We
have taken it ever since it was published. I am ten years old.

WILLIE CASTLE.

Prince Albert Victor, the Prince of Wales's eldest son, if then alive,
would succeed to the English throne after Queen Victoria, in case of the
previous death of her eldest son,--the Prince of Wales. A general answer
to this question will be found in the "Letter-Box" for May, 1877 (Vol.
IV., page 509), in a reply to an inquiry from "Julia."

Brunswick, Maine.

DEAR ST. NICHOLAS: It has occurred to me that some of my St. Nicholas
friends may like to know what I have learned from ancient books about
the constellation Ursa Major, or the Dipper, which, in St. Nicholas for
January, 1877 (vol. iv., p. 168), Professor Proctor has likened to a
monkey climbing a pole. It is about the other title of this
constellation, "Great Bear." I need not describe the group itself, for
that has been done already by Professor Proctor in ST. NICHOLAS for
December, 1876.

Sailors, in very ancient times, were without compasses and charts, and
when voyaging guided themselves by studying the situations and motions
of the heavenly bodies. They saw that most of the stars passed up from
the horizon and rose toward the zenith, the point right over head, and
then dropped westward to hide themselves beyond the earth. After a time
they noted some stars which never set, but every night, in fair weather,
were seen at that side where the sun never appears, or, in other words,
were seen at their left side, when their faces were toward the sunrise.
They did not long hesitate how to use these stars. And when, during foul
weather, the sailors were tossed to and fro, these same constant stars,
that again appeared after the storm, indicated to them their true
position, and, as it were, _spoke to them_. This caused them to give
more exact study to the constellations in that same part of the heavens.
None appeared more remarkable than that among which they reckoned seven
of the brightest stars, taking up a large space. Some who watched this
star-group, as it seemed to turn around in the sky, named it the
"Wheel," or "Chariot." The Phoenician pilots called it, sometimes,
"Parrosis," the Indicator, the Rule, or "Callisto," the Deliverance, the
Safety of Sailors. But it was more commonly named "Doube," signifying
the "speaking constellation," or the "constellation which gives advice."
Now, the word "Doube" signified also to the Phoenicians a "she-bear,"
and the Greeks are