This technical description is far from the poetry of Nature; but it is especially important here to be clear and precise. Let us suppose ourselves, however, under the starry vault on a beautiful summer’s night, splendid and silent, and let us consider that each of these points which we seek to recognize is a world, or rather a system of worlds. Look at this equilateral triangle (Fig 10); it permits us to cast our eyes successively on three important suns: Vega of the Lyre, Arcturus of Boötes, and the pole star, which watches above the solitudes of our mysterious North Pole. Many martyrs of science have died looking at it! In twelve thousand years our descendants will see the Lyre at the pole, ruling the harmony of the heavens. The stars which are near the pole, and which have for that reason received the name of circumpolar stars, are distributed in the groups which have just been indicated. I earnestly invite my readers to profit by fine evenings, and try to find for themselves these constellations in the sky. We have here the principal stars and constellations of the Northern Hemisphere, the North Pole being at the centre of the circle. We come now in the order of our description to the twelve constellations of the zodiacal belt, which makes the circuit of the sky, inclined at 23° to the Equator, and of which the ecliptic, the apparent path of the sun, forms the centre line. The name of zodiac, given to the zone of stars which the sun traverses during the course of the year, comes from ζώδια, _animals_, an etymology which is due to the species of figures traced on this belt of stars. Animals, in fact, predominate in these figures. The entire circumference of the sky has been divided into twelve parts, which have been named the twelve signs of the zodiac; our ancestors called them the “houses of the sun,” or “the monthly abodes of Apollo,” because the day star visits them each month, and returns every spring to the beginning of the zodiacal city. Two memorable Latin verses of the poet Ausonius present to us these twelve signs in the order in which the sun travels through them, and this still appears the easiest method of learning them by heart. Sunt _Aries_, _Taurus_, _Gemini_, _Cancer_, _Leo_, _Virgo_, _Libraque_, _Scorpius_, _Arciteneus_, _Caper_, _Amphora_, _Pisces_; or, in English, the Ram ♈︎, the Bull ♉︎, the Twins ♊︎, the Crab ♋︎, the Lion ♌︎, the Virgin ♍︎, the Balance ♎︎, the Scorpion ♏︎, the Archer ♐︎, Capricornus ♑︎, Aquarius ♒︎, and the Fishes ♓︎. The signs placed beside these names are a vestige of the primitive hieroglyphics which described them: ♈︎ represents the horns of the Ram, ♉︎ the head of the Bull; ♒︎ is a stream of water, etc.