154 



SCENERY OF THE HEAVENS. 



hounds of Hevelius, apparently pursuing Ursa Major round the pole of the heavens. 

 The fine star Arcturus, of the first magnitude, is in this constellation, once supposed to 

 be the nearest to the earth of the stellar host, but without authority. 



Of the stars of the southern hemisphere, only a portion of course are visible to us, but 

 these are by far the most important, and constitute the finest stellar objects upon which 

 we gaze. There is the beautifully splendid Orion, visible to all the habitable world, be- 

 cause the equinoctial passes through the middle of the constellation, and when on the 



meridian with us, we have at the same time the most 

 remarkable asterisms in the firmament above the 

 horizon. The outline of Orion is very distinctly 

 marked by four brilliant stars which form a long 

 square or parallelogram. The most northerly is 

 Betelguese of the first magnitude ; 7-J- westward is 

 Bellatrix of the second; 15 to the south is Rigel, a 

 splendid star of the first magnitude; and 8j to the 

 east is Saiph of the third. The two former form 

 the upper ends of the parallelogram, and the two 

 latter the lower. In the centre are three stars of the 

 second magnitude, in a straight line of about 3 in 

 length, running from north-west to south-east. 

 These form the well-known belt of Orion. The 

 uppermost of the triad being less than - south of the equinoctial, is almost exactly verti- 

 cal to the equator. South of the Belt, a row of smaller stars running down obliquely 

 towards Saiph forms the Sword. This fine asterism, in connection with the groups in its 

 neighbourhood, constitutes the richest part of the visible heavens. But the ancients 

 regarded Orion with fear and trembling, referring to him without ceremony those squalls 

 upon the deep which were observed to be periodical at his rising at certain seasons of 

 the year. Hesiod and Homer, therefore, call him fierce; Virgil connects him with 

 storms and tempests ; Horace points to his severity and turbulence ; and Polybius divides 

 the blame of losing the Roman fleet in the first Punic war between the malignity 

 of the constellation and the fool-hardiness of the consuls, ^neas accounts in this way 

 for the storm which cast him on the coast of Africa when proceeding to Italy: 



" To that blest shore we steer'd our destin'd way, 

 When sudden, dire Orion rous'd the sea : 

 All charg'd with tempests rose the baleful star, 

 And on our navy pour'd his wat'ry war." 



Orion has the bright clusters of Taurus giving splendour to his vicinity on the north- 

 west ; Canis Minor with Procyon, a star of the first magnitude, on the east ; and Canis 

 Major, a little on the south-east, universally known by the brilliancy of Sirius, the most 

 refulgent and perhaps the nearest object to us in the sidereal heavens. The old Egyptians 

 observed the heliacal rise of Sirius, or the appearance of the star in the morning above 

 the horizon just before the sun, to occur at a period which immediately anteceded the 

 annual overflow of the Nile, and supposing the two coincident events to be physically con - 

 nected, the dog-star was adored as the author of the fertility of their country. To the 

 Greeks, his heliacal rising taking place at the most sultry time of the year, when 

 disease was rife, seemed to authorise a reference of all the plagues of the season to his in- 

 fluence. Hence the description of 



" the star 



Autumnal of all stars, in dead of night 

 Conspicuous most, and w;irn'd Orion's dog 



