the Big Dipper was a perfect cross. That was about 50,000 years ago.
Fifty thousand years from now the Big Dipper will look like a steamer
chair. How do I know that? Because, the two stars at opposite ends of
the Dipper are going in a direction different from the other five stars.
How do I know that? Why, I don't know it. I just believe it. There are
lots of things I don't know, and I'm not afraid to say so. I hope you
will learn how to say "I don't know." It's infinitely better than
guessing; it saves trouble, and people like you better, because they see
you are honest. I don't know how the stars in the Big Dipper are moving,
but the men who look through telescopes and study mathematics say the
end stars do move in a direction opposite to the others, and they say
the Dipper _must_ have looked like a cross, and will look like a dipper
long, long after we are dead. And I believe them.
CONSTELLATIONS YOU CAN ALWAYS SEE
There are forty-eight well known constellations, but of these only about
a dozen are easy to know. I think a dozen is quite enough for children
to learn. And therefore, I shall tell you how to find only the showiest
and most interesting.
The best way to begin is to describe the ones that you can see almost
every night in the year, because you may want to begin any month in the
year, and you might be discouraged if I talked about things nobody could
see in that month. There are five constellations you can nearly always
see, and these are all near the Pole star.
Doubtless you think you know two of them already--the Big and the Little
Dipper. Ah, I forgot to tell you that these dippers are not the real
thing. They are merely parts of bigger constellations and their real
names are Great Bear and Little Bear. The oldest names are the right
ones. Thousands of years ago, when the Greeks named these groups of
stars, they thought they looked like two bears. I can't see the
resemblance.
But for that matter all the figures in the sky are disappointing. The
people who named the constellations called them lions, and fishes, and
horses, and hunters, and they thought they could see a dolphin, a
snake, a dragon, a crow, a crab, a bull, a ram, a swan, and other
things. But nowadays we cannot see those creatures. We can see the stars
plainly enough, and they do make groups, but they do not look like
animals. I was greatly disappointed when I was told this; but I soon got
over it, because new wonders are always coming on. I think the only
honest thing to do is to tell you right at the start that you cannot see
these creatures very well. You will spoil your pleasure unless you take
these resemblances good-naturedly and with a light heart. And you will
also spoil your pleasure if you scold the ancients for naming the
constellations badly. Nobody in the world would change those old names
now. There is too much pleasure in them. Besides, I doubt if we could do
much better. I believe those old folks were better observers than we.
And I believe they had a lighter fancy.
Let us, too, be fanciful for once. I have asked my friend, Mrs. Thomas,
to draw her notion of some of these famous creatures of the sky. You can
draw your idea of them too, and it is pleasant to compare drawings with
friends. There is only one way to see anything like a Great Bear. You
have to imagine the Dipper upside down and make the handle of the Dipper
serve for the Bear's tail. What a funny bear to drag a long tail on the
ground! Miss Martin says he looks more like a chubby hobby-horse. You
will have to make the bowl of the Dipper into hind legs and use all the
other stars, somehow, to make a big, clumsy, four-legged animal. And
what a monster he is! He measures twenty-five degrees from the tip of
his nose to the root of his tail. Yes, all those miscellaneous faint
stars you see near the Big Dipper belong to the Great Bear.
[Illustration: Orion fighting the Bull. Above are Orion's two dogs]
[Illustration: The Little Bear, the Queen in her chair, the Twins and
the Archer]
How the Great Bear looked to the people who named it thousands of years
ago, we probably shall never know. They left no books or drawings, so
far as I know. But in every dictionary and book on astronomy you can
find these bears and other animals drawn so carefully and beautifully
that it seems as if they _must_ be in the sky, and we must be too dull
to see them. It is not so. Look at the pictures in this book and, you
will see that the stars do not outline the animals. Many of them come at
the wrong places. And so it is with all the costly books and charts and
planispheres. It is all very interesting, but it isn't true. It's just
fancy. And when you once understand that it isn't true, you will begin
to enjoy the fancy. Many a smile you will have, and sometimes a good
laugh. For instance, the English children call the Dipper "Charles's
wain" or "the wagon." And the Romans called it "the plough." They
thought of those seven stars as oxen drawing a plough.
Well, that's enough about the two Bears. I want to tell you about the
other three constellations you can nearly always see. These are the
Chair, the Charioteer, and Perseus (pronounced _per'soos_).
The Chair is the easiest to find, because it is like a very bad W, and
it is always directly opposite the big Dipper, with the Pole star half
way between the two constellations. There are five stars in the W, and
to make the W into a Chair you must add a fainter star which helps to
make the square bottom of the chair. But what a crazy piece of
furniture! I have seen several ways of drawing it, but none of them
makes a comfortable chair. I should either fall over backward, or else
the back of the chair would prod me in the small of my back. The correct
name of this constellation is Cassiopeia's Chair.
I think this is enough to see and enjoy in one night. To-morrow night
let us look for the Charioteer.
I love the Charioteer for several reasons. One is that it makes a
beautiful pentagon, or five-sided figure, with its five brightest stars.
Another is that it contains the second-brightest star in the northern
part of the heavens, Capella. The only star in the north that is
brighter is Vega, but Vega is bluish white or creamy.
If you haven't already found the five-sided figure, I will tell you how
to find Capella. Suppose you had a gun that would shoot anything as far
as you wish. Shoot a white string right through the Pointers and hit the
Pole star. Then place your gun at the Pole star and turn it till it is
at right angles to that string you shot. Aim away from the big Dipper,
shoot a bullet forty-five degrees and it will hit Capella.
If that plan doesn't work, try this. Start with the star that is at the
bottom of the Dipper and nearest the handle. Draw a line half-way
between the two Pointers and keep on till you come to the first bright
star. This is Capella, and the distance is about fifty degrees.
Capella means "a kid," or "little goat," and that reminds me of the
third reason why I enjoy so much the constellation of which Capella is
the brightest star. In the old times they sometimes called this
five-sided figure "the goat-carrier." And the shepherds thought they
could see a man carrying a little goat in his left hand. I am sure you
can see the kid they meant. It is a triangle of faint stars which you
see near Capella. That's enough for to-night.
To-morrow night let us look for Perseus. I dare say you know that old
tale about Perseus rescuing the princess who was chained upon a rock.
(He cut off the snaky head of Medusa and showed it to the dragon that
was going to devour the princess, and it turned the monster to stone.
Remember?) Well, there are constellations named after all the people in
that story, but although they contain many showy stars, I could never
make them look like a hero, a princess, a king, and a queen. I do not
even try to trace out all of Perseus. For I am satisfied to enjoy a very
beautiful part of it which is called the "Arc of Perseus."
An arc, you know, is a portion of a circle. And the way to find this arc
is to draw a curve from Capella to Cassiopeia. On nights that are not
very clear I can see about seven stars in this Arc of Perseus. And the
reason I love it so much is that it is the most beautiful thing, when
seen through an opera-glass, that I know. You could never imagine that a
mere opera-glass would make such a difference. The moment I put it to my
eyes about a dozen more stars suddenly leap into my sight in and near
the Arc of Perseus. That's enough. No more stories to-night.
WINTER CONSTELLATIONS
By winter constellations I mean those you can see in winter at the
pleasantest time--the early evening. And I want you to begin with the
Northern Cross. I hope you can see this before Christmas, for, after
that, it may be hidden by trees or buildings in the west and you may not
see it again for a long while. This is because the stars seem to rise in
the east and set in the west. To prove this, choose some brilliant star
you can see at five or six o'clock; get it in line with some bush or
other object over which you can just see it. Put a stake where you
stand, and then go to the same spot about eight o'clock or just before
you go to bed. You can tell at once how much the star seems to have
moved westward.
Another thing, every star rises four minutes later every night, and
therefore the sky looks a little different at the same hour every
evening. The stars in the north set for a short time only, but when
those toward the south set they are gone a long time. For instance, the
brightest star of all is Sirius, the Dog Star, which really belongs to
the southern hemisphere. There are only about three months in the year
when children who go to bed by seven o'clock can see it--January,
February, and March.
So now you understand why I am so eager that you should not miss the
pleasure of seeing the famous Northern Cross. But although it is a big
cross, and easy to find, after you know it, I have never yet known a boy
who could show it to another boy simply by pointing at it. The surest
and best way to find it is learn three bright stars first--Altair, Vega,
and Deneb.
Altair is the brightest star in the Milky Way. It is just at the edge of
the Milky Way, and you are to look for three stars in a straight line,
with the middle one brightest. Those three stars make the constellation
called "the Eagle." The body of the eagle is Altair, and the other two
stars are the wings. I should say that Altair is about five degrees from
each of his companions. It is worth half an hour's patient search to
find the Eagle. Now these three stars in the Eagle point straight toward
the brightest star in the northern part of the sky--Vega.
To make sure of it, notice four fainter stars near it which make a
parallelogram--a sort of diamond. These stars are all part of a
constellation called "the Lyre." If you try to trace out the old musical
instrument, you will be disappointed; but here is a game worth while.
Can you see a small triangle made by three stars, of which Vega is one?
Well, one of those stars is double, and with an opera-glass you can see
which it is. On very clear nights some people with very sharp eyes can
see them lying close together, but I never could.
At last we are ready to find the celebrated Northern Cross. First draw a
line from Altair to Vega. Then draw a line at right angles to this,
until you come to another bright star--Deneb--which is about as far from
Vega as Vega is from Altair. Now this beautiful star, Deneb, is the top
of the Northern Cross. I can't tell you whether the Cross will be right
or wrong side up when you see it, or on its side. For every
constellation is likely to change its position during the night, as you
know from watching the Dipper. But you can tell the Cross by these
things. There are six stars in it. It is like a kite made of two sticks.
There are three stars in the crosspiece and four in the long piece.
Deneb, the brightest star in the cross, is at the top of the long stick.
But you mustn't expect to see a perfect cross. There is one star that is
a little out of place, and sometimes my fingers fairly "itch to put it
where it belongs." It is the one that ought to be where the long stick
of your kite is tacked to the crosspiece. And one of the stars is
provokingly faint, but you can see it. Counting straight down the long
piece, it is the third one from Deneb that is faint. It is where it
ought to be, but I should like to make it brighter. Have you the Cross
now? If not, have patience. You can't be a "true sport" unless you are
patient. You can't be a great ball-player, or hunter, or any thing else,
without resisting, every day, that sudden impulse to "quit the game"
when you lose. Be a "good loser," smile and try again. That is better
than to give up, or to win by cheating or sharp practice.
This is the last thing I want you to see in the northern part of the
sky; and if you have done a good job, let us celebrate by having a
story.
Once upon a time a cross didn't mean so much to the world as it does
now. That was before Christ was born. In those old times people did not
think of the Northern Cross as a cross. They thought of it as a Swan,
and you can see the Swan if you turn the Cross upside down. Deneb will
then be in the tail of the Swan, and the two stars which used to be at
the tips of the crosspiece now become the wings. Is that a true story?
Yes. If we lived in Arabia the children there could tell us what Deneb
means. It means "the tail."
Another story? Well, do you see the star in the beak of the Swan, or
foot of the Cross? What color is it? White? Well, they say this white
star is really made up of two stars--one yellow and the other blue. That
is one reason I want to buy a telescope when I can afford it, for even
the smallest telescope will show that. And Mr. Serviss says that even a
strong field-glass will help any one see this wonder.
I can't tell you about all the winter constellations in one chapter. We
have made friends of the northern ones. Now let's see the famous
southern ones. And let's start a new chapter.
ORION, HIS DOGS, AND THE BULL
The most gorgeous constellation in the whole sky is Orion. I really pity
any one who does not know it, because it has more bright stars in it
than any other group. Besides, it doesn't take much imagination to see
this mighty hunter fighting the great Bull. I dare say half the people
in the United States know Orion and can tell him as quick as they see
him by the famous "belt of Orion."
This belt is made of three stars, each of which is just one degree from
the next. That is why the English people call these three stars "the ell
and yard." Another name for them is "the three kings." You can see the
"sword of Orion" hanging down from his belt.
As soon as you see these things you will see the four bright stars that
outline the figure of the great hunter, but only two of them are of the
first magnitude. The red one has a hard name--Betelgeuse (pronounced
_bet-el-guz'_). That is a Frenchified word from the Arabic, meaning
"armpit," because this star marks the right shoulder of Orion. The other
first-magnitude star is the big white one in the left foot. Its name is
Rigel (pronounced _re'-jel_) from an Arabian word meaning "the foot."
You can see the giant now, I am sure. Over his left arm hangs a lion's
skin which he holds out to shield him from the bull's horns. See the
shield--about four rather faint stars in a pretty good curve? Now look
for his club which he holds up with his right hand so as to smite the
bull. See the arm and the club--about seven stars in a rather poor
curve--beyond the red star Betelgeuse? Now you have him, and isn't he a
wonder!
It is even easier to see the Bull which is trying to gore Orion. Look
where Orion is threatening to strike, and you will see a V. How many
stars in that V? Five. And which is the brightest? That red one at the
top of the left branch of the V? Yes. That V is the face of the Bull and
that red star is the baleful eye of the angry Bull which is lowering his
head and trying to toss Orion. The name of that red eye is Aldebaran
(pronounced _al-deb'-ar-an_).
I wish Aldebaran meant "red eye," but it doesn't. It is an old Arabian
word meaning the "hindmost," or the "follower," because every evening it
comes into view about an hour after you can see the famous group of
stars called the Pleiades, which are in the shoulder of the Bull.
I do not care to trace the outline of this enormous bull, but his horns
are a great deal longer than you think at first. If you will extend the
two arms of that V a long way you will see two stars which may be called
the tips of his horns. One of these stars really belongs in another
constellation--our old friend the Charioteer, the one including
Capella. Wow! what a pair of horns!
But now we come to the daintiest of all constellations--the Seven
Sisters, or Pleiades (pronounced _plee'-a-deez_).
I can see only six of them, and there is a famous old tale about the
"lost Pleiad." But I needn't describe them. Every child finds them by
instinct. Some compare them to a swarm of bees; some to a rosette of
diamonds; some to dewdrops. But I would not compare them to a dipper as
some do, because the real Little Dipper is very different. The light
that seems to drip from the Pleiades is quivering, misty, romantic,
magical. No wonder many children love the Pleiades best of all the
constellations. No wonder the poets have praised them for thousands of
years. The oldest piece of poetry about them that I know of was written
about 1,500 years before Christ. You can find it in the book of Job. But
the most poetic description of the Pleiades that I have ever read is in
Tennyson's poem "Locksley Hall," in which he says they "glitter like a
swarm of fireflies tangled in a silver braid."
There are a great many old tales about the lost Pleiad. One is that she
veiled her face because the ancient city of Troy was burned. Another
story says she ceased to be a goddess when she married a man and became
mortal. Some people think she was struck by lightning. Others believe
the big star, Canopus, came by and ran away with her. Still others
declare she was a new star that appeared suddenly once upon a time, and
after a while faded away.
For myself, I do not believe any of these stories. One reason why I
don't is that a seventh star is really there, and many people can really
see it. Indeed, there are some people so sharp-eyed that on clear nights
they can see anywhere from eight to eleven. And, what is more, they can
draw a map or chart showing just where each star seems to them to be.
But the most wonderful stories about the Pleiades are the true stories.
One is that there are really more than 3,000 stars among the Pleiades.
Some of them can be seen only with the biggest telescopes. Others are
revealed only by the spectroscope. And some can be found only by means
of photography.
But the most amazing thing about the Pleiades is the distances between
them. They look so close together that you would probably say "the moon
seems bigger than all of them put together." Sometimes the moon comes
near the Pleiades, and you expect that the moon will blot them all out.
But the astronomers say the full moon sails through the Pleiades and
covers only one of them at a time, as a rule. They even say it is
possible for the moon to pass through the Pleiades without touching one
of them! I should like to see that. If anything like it is going to
occur, the magazine I spoke of in the first chapter will tell me about
it. And you'd better believe I will stay up to see that, if it takes all
night!
There are two more constellations in the southern part of the sky that
ought to be interesting, because they are the two hunting dogs that help
Orion fight the Bull. But I can't trace these animals, and I don't
believe it is worth while. The brightest stars in them everybody can see
and admire--Sirius, the Bigger Dog, and Procyon, the Smaller Dog.
Every one ought to know Sirius, because he is the brightest star of all.
(Of course, he is not so bright as Venus and Jupiter, but they are
planets.) To find him, draw a line from the eye of the Bull through the
belt of Orion and extend it toward the southeast about twenty degrees.
They call him the Dog star because he follows the heels of Orion. And
people still call the hottest days of summer "dog days" because 400
years before Christ the Romans noticed that the Dog star rose just
before the sun at that time. The Romans thought he chased the sun across
the sky all day and therefore was responsible for the great heat. But
that was a foolish explanation. And so is the old notion that dogs are
likely to go mad during the dog days "because the dog star is in the
ascendant." So is the idea that Sirius is an unlucky star.
There are no lucky or unlucky stars. These are all superstitions, and we
ought to be ashamed to believe any superstition. Yet for thousands of
years before we had public schools and learned to know better, people
believed that every one was born under a lucky star or an unlucky one,
and they believe that farmers ought to plant or not plant, according to
the size of the moon. Now we know that is all bosh. Those old
superstitions have done more harm than good. One of the most harmful was
the belief in witches. Let us resolve never to be afraid of these old
tales, but laugh at them.
Why should anybody be afraid of anything so lovely as Sirius? I used to
think Sirius twinkled more than any other star. But that was bad
reasoning on my part. I might have noticed that every star twinkles more
near the horizon than toward the zenith. I might have noticed that stars
twinkle more on clear, frosty nights than when there is a little uniform
haze. And putting those two facts together I might have reasoned that
the stars never really twinkle at all; they only seem to. I might have
concluded that the twinkling is all due to the atmosphere--that blanket
of air which wraps the earth around. The nearer the earth, the thicker
the air, and the more it interferes with the light that comes to us from
the stars.
They say that Sirius never looks exactly alike on two successive nights.
"It has a hundred moods," says Mr. Serviss, "according to the state of
the atmosphere. By turns it flames, it sparkles, it glows, it blazes, it
flares, it flashes, it contracts to a point, and sometimes when the air
is still, it burns with a steady white light." (Quotation somewhat
altered and condensed.)
It is a pity that so fine a star as Procyon should be called the
"Smaller Dog," because it suffers unjustly by comparison with Sirius. If
it were in some other part of the sky we might appreciate it more,
because it is brighter than most of the fifteen first-magnitude stars we
can see. My brother William has grown to love it, but perhaps that is
because he always "sympathizes with the under dog." He was the youngest
brother and knows. And curiously enough he was nicknamed "the dog"--just
why, I don't know.
To find Procyon, drawn a line from Sirius northeast about twenty
degrees. And to make sure, draw one east from Betelgeuse about the same
distance. These three stars make a triangle of which the sides are
almost equal.
The name Procyon means "before the dog" referring to the fact that you
can see him fifteen or twenty minutes earlier every night than you can
see Sirius.
The only kind word about Procyon I have heard in recent years was in
connection with that miserable business of Dr. Cook and the North Pole.
A Captain Somebody-or-other was making observations for Dr. Cook, and he
wanted to know what time it was. He had no watch and didn't want to
disturb any one. So he looked out of the window and saw by the star
Procyon that it was eleven o'clock.
That sounds mysterious, but it is easy if you have a planisphere like
ours. Last winter when we were all enjoying Orion, the Bull, and the two
Dogs, I used to whirl the planisphere around to see where they would be
at six o'clock at night, at eight, at ten, at midnight, and even at six
o'clock in the morning. And so, if I waked up in the night I could tell
what time it was without even turning my head. Sometimes I looked out of
my window, saw Orion nearly overhead and knew it must be midnight. And
sometimes I woke up just before daybreak and saw the great Bull backing
down out of sight in the west, the mighty Hunter still brandishing his
club, and his faithful Dogs following at his heels.
SEVEN FAMOUS CONSTELLATIONS
There are only seven more constellations that seem to me interesting
enough for every one to know and love all his life. These are:
The Lion (Spring)
The Twins (Spring)
The Virgin (Summer)
The Herdsman (Summer)
The Northern Crown (Summer)
The Scorpion (Summer)
Southern Fish (Autumn)