Truly, this is a strange symbol to see emblazoned in the heavens; has it too a story? Indeed, yes; this cluster of stars is the Sickle of Leo and lies on the head of the fierce Nemean lion which came from the moon and which was later killed by Hercules and transferred to the starry sky. The lion's head rests in the curve of the figure; his shaggy neck on the short straight line and his heart beneath the bright star on the end. [Figure 47] Not far away lies the rest of this brave creature with another bright star on the tuft of his tail. Drawn together, the sickle and the triangle now suggest a very dignified lion, although in the old star atlases he is pictured as a very ferocious lion transfixed in a moment of action. Note well this curious sickle-shaped figure beneath the bowl of the Big Dipper. We will take this figure just at present, as a leader, while calling attention to the oddly assorted but interestingly assembled groups of stars which follow Leo in a widely curved path near the dome of the heavens, from the far northeast to the far northwest. [Figure 48] These groups appear one by one like a line of floats pulled up over the horizon; then drawn in a glittering procession toward the west. Each evening they appear farther along in their journey westward,--a pageant far distant in the darkness yet visible by the gleaming of its lights. Closely following Leo, the Leader, is a representation in faint golden starlight of Queen Berenice's Hair; next the lovely orange-yellow star, Arcturus, on the dim kite-shaped figure of Boötes, the Herdsman; then a crown of star gems which belonged to Ariadne, daughter of an ancient king of Crete; a huge giant called Hercules; the golden Lyre with which Apollo raised the walls of Troy and Orpheus charmed the souls in Hades; and last, but not least, a large and beautiful Cross. The Lion disappears behind the western "bulge of the world" during the early summer, although the last of the procession, the great Cross borne on the back of Cygnus, the Swan, does not even reach the meridian--the line midway between east and west--until September. Some of these groups are also seen later than October, but at that time their splendor is dimmed by the gorgeous winter constellations in the southeast.