106 



KNOWLEDGE 



May, 1901. 



to see in this long winding trail of stars, a gigantic 

 scorpion, with its head to the west, and flourishing its 

 upraised sting, that glitters with a pair of twin stars, 

 as if ready to strike." 



The pair of stars in question are Lambda and Upsilon. 

 Lambda being the brighter. To the north and east of 

 this pair of stars, and about 6° distant from Lambda, 

 are two star clusters about 4° apart — 6 and 7 Messier, 



— we come in turn to Tau, then after a gap to Epsilon, 

 and then to Mu Scorpii, a lovely pair in the opera- 

 glass, whilst the next star lower down in the curve, 

 Zeta, gives a region of most exceptional beauty to a 

 good binocular. To the English observer, Scorpii hugs 

 the horizon too closely for the full magnificence of the 

 region to reveal itself, but for those who are favoured 

 with a more southern residence, the Milky Way attains 







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XXI 



XX 



XIX XVllI XVII XVI 



XV 



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star Ma)) Xo. .j : Tlie Region of Scorpio. 



both 



li well worth cxaniinatiou with the opera^glass. 

 Turning back to Antares, the bright star to the "west 

 of it is Sigma, and almost between Sigma and Antares, 

 but a little below, is another star cluster, number 4 in 

 Messier's catalogue. The entire constellation is full 

 of interesting and beautiful fields even for so slight an 

 optical assistance as the opera-glass gives. The two 

 principal stars in the forehead of the Scorpion are Beta 

 the more northern. Delta the more southern, distant 

 from Antares roughly one-third the way to Beta and 

 Alpha Librae. Immediately below Beta is the bright 

 and pretty pair, situated on the ecliptic. Omega Scorpii, 

 wliilst Nu Scorpii, a little above and following Beta, is 

 also a double, but requires a more powerful lens to show 

 it as such. Immediately above Antai-es is 22 Scorpii, a 

 star with two companions ; Rho Ophiuchi a little 

 further north, has also a coiiple, both within the grasp 

 of the opera-glass. 



Following the curve of stars downwai'ds from Antares, 

 — which by the way owes its name to its pronounced 

 red coloiu', the reddest bright star in the sky, and, 

 therefore, fitly called Antares, the rival of Ares or Mars, 



here its greatest glory and its most striking complexity 

 of form. 



The old constellation makers have left evident proof 

 in this portion of the sky that they were not working 

 haphazard in the designs they selected for the star 

 groups, and the places which they assigned to them. 

 At midnight at the spring equinox, the Scorpion was 

 for them on the meridian in the south, and the Dragon 

 was in like manner on the meridian low down in the 

 north. Just as they had planted the Kneeler, whom we 

 now call Hercules, upon the Dragon in the north, so 

 they provided another hero, the Serpent-holder, to tram- 

 ple down the Scorpion in the south, and the heads of 

 the two heroes were made up by the stars in the zenith. 

 Both th© unknown warriors, therefore, were pictured 

 in those primitive ideas as erect, but for many genera- 

 tions Hercules has been to us hanging head downwards 

 in the sky in the most uncomfortable of attitudes, for 

 our zenith, nowadays, passes nearly through his feet. 



Although the conqueror over the Scorpion, Ophiuchus 

 is not for a moment to be compared with his enemy as a 

 constellation. It covers a great extent of sky. its stars 



