he mutations
of Nature.

[Illustration: MAP NO. 12.]

The constellation Scorpio is nearly as striking in outline as Orion, and
its brightest star, the red Antares (alpha in map No. 12), carries
concealed in its rays a green jewel which, to the eye of the enthusiast
in telescopic recreation, appears more beautiful and inviting each time
that he penetrates to its hiding place.

We shall begin our night's work with this object, and the four-inch
glass will serve our purpose, although the untrained observer would be
more certain of success with the five-inch. A friend of mine has seen
the companion of Antares with a three-inch, but I have never tried the
star with so small an aperture. When the air is steady and the companion
can be well viewed, there is no finer sight among the double stars. The
contrast of colors is beautifully distinct--fire-red and bright green.
The little green star has been seen emerging from behind the moon, ahead
of its ruddy companion. The magnitudes are one and seven and a half or
eight, distance 3", p. 270 deg.. Antares is probably a binary, although its
binary character has not yet been established.

A slight turn of the telescope tube brings us to the star sigma, a wide
double, the smaller component of which is blue or plum-colored;
magnitudes four and nine, distance 20", p. 272 deg.. From sigma we pass to
beta, a very beautiful object, of which the three-inch gives us a
splendid view. Its two components are of magnitudes two and six,
distance 13", p. 30 deg.; colors, white and bluish. It is interesting to
know that the larger star is itself double, although none of the
telescopes we are using can split it. Burnham discovered that it has a
tenth-magnitude companion; distance less than 1", p. 87 deg..

And now for a triple, which will probably require the use of our largest
glass. Up near the end of the northern prolongation of the constellation
we perceive the star xi. The three-inch shows us that it is double; the
five-inch divides the larger star again. The magnitudes are respectively
five, five and a half, and seven and a half, distances 0.94", p. 215 deg.,
and 7", p. 70 deg..

A still more remarkable star, although one of its components is beyond
our reach, is nu. With the slightest magnifying this object splits up
into two stars, of magnitudes four and seven, situated rather more than
40" apart. A high power divides the seventh-magnitude companion into
two, each of magnitude six and