On a fine winter’s night turn toward the south, and you will immediately recognize this giant constellation. The four stars, α, γ, β, κ, occupy the angles of a great quadrilateral. The three others, δ, ε, ζ, are crowded in an oblique line in the middle of this quadrilateral; α, at the northeast angle, is named _Betelgeuse_ (not Beteigeuse, as some books print it); β, at the southeast angle, is called _Rigel_. The line of the Belt, produced both ways, passes to the northeast near _Aldebaran_, the Eye of the Bull, which we know already, and to the southeast near _Sirius_, the finest star of the sky, which we shall soon consider. It is during the fine nights of winter that this constellation shines in the evening above our heads. No other season is so magnificently constellated as the months of winter. While nature deprives us of certain enjoyments in one way, it offers us in exchange others no less precious. The marvels of the heavens present themselves from Taurus and Orion in the east to Virgo and Boötes on the west. Of eighteen stars of the first magnitude which are counted in the whole extent of the firmament, a dozen are visible from nine o’clock to midnight, not to mention some fine stars of the second magnitude, remarkable nebulæ, and celestial objects well worthy of the attention of mortals. It is thus that nature establishes a harmonious compensation, and while it darkens our short and frosty days of winter, it gives us long nights enriched with the most opulent creations of the sky. The constellation of Orion is not only the richest in brilliant stars, but it conceals for the initiated treasures which no other is known to afford. We might almost call it the California of the sky. To the southeast of Orion, on the line of the Three Kings, shines the most magnificent of all the stars, _Sirius_, or α of the constellation of the Great Dog. This star of the first magnitude marks the upper eastern angle of a great quadrilateral, of which the base near the horizon of London, is adjacent to a triangle. This constellation rises in the evening at the end of November, passes the meridian at midnight at the end of January, and sets at the end of March. It played the greatest part in Egyptian astronomy, for it regulated the ancient calendar. It was the famous Dog Star; it predicted the inundation of the Nile, the summer solstice, great heats and fevers; but the precession of the equinoxes has in 3,000 years moved back the time of its appearance by a month and a half, and now this fine star announces nothing, either to the Egyptians who are dead or to their successors. The _Little Dog_, or Procyon, is found above the Great Dog and below the Twins (Castor and Pollux), to the east of Orion. With the exception of α Procyon, no brilliant star distinguishes it.