St. Nicholas/Volume 40/Number 6/Nature and Science/Leo

THE “LION” IN THE SKY

At about nine o’clock in the evening, at the beginning of April, if you will look at the sky toward the south, you will see a group of bright stars in the form of a sickle, and another group to the east of it in the form of a right-angled triangle. The very bright star at the eastern point of the triangle is Denebola. The bright star at the end of the “handle” of the sickle is Regulus. In olden times, people fancied that the stars in this vicinity formed the figure of a lion.

Modern charts of the stars do not show the picturesque beasts, birds, men, and women, as fancied by the early star-gazers, but the ancient names, usually in the Latin, are still retained to designate the various groups of stars in the heavens. Thus, Leo is the lion, Ursa Major the big
The fancied figure of a lion. bear, Coma Berenices, Queen Berenice’s hair, etc. North of Leo is Leo Minor—the little lion.

The most beautiful stars to be seen in the month of April are in this vicinity. But beautiful as they are to the unaided eyes, you will find that a strong field-glass or even an ordinary opera-glass will make them still more so, and will also reveal hundreds of “small” bright stars in Coma Berenices.

Westward from the sickle is a small closely clustered group of “small” stars known as the
A map of Leo and surrounding constellations. beehive (Presepe). We have not located it on the map, leaving to you the pleasant surprise of finding it, by carefully “sweeping” the sky westward and not very far away from the sickle.