ellow star of the 9th to 10th magnitude. The mean distance apart
is about 20 astronomical units; the total mass of the pair is 3.7 times
the mass of the sun, Sirius itself being twice as massive as its
companion, and, marvellously enough, forty thousand times as bright. The
spectrum of Sirius is characterized by prominent absorption lines due to
hydrogen, the metallic lines being weak; other stars having the same
spectra are said to be of the "Sirian type." Such stars are the most
highly heated (see STAR).

_Procyon_, or a Canis minoris, is a star of the 2nd magnitude, one-fifth
as bright as Sirius, or numerically 0.47 when compared with Aldebaran.
It is more distant than Sirius, its parallax being 0.33"; and its light
is about six times that of the sun. Its proper motion is large, 1.25",
and its velocity at right angles to the line of sight is about 11 m. per
second. Its proper motion shows large irregularities, pointing to a
relatively massive companion; this satellite was discovered on the 13th
of November 1896 by J.M. Schaeberle, with the great Lick telescope, as a
star of the 13th magnitude. Its mass is equal to about that of the sun,
but its light is only one twenty-thousandth.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] See G. Schiaparelli, _Astronomy in the Old Testament_ (1905).

[2] For other values of the interval between the summer solstice and
the rising of Sirius, see Smith's _Dict. of Greek and Roman
Antiquities_.

[3] See Thomas Barker, _Phil. Trans._, 1760, 51, p. 498, for
quotations from classical authors; also T.J.J. See, _Astronomy and
Astrophysics_. vol. xi. p. 269.

CANITZ, FRIEDRICH RUDOLF LUDWIG, FREIHERR VON (1654-1699), German poet
and diplomatist, was born at Berlin on the 27th of November 1654. He
attended the universities of Leiden and Leipzig, travelled in England,
France, Italy and Holland, and on his return was appointed groom of the
bedchamber (Kammerjunker) to the elector Frederick William of
Brandenburg, whom he accompanied on his campaigns in Pomerania and
Sweden. In 1680 he became councillor of legation, and he was employed on
various embassies. In 1697 the elector Frederick III. made him a privy
councillor, and the emperor Leopold I. created him a baron of the
Empire. Having fallen ill on an embassy to the Hague, he obtained his
discharge and died at Berlin in 1699. Canitz's poems (_Nebenstunden
unterschiedener Gedichte_), which did not appear until after his death
(1700),