Page:The Music of the Spheres.djvu/44

 Mapmakers later drew fanciful pictures of these objects and animals and heroes which had been transposed to the sky and united them up with the positions of the stars. This imaginative tapestry of figures is believed to be an attempt on the part of the ancient people to weave a record of their history in the dusk among the stars. That this most original method was successful is attested by the fact that although several thousand years have elapsed these ancient figures still stand and the names that they gave to the constellations are used by astronomers today.

Many of the Grecian characters which are mentioned in the stories of the gods and heroes are personified in groups of three—the three Fates, daughters of Chaos, appointed to watch over the thread of human life—

the three Furies, daughters of Night, who represent the remorse which torments and pursues the wicked; the three Sirens, who lived on an enchanted Isle in the Mediterranean Sea and lured mariners on the rocks with their bewitching songs; the three Graces, who presided over feast and dance; the nine Muses, daughters of Jupiter, who dwelt on Mount Helicon and presided over arts and sciences—

Mount Helicon was also the home of the great Flying Horse which is sought by poets and is now represented in the sky by a large square of stars called the Square of Pegasus. In one of the adventures of the hero Perseus he snatched the solitary eye away from the three Grey Sisters and thus forced them to tell where he