ion,
they rejoiced that he had the eyesight which is the first requisite of
a good hunter.

The Great Bear is also to be remembered as the Pointers for another
reason. It is the hour-hand of the woodman's clock. It goes once
around the North Star in about twenty-four hours, the same way as the
sun, and for the same reason--that it is the earth that is going and
leaving them behind.

The time in going around is not exactly twenty-four hours, so that the
position of the Pointers varies with the seasons, but, as a rule, this
for woodcraft purposes is near enough. The bowl of the Dipper swings
one and one half times the width of the opening (i.e., fifteen
degrees) in one hour. If it went a quarter of the circle, that would
mean you had slept a quarter of a day, or six hours.

{83}

Each fifteen days the stars seem to be an hour earlier; in three
months they gain one fourth of the circle, and in a year gain the
whole circle.

According to Flammarion, there are about seven thousand stars visible
to the naked eye, and of those but nineteen are stars of the first
magnitude. Thirteen of them are visible in the latitude of New York,
the other six belong to the South Polar Region of the sky. Here is
Flammarion's arrangement of them in order of seeming brightness. Those
that can be seen in the Southern Hemisphere only, are in brackets:

1. Sirius, the Dog-star.
2. [Canopus, of Argo.]
3. [Alpha, of the Centaur.]
4. Arcturus, of Bootes.
5. Vega, of the Lyre.
6. Rigel, of Orion's foot.
7. Capella, of Auriga.
8. Procyon, or the Little Dog-star.
9. Betelguese, of Orion's right shoulder.
10. [Beta, of the Centaur.]
11. [Achernar, of Eridanus.]
12. Aldebaran, of Taurus, the Bull's right eye.
13. Antares, of Scorpio.
14. [Alpha, of the Southern Cross.]
15. Altair, of the Eagle.
16. Spica, of Virgo.
17. Fomalhaut, of the Southern Fish.
18. [Beta, of the Southern Cross.]
19. Regulus, of the Lion.

Orion

Orion (O-ri-on), with its striking array of brilliant stars,
Betelguese, Rigel, the Three Kings, etc., is generally admitted to be
the finest constellation in the heavens.

Orion was the hunter giant who went to Heaven when he died, and now
marches around the great dome, but is seen only in the winter,
because, during the summer, he passes over during daytime. Thus he is
still the hunter's constellation. The three stars of his belt are
called the "Three Kings."

Sirius, the Great Dog-star, is in the head o