In legend, Aries was a great ram with a golden fleece and possessed the ability to fly. Mercury brought this beautiful creature to Helle and Prixus, the persecuted children of the King of Thessaly, so that they might climb upon its back and escape across the sea from their cruel stepmother. On the way over, Helle lost her hold on the fleece, sank under the waves and was drowned. Commemorating this tragedy, the sea was ever after called the Sea of Helle or the Hellespont but in modern days, the Dardanelles. The Dardanelles is a narrow channel separating Europe from Asia, and is the "Hellespont" that Leander so faithfully swam when visiting Hero, his sweetheart. Prixus, coming safely to the end of his journey, dedicated the ram to Jupiter who placed it among the stars. It is now a zodiacal constellation with the horns of the ram for its sign: ♈︎. The golden fleece, while on earth, was of course very desirable so that it was fastened to an oak tree in the sacred grove of the War-god Mars at the eastern end of the Black Sea and a sleepless dragon was wound around the tree-trunk to protect it. It was to obtain this fleece that, in 936 B. C., Jason built a fifty-oared galley--the first of ships--and invited the heroes of Greece to go with him on the expedition. This adventurous undertaking was afterward known as the Argonautic Expedition. The ship Argo was placed in the sky as a southern constellation, or at least a part of it was for the bow is said to have been lost when passing through the Bosporus. "Argo, exalted for that daring feat To fix in heaven her shape with stars." --_Wordsworth._ But even the portion that was lifted to the sky is so large that astronomers, for convenience, have divided it into three parts,--Carina, the Keel; Puppis, the Stern; and Vela, the Sail. The beautiful star Canopus lies on the Keel. Triangulum and Aries, traveling beneath Andromeda, rise in late September and October and pass the meridian in the early evenings during the first weeks of December. [Figure 44: THE PARADE OF THE ZENITH CONSTELLATIONS. During the spring and summer months these clearly marked constellations parade slowly across the dome of the heavens. Leo, the Lion, may be easily located beneath the Big Dipper.] CHAPTER VI THE PARADE OF THE ZENITH CONSTELLATIONS LEO, THE LION [Figure 45] ABOUT 9 o'clock on the 8th of April, a large, bright sickle passes near the zenith. This sickle lies just south of the Big Dipper and is a clearly defined figure among the other designs which decorate the sky during the early spring. [Figure 46]