Yes; and if I had that point over my head I should be where no one else has been—at the south pole of the earth. Now I have my centre, I would like to describe a circle at the distance of the Cross and know the stars inside of it.
Begin, then. Look at the two bright ones pointing toward the Cross beside it. They are the Pointers to the Cross. A lot of bright stars together, on the other side of the Cross, are in the Ship, Argo. Follow on the circumference that way, and you arrive at a large star, a little north of our course, called Canopus. From the Cross to Canopus is one-quarter of the circle round the pole, and it is filled up with the Ship.
What a ship!
It goes northward, too, to Sirius, the Dog-star. Canopus is half-way between Sirius and the south pole, and is in the line between the two.
That is a capital point, for I know them.
South of the Ship, between it and the pole, are the little Flying Fish. The Table Mountain and Chameleon, with feeble stars, are between the Fish, again, and the poles.
Now I have that quarter of the circle, well.
Keep on to the right, still away from the Cross and beyond Canopus, nearly as far again, and you see a bright star in our circle, which is called Achernar, at the bottom of the long River Po.
Not the Italian river, but the Celestial one.
That heavenly stream runs northward to Orion. Now, between Canopus and Achernar we see but few stars, although we pass the constellations of the Painter’s Easel, Rhomboidal Net, and Clock. Between Achernar and the Pole are the tiny stars of the Little Hydra. But between the Little Hydra and the Flying Fish, resting like on the Table Mountain, is the beautiful Nubecular Major, the great Magellanic Cloud.