precursor of rain, and if the Bee Hive is not visible in a clear sky, it is a presage of a violent storm.

CANCER

HYDRA (hi´-dra)—THE SEA-SERPENT. (Face South and Southwest.)

Location.—The head of Hydra, a striking and beautiful arrangement of stars, lies just below the Bee Hive, in Cancer, 6° south of Acubens in that constellation, and forms a rhomboidal figure of five stars.

Hydra is about 100° in length and reaches almost from Canis Minor to Libra. Its stars are all faint except Alphard, or the Hydra's heart, a second-magnitude star remarkable for its lonely situation, southwest of Regulus, in Leo. A line drawn from γ Leonis through Regulus points it out. It is of a rich orange tint. Castor and Pollux, in Gemini, point southeast to it.

The constellations Crater, the Cup, and Corvus, the Crow, both stand on the coils of Hydra, south of Denebola, the bright star in the tail of the Lion.

Hydra is supposed to be the snake shown on a uranographic stone from the Euphrates, 1200 b.c.

The little asterism Sextans, the Sextant, lies in the region between Regulus and Alphard. It contains no stars brighter than the fourth magnitude.

HYDRA

LEO (le´o)—THE LION. (Face South.)

Location.—A line drawn from Pollux, in Gemini, to γ in Cancer, and prolonged about 12°, strikes Regulus, the brilliant star in the heart of the Lion. Regulus lies about 9° east of Acubens, in Cancer, and about 12° northeast of Alphard, in the heart of Hydra.

Leo is one of the most beautiful constellations in the zodiac. It lies south of the Great Bear, and its principal stars are arranged in the form of a sickle which nearly outlines the Lion's head. This group is so striking as to be unmistakable. Regulus is in the handle of the sickle. It is one of the stars from which longitude is reckoned, lies almost exactly on the ecliptic, and is visible for eight months in the year.

Denebola, the bright star in the Lion's tail, lies 25° east of Regulus, and about 35° west of Arcturus, in Boötes. It is the same distance northwest of Spica, in Virgo, and forms with Spica and Arcturus a large equilateral triangle.

ζ is double, and has three faint companion stars.

ε has two seventh-magnitude companion stars, forming a beautiful little triangle.

Regulus is white in color, γ yellow, π red.

γ is a beautiful colored telescopic double star and has a companion visible in an opera-glass.

The figure of Leo very much as we now have it appears in all the Indian and Egyptian zodiacs.

LEO & THE SICKLE

COMA BERENICES (kō´-ma ber-e-ni´-sez)—BERENICE'S HAIR.

Location.—A line drawn from Regulus to Zosma, in Leo, and prolonged an equal distance, strikes this fine cluster, which is 18° northeast of Zosma, δ Leonis.

The group lies well within a triangle formed by Denebola, Arcturus, in Boötes, and Cor Caroli, in Canes Venatici, which triangle is the upper half of the Diamond of Virgo.

Twenty or thirty stars in this group can be counted with an opera-glass, and the group can be easily distinguished with the naked eye, when the moon is not visible.

The first half of the month of April can be called the most brilliant sidereal period of the year. At this time eleven first-magnitude stars are visible in this latitude at 9 p.m. From east to west they are: Vega, Arcturus, Spica, Regulus, Pollux, Procyon, Sirius, Capella, Aldebaran, Betelgeuze, and Rigel, truly a glorious company, an incomparable sight.