Below the Belt hangs a fainter row of stars constituting the “Sword.” The central star of this row, Theta (θ), arrests the attention at once by a curious appearance of nebulosity, especially if it is examined with an opera-glass. A telescope shows it to be enveloped in one of the grandest nebulæ in the sky, the celebrated “Great Nebula of Orion.” With a large glass its appearance is astonishing in the highest degree. Instead of being elongated like the great nebula in Andromeda, it is about as broad as long, with no single centre of condensation, but many curdled accumulations, interspersed with partial gaps, and a great variety of curved lines of brighter nebulosity, suggesting the misty skeleton of some nondescript monster impact of phosphorescent clouds. A large number of stars are scattered over or through it, and some of them seem clearly to be connected with it, as if created out of its substance. Unlike the Andromeda nebula, this shows only the spectrum of glowing gas, so that no such supposition as has been made in the other case--_viz._, that it may be an outside universe--is admissible here. It is rather a chaos, rich with the elements from whose combinations spring suns and planets, and where the effects of organizing forces are just beginning to become manifest. It resembles a vast everglade filled with tangled vegetation and uncouth growths, but where the fertile soil, once cleared and drained, is capable of producing an enormous harvest. On either side of the Belt, but far removed from it, shine the two great stars of Orion, Alpha (α), or Betelgeuse (from an Arabic phrase meaning the “Armpit of the Central One”), and Beta (β), or Rigel (from an Arabic phrase meaning the “Leg of the Giant”). These stars differ remarkably in color, Betelgeuse being orange-hued, and Rigel white. Although Betelgeuse takes precedence in the Greek-letter ranking, it is variable in brightness, sometimes exceeding Rigel in brilliance, and sometimes falling below it. The changes are uncertain in a long and as yet unascertained period. There is here an opportunity for an amateur to make valuable observations. But such observations must be continued over a considerable period of years.