Page:Star Lore Of All Ages, 1911.pdf/490

364 on the Middle Horse," and in Germany it represented Hans the Waggoner rewarded for assisting our Saviour.

In the field with Mizar and Alcor is the so-called "Sidus Ludovicanium," an eighth magnitude star of a bluish colour. This was first observed by Einmart of Nuremberg in 1691, and in 1723 another German, thinking he had discovered a planet, named it after his sovereign Ludwig V.

There are two noted stars in this constellation that remain to be mentioned. They are known as 1830 Groom bridge, and Lalande 21,185. The former has been called "the Flying Star," or "Runaway Star," from the fact that its proper motion is swifter with one exception than any other star in the heavens. Its speed is so great that it would show a displacement equal to about one third of the apparent diameter of the moon in one hundred years. According to Argelander, its pace will carry it around the entire sphere in 185,000 years. Another authority asserts that in 6000 years it will reach the asterism known as Coma Berenices. Its estimated speed is two hundred miles a second, a pace that Newcomb claims is uncontrollable by the combined attractive power of the entire sidereal universe.

According to Prof. Young this star is 37.5 light years distant.

Lalande 21,185 is noted as being the nearest star to the earth of all the northern stars. Its magnitude is 7.4, and it is estimated to be 7.5 light years distant from the earth.

Five of the seven stars in the Dipper, those from β to ζ inclusive, are moving together in the sky all very nearly parallel to the line joining the first to the last. The remaining stars, α and η, are moving in almost an opposite direction, and both are receding at almost the same rate from a point in the sky not far from Vega. The accompanying diagram illustrates this movement. See p..

Because of this drift, says Flammarion, they will form