scription of what is popularly known as a saturnine 
 disposition. But when Saturn is plagued with evil 
 influences, then the astrologers give him a very bad 
 character. He is "envious, covetous, jealous, mis- 
 trustful, timorous, sordid, dissembling, sluggish, stub- 
 born, a contemner of women and a liar, never con- 
 tented and ever repining." Some of these, too, are 
 good definitions of what we call a saturnine person, 
 and the adoption of the word in common use shows 
 how deeply the astrological superstition sank into 
 people's minds in former centuries. 
 
 Saturn's mean distance from the sun is 886,000,000 
 miles. His period of revolution, or the length of his 
 year, is twenty-nine and one-half years, consequently 
 he remains visible in the same quarter of the sky for 
 several years in succession. He comes into opposition 
 to the sun once in every 378 days. From the earth
 
 THE PLANETS 
 
 Saturn's distance varies between 1,028,000,000 and 
 744,000,000 miles. 
 
 The globe of Saturn measures 75,000 miles through 
 the equator and 68,000 miles through the poles. The 
 difference is equal to the entire diameter of the earth. 
 His volume is 760 times that of the earth, but his den- 
 sity is so slight that he equals only 95 earths in weight. 
 Saturn would float if there were an ocean big enough 
 to hold him, his mean density being only five-sevenths 
 that of water. His axial rotation period is about the 
 same as that of Jupiter 10 hours 14 minutes. 
 
 The great marvel of Saturn is his rings, of which 
 Professor Young has said that they are " unlike any- 
 thing else in the universe," and are "the most beau- 
 tiful and most interesting of all telescopic objects." 
 Besides these rings, which are suspended directly over 
 his equator, and are divided by two gaps, Saturn has 
 ten moons, two of which are very minute objects, only 
 recently discovered. The outer diameter of the ring 
 system is no less than 168,000 miles, and yet the 
 rings probably do not exceed 100 miles in thickness. 
 It has been established, both by mathematical rea- 
 soning and by spectroscopic evidence, that they con- 
 sist of an almost infinite number of small bodies, 
 like flights of meteors, revolving around Saturn in a 
 common plane. Their telescopic appearance changes 
 according to the inclination of their plane towards 
 the earth. When the inclination is greatest, the rings 
 appear in an oval form, extending a little beyond the 
 poles of the planet ; when they are edgewise towards 
 the earth, they practically disappear, all that is left 
 in sight with telescopes being a delicate straight line 
 223
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 of light which resembles a pair of illuminated needles 
 stuck into the ball of the planet on opposite sides. 
 They thus disappear once in about every fifteen years. 
 The latest disappearance occurred in 1907. About 
 1915 they will be opened again to their widest extent. 
 
 Galileo discovered the existence of the rings of 
 Saturn in 1610. As in the case of his discovery of the 
 phases of Venus, he concealed the fact for a time in 
 an anagram sent to Kepler. In 1612 they got so near 
 edgewise that he could no longer see them, and his 
 amazement for a time was extreme, while his enemies 
 laughed at him and gloried in his disappointment 
 and what they regarded as deception. In 1616 he 
 caught sight of them again, but, becoming blind in 
 his later years, he never recognized them in their true 
 form, always supposing that they were subsidiary 
 bodies attending Saturn, or projections extending out 
 on each side of the globe. It was not until 1656 that 
 Huygens finally saw the rings in their true form. It 
 is a curious fact, to which Proctor was the first to call 
 general attention, that among the discoveries of Lay- 
 ard in the ruins of Nineveh was a figure of the god 
 Nisroch (identical with Saturn) enveloped with a ring. 
 Mr. Proctor thought that here might be an indication 
 that the ancient Chaldean astronomers had telescopes, 
 but no confirmation of this has been obtained. 
 
 What has been said about the habitability of Jupiter 
 applies equally to Saturn. His globe, as we have seen, 
 possesses a density much less, even, than that of Jupi- 
 ter, so that it is hardly possible to suppose that it has 
 a solid nucleus at the centre. If so it must be re- 
 latively very small. At the distance of Saturn, too, 
 224
 
 THE PLANETS 
 
 the light and heat of the sun are reduced to about 
 one-ninetieth of their intensity at the earth, so that if 
 this planet should ever become a solid globe its surface 
 temperature would be so extremely low that no living 
 forms with which we are acquainted could exist there.
 
 XVIII 
 
 THE MOON 
 
 Queen and huntress chaste and fair, 
 
 Now the sun is laid to sleep, 
 Seated in thy silver chair 
 
 State in wonted manner keep. 
 Hesperus entreats thy light 
 Goddess excellently bright. 
 
 Ben Jonson. 
 
 '"PHE imagination of mankind has never resisted 
 1 the fascination of the moon. Under her magic 
 spell the whole world is transformed, and every mind 
 becomes poetical in its degree. Watch the effect 
 upon a great ship's company when the full moon 
 shines over the sea. It may be " the captain's night," 
 with a brilliant ball on the promenade deck, but 
 neither the dancing nor the small talk nor the music 
 can overmatch the attraction of the moon, and couples 
 will be observed withdrawing from the revelry and 
 seeking open places on the deck where they can watch 
 the wondrous sight of Diana on her throne. 
 
 Without the presence of the moon the Grand Canal 
 of Venice fails in its sorcery. The Parisians eagerly 
 await the nights of the clair de lime to assemble along 
 the banks of the Seine and enjoy the spectacle of 
 their beautiful and historic river stretching its shin- 
 226
 
 Chart XIV 
 
 Sea Of 
 Humors. 
 
 ry 
 
 cho 
 
 THE MOON AS SEEN WITH THE NAKED EYE.
 
 THE MOON 
 
 ing reaches between the bridges, while the towers of 
 Notre Dame stand bewitched in the moonlight. Lon- 
 don's Victoria Embankment and ugly Thames become 
 fairy scenes when the rays of the full moon touch 
 them. What New-Yorker who has ever crossed the 
 Brooklyn Bridge at midnight, when the moon was sil- 
 vering the bay and turning the sails of distant sloops 
 into ebon wings outspread against the brightness, can 
 possibly erase the picture from his memory? The 
 force of the incantation is always and everywhere 
 the same. Who can number the songs and the poems 
 that have been inspired by the moonlight? In the 
 depths of the African or the Amazonian forests, or 
 the wilds of Canada, or among the palm-ringed Pacific 
 islands, or amid the ice and snow of the arctic and the 
 antarctic circles, the moon is the same enchantress. 
 
 In every part of the world people have sat in the 
 moonlight, and still sit, spinning fancies about the 
 curious spots on that bright, round face in the sky. 
 The legend of the Man in the Moon is as ancient and 
 as multiform in its variations as anything in the his- 
 tory of human thought. In China the Man in the 
 Moon is believed to govern marriages and to tie to- 
 gether with an invisible silken cord the young men 
 and maidens whom he designs to unite in matrimony. 
 "This," says the Reverend Timothy Harley, comment- 
 ing on the story in his Moon Lore, "must be the man 
 of the honey-moon, and we shall not meet his superior 
 in any part of the world." In Teutonic legend the 
 Man in the Moon, carrying a bundle of sticks on his 
 back, represents a Sabbath-breaker who met a di- 
 vine being while cutting wood on the sacred day, and 
 227
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 when remonstrated with laughed and said that Sun- 
 day and Monday were all the same to him. "Then 
 stand in the moon for a perpetual Monday!" (Moon- 
 day) was the sentence instantly pronounced. Dante 
 says that the Man in the Moon is Cain. Some of our 
 Indian tribes had a legend that the Man in the Moon 
 was a hunter with his dog, banished to the sky for 
 some transgression; and a British Columbian tribe, 
 visited by Mr. William Duncan, told him a story of a 
 child that cried out in the night for water, but was 
 neglected by its mother, whereupon the Moon sud- 
 denly appeared at the door of the lodge with a pot 
 of water which the child eagerly seized. Then the 
 Moon carried the child up into the sky, where its face 
 can still be seen. The New Zealand savages said that 
 the Man in the Moon was one who, going out in the 
 night, stumbled and sprained his ankle, whereupon he 
 cried for help, and lamented so loudly that at last 
 the Moon came down and took hold of him. In his 
 terror he seized a bush, but the Moon pulled it up by 
 the roots and sailed back into the sky with both 
 man and bush. 
 
 The Woman in the Moon has also been a favorite 
 subject of myth-making. In truth, it would seem 
 that the profile of a woman's face in the moon is more 
 evident than any masculine eidolon there. It can 
 be seen at any time between first quarter and full 
 moon. The face, which is bright, is turned eastward. 
 The outlines of forehead, nose, mouth, and chin are 
 formed by the "Sea of Showers" and the "Sea of 
 Clouds"; the eye is indicated by one of the small, 
 dark, oval plains near the centre of the disk, while 
 228
 
 THE MOON 
 
 the "Seas" of "Serenity," "Tranquillity," "Fertili- 
 ty," and "Nectar" constitute the hair on the top 
 and back of the head. The great crater ring Tycho 
 blazes like a jewel on her bosom. The Chinese call 
 the Woman in the Moon the Fairy Queen, and imag- 
 ine that they can see her palace. Even the Esqui- 
 maux have invented a legend about her, although 
 their story relates rather to the moon's phases than 
 to anything visible on her face. They say that the 
 Sun and the Moon are brother and sister, and that the 
 Sun, in a fit of anger, burned one side of his sister's 
 face coal black. Then she ran away, and the Sun 
 has been chasing her ever since. When the burned 
 side of her face is towards us, she disappears. Pro- 
 fessor Charles Frederick Hartt, the geologist, found 
 a variant of this legend among the tribes along the 
 Amazon. The Samoan savages say that the Moon 
 came down one evening and stole a woman named 
 Sina while she was at work in the twilight. Sina has 
 never been able to get back again, but she still has 
 her mallet and the board on which she was beating 
 out bark to make cloth. The most charming of all 
 the moon legends is that of the Greeks, who called 
 the moon Selene, and said that she fell in love with 
 the beautiful youth Endymion as he lay asleep on a 
 mountain in Elis. 
 
 Peace ho! the moon sleeps with Endymion, 
 And would not be awaked. 
 
 MercJiant of Venice. 
 
 Mr. Harley calls attention to the fact that in 
 English, French, Italian, Latin, and Greek the moon 
 229
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 is feminine, but in the Teutonic languages mascu- 
 line. 
 
 Equally famous with the Man in the Moon and the 
 Woman in the Moon is the Hare in the Moon. The 
 original of this is a Buddhist legend. The god Sak- 
 kria, disguised as a Brahman, pretended to be starving 
 and went to the animals for help. The monkey got 
 him a bunch of mangoes ; the coot picked up a fisher- 
 man's neglected string for him; the fox stole him a 
 pot of milk. At last the god approached the hare. 
 "I have nothing but grass," said the hare, "and you 
 can't eat that." "But your flesh is good," suggest- 
 ed the pretended Brahman. The hare assented. 
 " Then," said the Brahman, "I'll kindle a fire at the 
 foot of this rock and you jump off into it. That '11 
 save me the trouble of killing you." The hare as- 
 sented again, but as he leaped from the rock the god 
 caught him in his arms, and then drew his figure in 
 the Moon as a perpetual reminder of the excellence 
 of self-sacrifice. 
 
 The worship of the moon extends to the most an- 
 cient dates of history. In Chaldea the principal cen- 
 tre of moon-worship was Ur, in the land of Abraham. 
 The Israelites, in their pagan age, adored the moon 
 under the Assyrian name of Astarte or Ashtaroth. 
 Some have asserted that Mount -Sinai was originally 
 consecrated to the moon. The moon was the great- 
 est divinity of the Arabs. She was one of the gods 
 of the Persians. The moon played a great part in 
 the religion of India, arid in China moon-worship still 
 exists. In ancient Egypt she was Isis, the sun being 
 Osiris. The Greeks first worshipped her under the 
 230
 
 THE MOON * 
 
 names of Selene and Phoebe, the name Artemis 
 (Diana), as Sir G. C. Lewis thinks, being of later date. 
 Diana and Luna were the Roman names for the 
 moon-goddess. The moon played a conspicuous part 
 in the rites of the Druids, and there are traces of an- 
 cient moon-worship in popular customs still surviv- 
 ing in the British Isles, as well as in many parts of 
 Europe. Among the American Indians moon-worship 
 was widely spread. By the Aztecs she was deified 
 under the name Meztli, and they had a Pyramid of 
 the Moon, as well as one of the sun. In the Temple 
 of the Sun at Cuzco was a chapel consecrated to the 
 moon, the deity held next in reverence to the sun 
 and regarded as the mother of the Incas, the moon 
 being both the sister and the wife of the sun. 
 
 In astrology the moon, of course, makes a great 
 figure, and as she passes so rapidly through the signs 
 of the zodiac her influence upon the planets is de- 
 scribed as very variable. When "well affected" she 
 bestows good qualities, according to Lilly, but even 
 at the best a "moon person" is apt to be unsteady 
 and inclined to flit about. When she is " ill affected " 
 the moon makes bad characters. As Venus is said to 
 bestow dimples, so the moon, it is averred, usually 
 makes "one eye a little larger than the other" in her 
 subjects. 
 
 f The strange spots on the moon, that have given 
 rise to so many legends, first had their true character 
 revealed when Galileo, in 1610, aimed his telescope 
 at her. They turned out to be mountains, hills, and 
 plains. " It is just like the earth," he declared. But 
 the assertion, often made, that Galileo believed the
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 moon to be inhabited is erroneous. In a letter 
 written in 1616, and quoted by Mr. Fahie in his Life, 
 Galileo distinctly states his belief that it is impos- 
 sible for the moon to be inhabited, and he gives sub- 
 stantially the same reasons that would be given to- 
 day viz., the absence of water and the lack of rapid 
 succession of day and night on her surface. The sun- 
 light takes two weeks to creep over the face of the 
 moon, and day and night there are each a fortnight 
 in length. Moreover, as we now know, there is virtu- 
 ally no air on the moon. Yet the moon is "of the 
 earth, earthy." ^When Addison wrote: 
 
 Soon as the evening shades prevail 
 The moon takes up the wondrous tale, 
 And nightly to the listening earth 
 Proclaims the story of her birth, 
 
 he did not in the least suspect what the story was 
 that the moon so insistently repeated./ It was left 
 for Professor George Darwin and mathematical phys- 
 ics to unfold that story, which is one of the most 
 wonderful in the whole domain of astronomy. Put 
 into a few words, this story avers that the moon is 
 the child of the earth, born by violence, under the 
 stress of forces generated by a rapid rotation of the 
 original single viscid mass, combined with tidal action 
 emanating from the sun. In the constellation Vul- 
 pecula there is a nebula which shows a similar process 
 of division now going on. Two enormous masses are 
 seen in apparent swift rotation, while their whole 
 substance has been whirled out into an hour-glass 
 or dumb-bell shape. After the separation was once 
 232
 
 THE MOON 
 
 effected, the moon retired from the earth under the 
 effects of "tidal friction," a subject too technical to 
 be discussed here. But if she carried air and water 
 with her when she parted from her mother earth, 
 what has become of them? According to one opin- 
 ion, they have been absorbed into her rocks as she 
 cooled off. The relics of frightful volcanic activity 
 on the moon seem conclusive evidence that there 
 was once water and fire there. According to another 
 opinion, the slight mass of the moon (one-eightieth 
 that of the earth) prevented her from permanently 
 retaining the gaseous and volatile elements. What- 
 ever the cause, the fact remains that no bodies of 
 water, and no atmosphere resembling ours, exist to- 
 day on the moon. Yet her great plains strikingly re- 
 semble the beds of dried-up oceans. 
 *^Ks^& telescopic object the moon takes the first 
 rank. The slightest magnification begins to reveal 
 the marvellous picturesqueness of her broken land- 
 scapes, and with higher powers the spectacles that 
 she presents are indescribable in their weird magnifi- 
 cence. Although she is only 2100 miles in diameter, 
 her mountains, and particularly her "craters," are 
 mightier than those of the earth. 
 
 Everybody knows, of course, why the moon changes 
 shape as she travels around the earth. These phases 
 are simply due to the change in the extent of the sun- 
 illuminated surface visible to us. When she is be- 
 tween the sun and the earth, she disappears; when 
 she emerges on the east of the sun, she appears as a 
 thin crescent in the western sky, only a narrow rim 
 of the illuminated half being then visible to us ; when 
 
 16 233
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 she reaches a point at right angles to the direction 
 of the sun, half of the illuminated side appears ; when 
 she is opposite to the sun she assumes the full phase, 
 because then the whole of her illuminated side is tow- 
 ards the earth. As she goes round she always keeps 
 the same side towards us, so that we know nothing, 
 except by inference, of the other side of the moon. 
 This peculiarity of the moon's rotation is believed to 
 be due to the "braking action of the tides raised by 
 the attraction of the earth when the moon was yet 
 in a viscid state. 
 
 The moon both causes and suffers eclipses. When 
 she passes exactly between the earth and the sun, 
 the latter is hidden behind her opaque globe, and we 
 have a solar eclipse one of the most interesting of 
 all astronomical phenomena, on account of the mar- 
 vellous streamers of light, called the corona, which 
 then appear surrounding the eclipsed sun, and ex- 
 tending away, in some cases, millions of miles. When 
 the moon passes the earth on the side opposite to the 
 sun in other words, when she is a full moon she 
 comes at certain times almost exactly in line with the 
 two, and then she enters the shadow of the earth and 
 is herself eclipsed. Eclipses of the sun are very rare 
 phenomena at any particular place on the earth, 
 because the moon's shadow is reduced almost to a 
 point before it reaches the earth, from her average 
 distance of 239,000 miles, and it is only within the 
 shadow that the sun appears eclipsed. The orbit of 
 the moon around the earth is continually shifting its 
 place a little, and so the point of her shadow does 
 not reach the earth at the same place in successive 
 234
 
 
 THE MOON 
 
 eclipses. Eclipses of the moon are more frequently 
 seen, because the earth's shadow, being much larger 
 than the moon's, completely buries the latter when 
 she passes into it, so that the moon can then be seen 
 eclipsed from all places on the earth above whose 
 horizon she happens to be at the moment. 
 
 An eclipse of the moon is very interesting to watch, 
 because of the curious reddish tint which the face 
 of the moon usually assumes when she is within the 
 earth's shadow. This is due to the refraction of light 
 by our atmosphere around the edge of the globe ; and 
 this light, being bent into the shadow, reaches the 
 moon, and produces a partial illumination there. It 
 follows that if we could be upon the moon during 
 such an eclipse we should see the huge black globe 
 of the earth completely covering the sun and sur- 
 rounded with a brilliant ring of reddish light. At 
 times when the atmosphere of the earth is choked 
 with clouds, the moon almost disappears during an 
 eclipse, because then the refraction is prevented by 
 the clouds. 
 
 The primary reason why there is not an eclipse of 
 the sun at every new moon, and an eclipse of the moon 
 at every full moon, is because the moon's orbit is in- 
 clined to the plane of the ecliptic, and ordinarily she 
 passes above or below the sun in the one case, and 
 above or below the conical shadow of the earth in the 
 other case. The greatest number of eclipses that can 
 occur in a year is seven, five of the sun and two of 
 the moon ; the least number is two, both of the sun. 
 On the average four or five eclipses occur every year, 
 more of the sun than of the moon, but, as already 
 235
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 explained, eclipses of the sun are visible from only 
 very limited areas on the earth, and the path of the 
 shadow seldom falls in a convenient place for ob- 
 servation. Some solar eclipses are annular i. e., 
 they occur at times when the moon is in the more 
 distant part of her orbit, and the point of her shadow 
 falls short of the earth. Then a bright rim of the 
 solar disk appears surrounding the black globe of the 
 moon. Total eclipses of the sun appear as partial 
 eclipses to those who are situated within about two 
 thousand miles of the edge of the moon's shadow. 
 So, too, the moon may be partially eclipsed by pass- 
 ing through the edge of the earth's shadow. 
 ^Eclipses have played an astonishing part in history. 
 The total obscuration of the sun in broad day is a 
 phenomenon especially calculated to awaken super- 
 stitious terror, and accordingly we find that solar 
 eclipses have generally been regarded with more fear 
 and awe than lunar ones. It is not too much to say 
 that, in the ages when the movements of the celestial 
 bodies were not understood, the course of the history 
 of nations was sometimes changed by the passage of 
 the moon across the sun's face. Battles were stopped, 
 the march of armies was arrested, treaties were dic- 
 tated by the terror inspired by an unexpected eclipse. 
 Since eclipses are phenomena that can be predicted 
 with almost absolute exactitude centuries in advance, 
 it is easy, from our knowledge of the moon's motion, 
 to trace her course backward as well as forward, and 
 thus eclipses occurring thousands of years ago, and 
 recorded by the uncritical analysts of those times, 
 have enabled modern astronomers to fix disputed 
 236
 
 THE MOON 
 
 dates in history. Herodotus records the fact that a 
 battle between the Medes and Lydians was interrupted 
 by an eclipse of the sun. Calculation shows that this 
 eclipse must have occurred on May 28th in the year 
 585 B.C. 
 
 A curious point in the history of the celebrated 
 Five Nations, occupying central New York at the 
 time of the arrival of the white men, is connected with 
 an eclipse. These Indians had a tradition that a 
 great war between the Mohawks and the Senecas was 
 averted by the interposition of Heaven. Some young 
 Seneca warriors, bent on winning fame for them- 
 selves, went, in a time of peace, into the land of the 
 Mohawks and made captive a number of girls who 
 were at work in the cornfields. The captives were 
 taken to Canandaigua. Their arrival caused con- 
 sternation among the Senecas, whose chiefs knew well 
 the terrible vengeance that the Mohawks would exact. 
 Still, the Senecas also were a proud people, and when 
 swift runners arrived demanding a humiliating sub- 
 mission, the Senecas responded with open defiance, 
 and resolved to meet the Mohawks in battle. A host 
 of Mohawk warriors, thirsting for vengeance, hurried 
 on the forest trails to Canandaigua, and the hostile 
 ranks were about to close in deadly contest when one 
 of the Mohawk girls cried out: 
 
 "See! the Great Spirit is angry!" 
 
 She pointed to the sky, and, all eyes following hers, 
 they saw the sun in heaven beginning to darken. 
 Swiftly its light was withdrawn and night fell upon 
 the lake and the forest. The warriors of both tribes 
 dropped to their knees, and then an aged sachem of 
 237
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH T PI E NAKED EYE 
 
 the Senecas called for the peace-pipe. As it passed 
 from lip to lip, the darkness lightened, the sun 
 slowly reappeared, and in a short time his smiling 
 face was again bent down upon his red children. The 
 captives were surrendered, reparation was made, and 
 the Mohawks, with full quivers, marched back to 
 their valley home. The late Professor Lewis Swift 
 showed that a total eclipse of the sun was visible in 
 central and western New York on June 28, 1451, and 
 this fact has been regarded as affirming the historic 
 accuracy of the Indian tradition, as well as fixing a 
 date for the event. 
 
 On the other hand, lunar eclipses sometimes caused 
 great terror. Plutarch, in his Life of Nicias, has a 
 curious story in point. When the Athenian army, 
 baffled before Syracuse, was about to embark for 
 home, there happened an eclipse of the moon, "at 
 which," says Plutarch, "Nicias and all the rest were 
 struck with a great panic, either through ignorance 
 or superstition. As for an eclipse of the sun, which 
 happens at the conjunction, even the common people 
 had some idea of its being caused by the interposition 
 *of the moon. But they could not easily form a con- 
 ception by the interposition of what body the moon, 
 when at the full,' should lose her light and assume 
 such a variety of colors. They looked upon it, there- 
 fore, as a strange and preternatural phenomenon, a 
 sign by which the gods announced some great calam- 
 ity." 
 
 The reader will observe that even in their terror the 
 frightened soldiers did not fail to note the curious 
 coloration of the eclipsed moon, due, as we now 
 238
 
 THE MOON 
 
 know, to the refraction of light by the earth's at- 
 mosphere. 
 
 But eclipses were not universally considered by the 
 ancients as miraculous events. Better instructed 
 minds perceived that there was a regular recurrence 
 of these phenomena, and that they were connected 
 with the movements of the moon. Thales is said 
 to have predicted the solar eclipse of 585 B.C., and 
 Hipparchus ascertained the general law of the moon's 
 motions. Even the Chaldeans knew that eclipses re- 
 cur in a certain order during every successive period 
 of eighteen years, and to this period was given the 
 name Saros. 
 
 The revolution of the moon naturally gave rise to 
 the division of time into months. All would have 
 been very simple if the moon's time of revolution 
 had been an exact fraction of the year. Then every 
 year would have had precisely twelve lunar months. 
 But the time from one new moon to the next is about 
 twenty-nine and a half days, and the problem that 
 the calendar-makers had to solve was how to adjust 
 this so as to give a fixed number of months to th^j 
 year. This is not the place to enter into a discussion 
 of the difficult subject of the settling of the calendar, 
 which is dealt with in ordinary school-books of as- 
 tronomy, but it may be remarked that as a result of 
 the necessary adjustments new and full moons may 
 occur at any time in the course of our present months. 
 So the name month (undoubtedly derived from the 
 same root as moon, just as the original idea of a 
 month was suggested by the moon's period of rev- 
 olution) no longer possesses more than a historic 
 239
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 connection with the monthly traveller through the 
 sky. 
 
 Another, and practically a much more important, 
 relation of the moon to the earth is seen in the tides. 
 Both the sun and the moon raise tides in the ocean, 
 but those of the moon are much the higher, simply 
 because she is so near. This is a technical subject 
 beyond the intended scope of our book, but it is in- 
 teresting to remember that but for the tides produced 
 by the moon some of the most important harbors on 
 the earth would be shut against deep-draught ships. 
 
 Those who look at the new moon often see the 
 whole face of her globe faintly illuminated, the bright 
 crescent seeming to border it like a silver handle. 
 Even some of the ancients recognized the fact that 
 this light comes from the earth. At such times the 
 earth hangs in the lunar sky as a round, gleaming ball 
 of portentous size, many times larger than the full 
 moon looks to us, and the faint illumination that we 
 see on the part of the moon hidden from the sun is 
 earth light. 
 
 In her course through the zodiac for the moon fol- 
 lows, practically, the same path as the planets she 
 often passes over, or occults, stars, and occasionally 
 planets. These phenomena are interesting to observe 
 with the naked eye, if the star occulted happens to be 
 a bright one. If the occultation occurs near the time 
 of new moon, or first quarter, the star disappears be- 
 hind the dark part of the moon as if it had been 
 snuffed out. When the moon is crescent-shaped the 
 star, just before its disappearance, often looks as if 
 it were inside the horns of the moon, and this appear- 
 240
 
 THE MOON 
 
 ance is so deceptive that some people think that the 
 moon really can carry a star in her arms. The month- 
 ly progress of the moon through the zodiacal con- 
 stellations, and her conjunctions with the planets and 
 the first and second magnitude stars, or with clusters 
 like the Pleiades and the Hyades, are among the most 
 captivating sights that astronomy with the naked eye 
 has to offer. 
 
 The idea that the moon exercises an important in- 
 fluence on the weather has no scientific foundation, 
 all attempts to establish such an influence having 
 failed. So, too, the supposed influence of the moon 
 on the sap in trees, and on the growth of plants has 
 no basis except that of a wide-spread popular belief.
 
 INDEX 
 
 ACHERNAR, 38, 168. 
 
 Achilles likened to Sirius, 42. 
 
 Al Aaraaf, 147. 
 
 Al Bali, 131. 
 
 Albireo, 127. 
 
 Al Chiba, 77. 
 
 Alcor, 69. 
 
 Alcyone, 23. 
 
 Aldebaran, 8, n, 21, 22. 
 
 Alderamin, 136. 
 
 Alfirk, !36. 
 
 Algenib/133, 153. 
 
 Algieda, 122. 
 
 Algol, 152. 
 
 Alioth, 71. 
 
 Al Jauzah, 36. 
 
 Allen, Richard Hinckley, 17, 22, 
 26, 28, 36, 38, 41, 46, 65, 71, 
 73, 78, 80, 108, 163. 
 
 Almaak, 141. 
 
 Alphacca, 93. 
 
 Alpha Centauri, 165. 
 
 Alpha Draconis, 98. 
 
 Alphard. 62. 
 
 Alpheratz, 133, 141. 
 
 Al Rischa, 139. 
 
 Altair, 115. 
 
 Amazon Star, the, 32. 
 
 Andromeda, 3, 4. 141; mytholo- 
 gy of, 142; telescopic objects, 
 
 145- 
 
 Antares, 8, n, 102, 104. 
 Antinoiis, 115. 
 
 Aquarius, 130; mythology of, 131. 
 Aquila, 115; mythology of, 116; 
 
 telescopic objects, 117. 
 Ara, 1 66. . 
 
 Aratus, 3. 
 
 Arctic constellation, 2. 
 
 Arcturus, 7, 90, 91. 
 
 Argo Navis, 158. 
 
 Ariadne's Crown, 94. 
 
 Ariadne's Hair, 84. 
 
 Aries, 148; mythology of, 148; 
 
 telescopic objects, 150. 
 Arion, legend of, 125. 
 Atlas, 23, 28. 
 Arthur's Wain, 70. 
 Aselli, 57. 
 Asterion, 85. 
 Asterope, 23, 28. 
 Astrasa, 80. 
 Auriga, 18; mythology of, 19; 
 
 telescopic objects, 20. 
 
 BEAR DRIVER, 90. 
 
 Beehive, the, 60. 
 
 Bellatrix, 32, 33. 
 
 Belt, Orion's, 24, 31, 33. 
 
 Benetnasch, 71. 
 
 Berenice's Hair, 7. 
 
 Betelgeuse, u, 30, 32. 
 
 Bird, Great Storm, 78. 
 
 Bird, the Red, 78. 
 
 Bootes, 2, 89; mentioned by 
 
 Homer, 89; mythology of, 92; 
 
 telescopic objects, 92. 
 
 CAMELOPARDALIS, 20. 
 
 Cancer, 57; mythology of, 60; 
 
 telescopic objects, 61. 
 Canes Venatici, 85. 
 Canis Major, 42; mythology of, 
 
 46; telescopic objects, 47. 
 
 243
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 Canis Minor. 48; telescopic ob- 
 jects, 50. 
 
 Canopus, 46, 159, 161. 
 
 Capella, n, 18. 
 
 Caph, 146. 
 
 Capricornus, 122; mythology of, 
 123; telescopic objects, 124. 
 
 Carlyle, Thomas, on Canopus, 
 1 60. 
 
 Cassiopeia, 145; seen at My- 
 cenae, 3; telescopic objects, 
 
 147- 
 
 Castor, 50, 53. 
 Celaeno, 28. 
 Centaurus, 164. 
 Cepheus, 135; mythology of, 
 
 136; telescopic objects, 136. 
 Cetus, 155; mythology of, 156; 
 
 telescopic objects, 157. 
 Chara, 85. 
 Charioteer, the, 18. 
 Charles's Wain, 69, 70. 
 Chi Persei, 153. 
 Coal Sack, the, 176. 
 Colas, T. A., 34. 
 Columoa, 41. 
 Coma Berenices, 83; telescopic 
 
 objects, 84. 
 Constellations, seen from Mount 
 
 Etna, 5; and the seasons, 6. 
 Cor Caroli, 85. 
 Cor Hydrae, 62. 
 Corn Mother, the, 80. 
 Corona Borealis, 93; mythology 
 
 of, 94; telescopic objects, 94. 
 Coronis, story of, 78. 
 Corvus, 77. 
 Cor Serpentis, 106. 
 Crater 75. 
 Cursa 38. 
 Cygnus, 127; telescopic objects, 
 
 129; star "61," 128. 
 Cynosura, 96. 
 
 DABIH, 122. 
 Dancing Bears, the, 72. 
 Delphinus, 124; telescopic ob- 
 jects, 125. 
 Delta Librae, 89. 
 
 Deluge and the Pleiades, 27. 
 Deneb, 127. 
 Deneb Kaitos, 155. 
 Denebola, 66. 
 Diamond of Virgo, 79. 
 Donati's comet and Arcturus, 91 . 
 Draco, 98; mythology of, 100; 
 
 telescopic objects, 101. 
 Druids, cult of Pleiades, 27. 
 Dubhe, 71. 
 
 EAGLE of the winds, 115. 
 
 Electra, 23, 28. 
 
 El Nath, 1 8, 24. 
 
 Equuleus, 125. 
 
 Eridanus, 3 7 ; mythology of, 38; 
 telescopic objects, 39; south- 
 ern, 1 68. 
 
 Erigone, 81. 
 
 Eta Argus, 1 60. 
 
 Euro pa, myth of, 25, 26. 
 
 FRIGID MAIDEN, the, 79. 
 Fomalhaut, 131. 
 
 GAMMA DRACONIS, 99, 100. 
 Garnet Star, Herschel's, 137. 
 Gate of the Gods, 123. 
 Gemma, 93. 
 Gemini, 50; mythology of, 52; 
 
 telescopic objects, 55. 
 Golconda of the heavens, 30. 
 Golden Age, the, 80. 
 Golden Fleece, the, 100, 101. 
 Golden Ox, the, 26. 
 Gomeiza, 49. 
 Great Dipper, the, 69. 
 Great Square of Pegasus, 132. 
 Greenwich of the sky, 138. 
 Grus, 167. 
 
 HARMONY in the heavens, 13. 
 
 Head of Draco, 99. 
 
 Head of Orion, 34. 
 
 Helice, 72, 96. 
 
 Hercules, 107; mythology of, 
 
 1 08; telescopic objects, no; 
 
 great cluster in, no; motion 
 
 towards, 109. 
 
 244
 
 INDEX 
 
 Hood, Dr. Thomas, 73. 
 Hydra, 6, 61 ; mythology of, 62. 
 
 JASON, 5, 100, 101. 
 
 Job. reference to Pleiades, 23 ; to 
 Arcturus, 90. 
 
 Job's Coffin, 124. 
 
 Jupiter, 216; various names of, 
 216; astrology of, 216; dis- 
 tance and appearance, 217; 
 oppositions of, 217; moons of, 
 218; Galileo's discoveries, 218; 
 density of, 219; clouds on, 
 219; habitability of, 219; 
 Red Spot on, 220; gravity on, 
 
 321. 
 
 KARNAK, temple of, 100. 
 Kern Baby, the, 80. 
 Kochab, 95. 
 
 LACERTA, 135. 
 
 Laconian Key, the, 146. 
 
 Landmarks, stars as, i. 
 
 Lantern Feast and Pleiades, 27. 
 
 Leo, 65; mvthology, 67; tele- 
 scopic objects, 68. 
 
 Leo Minor, 68. 
 
 Lepus, 40. 
 
 Lewis, Sir G. C., 23, 72. 
 
 Libra, 87; mythology of, 88. 
 
 Lilac stars, 84. 
 ; Little Dipper, the, 95. 
 
 Lynx, 55. 
 
 i Lyra, 118; mythology of, 120; 
 telescopic objects, 120. 
 
 f MAGELLANIC CLOUDS, 2, 169. 
 i Magnitudes, stellar, 10. 
 Magi, star of the, 84, 140. 
 j Magpie Bridge, the, 116. 
 Maia, 23. 
 Manger, the 57. 
 
 :Mars, 209; various names of, 
 210; astrology of, 210; op- 
 positions of, 21 1 ; gravity on, 
 i 212; polar caps of, 212; at- 
 mosphere of, 212; "canals" 
 i on, 213;- irrigation of, 214; 
 
 giants on, 215; moons of, 
 2I S- 
 
 Markab, 133. 
 
 Mazzaroth, 44. 
 
 Medusa, 4, 152. 
 
 Megrez, 71. 
 
 Menkalina, 18. 
 
 Menkar, 155. 
 
 Merak, 71. 
 
 Mercury, 192; astrology of, 193; 
 and naked eye, 195; transits 
 of, 197; density of, 197; life on, 
 198; rotation of, 199; tem- 
 perature on, 200. 
 
 Meridian, definition of, 16. 
 
 Merope, 23, 28. 
 
 Mesarthim, 150. 
 
 Milk Dipper, the, 112. 
 
 Milky Way. the, 171; Galileo on, 
 172; shape of, 173; constella- 
 tions, 174; details of, 175; 
 stars near, 178; distance of, 
 179; mythology of, 179. 
 
 Mira (o Ceti), 156. 
 
 Mirach, 141. 
 
 Mirzam, 45. 
 
 Mizar, 69. 
 
 Monoceros, 48. 
 
 Moon, the, fancies about man in, 
 227; fancies about woman in, 
 228; the hare in, 230; wor- 
 ship of, 230; gender of 230; 
 origin of, 232; eclipses, 234, et 
 seq.\ phases of, 233; supersti- 
 tions about eclipses, 237, 238; 
 and the months, 239; and 
 the tides, 240; earthlight on, 
 240; occultations by, 240; and 
 weather, 241 ; and plants, 241. 
 
 Music of the Spheres, 191. 
 
 NAMES of constellations, 3. 
 
 Nebula, in Orion, 34; the Whirl- 
 pool, 86: Dumb-bell, 126; An- 
 dromeda, 142; the Ring, 120; 
 the Key- hole, 161. 
 
 Nebula;, Field of the, 82. 
 
 Nimrod, 36. 
 
 Northern Cross, 7, 127. 
 
 245
 
 ASTRONOMY WITH THE NAKED EYE 
 
 North Star, the, 95. 
 
 OCTANT, 161. 
 
 Onondaga Indians and Pleiades, 
 
 12, 26. 
 Ophiuchus, 105; mythology of, 
 
 105; telescopic objects, 106. 
 Orihim6 (see Spinning Damsel), 
 
 116, 181. 
 Orion, 2, 3, 7, 30; origin of, 31; 
 
 mythology of, 35; telescopic 
 
 objects, 36. 
 
 PEGASUS. 132; mythology of. 
 
 133; telescopic objects, 135. 
 Perseus, 3, 4, 143, 151; new 
 
 star in, 152; telescopic ob- 
 jects, 154. 
 Phaed, 71. 
 Phaet, 41. 
 Phaeton, 39. 
 Phoenice, 95. 
 Phoenix, 167. 
 Pisces. 138; mythology of, 139; 
 
 telescopic objects, 140. 
 Piscis Australis, 131. 
 Planets, the, 186; how to find. 
 
 189. 
 
 Pleiad, the Lost, 23, 28. 
 Pleiades, 21, 23; photographs of , 
 
 24- 
 
 Pleione, 28. 
 Plough, the, 69. 
 Pointers, the, 71. 
 Polaris, j>5; and the slaves, 96. 
 Pole, position of true, 146; 
 
 southern, 161. 
 Pollux, 50, 53. 
 Praesepe, 57. 
 
 Prince of the Zodiac, 149. 
 Procyon, n, 48. 
 Prosper Henry, n. 
 Pyramid, the Great, 27, 99. 
 
 RAS ALGETHI, 109. 
 Ras Alhague, 105. 
 Regulus, 65. 
 Rigel, 30, 32, 38. 
 Ring Nebula, 120. 
 
 Royal Stars, the, 66. 
 Ruchbar, 146. 
 
 SADALMEI.IK, 131. 
 
 Sadalsuud, 131. 
 
 Sagitta, 117. 
 
 Sagittarius, 112; star clusters in, 
 112; mythology of, 113; tele- 
 scopic objects, 114. 
 
 St. Paul, 53. 
 
 Saturn, 221; astrology of, 222; 
 density of, 223; rings of, 
 223; Galileo's discoveries, 224; 
 habitability of, 224; possible 
 knowledge of, at Nineveh, 224. 
 
 Scheat, 131, 133. 
 
 Schedar, 146. 
 
 Scorpio, 102; mythology of, 103; 
 telescopic objects, 104. 
 
 Scutum Sobieskii, 114. 
 
 Seiss, Rev. Joseph A., his "gos- 
 pel mythology," 20, 29, 36, 
 39, 40, 46, 54, 63, 67, 73, 76, 
 78, 82, 89, 98, 101, 104, 109, 
 117, 124, 131. 149, 154, 156. 
 
 Septentriones, the, 71. 
 
 Serpens, 1 05 ; mythology of , 106; 
 telescopic objects, 106. 
 
 Seven Little Indians, 70. 
 
 Seven Stars, the, 71. 
 
 Sextans. 74. 
 
 Sickle, the, 65. 
 
 Sirius, 3, 9, n, 42, 47, 88; size 
 of, 44; crossed Milky Way, 43. 
 
 Southern Cross, 2, 162. 
 
 Spica, 7, ii, 78. 
 
 Spinning Damsel, the, 1 1 6. 
 
 Stars, as sentinels, i ; personal 
 influence of, 2; and seasons, 
 7; individuality of, 9; colors 
 of, 1 1 ; grouping of, 1 1 ; har- 
 monious effect of, 12. 
 
 Sword of Orion, 34. 
 
 TANABATA, festival of, 116. 
 Taurus, 21; mythology of, 25; 
 
 telescopic objects, 30. 
 Taygeta, 23, 28. 
 Tennyson on Pleiades, 24.
 
 INDEX 
 
 Thor's Wagon, 73. 
 Three Guides, the, 133. 
 Thuban, 98. 
 Toucan, 167. 
 Triangle, the, 166. 
 Triangulum, 150. 
 Twins, the sailors' stars, 54. 
 Tycho Brahe's star, 146. 
 
 UNUKALHAI, 106. 
 
 Ursa Major, 69; mythology of, 
 
 72; telescopic objects, 74. 
 Ursa Minor, 95; mythology of, 
 
 97; telescopic objects, 98. 
 
 "V," the letter, 21, 22. 
 Vega, ii, 118, 119, 120. 
 Venus, 201; astrology of, 203; 
 
 Galileo's discoveries, 204; 
 
 transits of, 205; habitability 
 
 of, 206; atmosphere of, 206; 
 
 temperature on, 206; surface 
 
 features of, 207; appearance 
 
 of earth from, 208; upright 
 
 axis of, 209. 
 Vindemiatrix, 80. 
 Virgo, 7, 78; mythology, of 80; 
 
 telescopic objects, 82. 
 Vulpecula, 126. 
 
 "W," the letter, 145. 
 Water-bearer, the, 130. 
 White Ox, the, 170. 
 White Tiger, the, 26. 
 
 "X" CLASS, Professor New- 
 comb's, 159. 
 
 Xavier de Maistre, remark about 
 stars, 1 2 . 
 
 ZODIAC, the, 138. 
 Zodiacal Light, the, 182. 
 Zubenelgenubi, 88. 
 Zubeneschemali, 88. 
 
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