The Great Square in Pegasus is the most conspicuous configuration
of stars to be seen in the heavens in autumn evenings. The star
that marks the northeastern corner of The Great Square belongs to
the constellation of Andromeda and marks the head of the maiden,
who is resting upon the shoulders of Pegasus, The Winged Horse. The
three bright stars nearly in a straight line outline the maiden's
body, Alpha, or Alpheratz, as it is called, being the star in the
head, Beta or Mirach in the waist, and Gamma or Almach in the left
foot. The last-named star, which is farthest to the northeast in
the diagram, was, in the opinion of the noted astronomer Herschel,
the finest double star in the heavens. The two stars into which the
telescope splits it are of the beautifully contrasted shades of
orange and sea green.
A second most interesting object in Andromeda and one of the finest
in the entire heavens is The Great Andromeda Nebula, which is faintly
visible without the aid of a telescope as a hazy patch of light. It
is believed that in reality this nebula is a great universe composed
of many thousands of stars so distant that no telescope can show the
individual members and that the light from it takes many thousands
of years to span the abyss that separates it from the solar system.
Some magnificent photographs of The Great Andromeda Nebula have been
taken with powerful telescopes. It is through the use of photography
that the nebulæ can best be studied, for a photographic plate after
long exposure, reveals a wonderful detail in the structure of these
objects that the human eye fails to see. On a clear, dark evening
one may find The Great Andromeda Nebula by the aid of two faint stars
with which it makes a small triangle, as shown in the chart. This
nebula is the only one of the spiral nebula that can be seen in these
latitudes without the aid of a telescope, though there are several
spiral nebulæ in the southern heavens that can be thus seen.
Lying to the northwest of The Great Square in Pegasus are a number of
faint stars that outline the shoulders and head of the winged steed,
while the stars to the southwest of the square outline his forelegs.
The creature is represented without hind quarters in all star
atlases. The space within The Great Square contains no bright stars,
and as a result, the outline of the square stands out with great
distinctness. There are, in fact, no stars of the first magnitude in
either Pegasus or Andromeda, though there are a number of the second
and third magnitude which very clearly show the distinctive forms of
these two star-groups.
Pisces, The Fishes, the constellation just south of Andromeda and
Pegasus, is the first of the twelve zodiacal constellations. It
consists of the southern fish, lying in an east-to-west direction,
and the northern fish, lying nearly north and south, the two touching
at the southeastern extremity of the constellation.
[Illustration: NOVEMBER--PISCES]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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