Page:Star Lore Of All Ages, 1911.pdf/484

360 the Greeks, and alludes principally to the motion of the stars in the immediate vicinity of the Pole.

There is some little interest in Ursa Major on account of the possibility of its being used as a kind of celestial timekeeper. The northern sky is in reality a great clock dial, over which hands wrought of stars trace their way unceasingly. Moreover, it is a timepiece that is absolutely accurate, and which requires no winding or repairing. A line drawn through α and β Ursæ Majoris, or "the Pointers" as these stars are called, passes almost exactly through the pole of the heavens. Now this line revolves with the constellation once in twenty-four hours. On March 21st at 10.55, the superior passage takes place; a like passage, but invisible, occurs on Sept. 22d at 10.55 Knowing the day of the month, the time may be derived by observing what angle the line joining these stars makes with the vertical. In Shakespeare's King Henry IV. the Carrier exclaims:

And Falstaff says:

Poe in one of his poems writes:

Tennyson wrote:

And again in The Princess: