“Why, not very well,” said his father. “I cannot look round, I am so muffled up.”
Rollo, being seated on the front seat, with his back to the horse, of course was looking at that part of the sky which was behind the sleigh, so that his father could not see the constellation in that quarter of the heavens.
“Let me see,” said his father; “we must be going nearly west, so that that part of the sky is the eastern part. Orion must be rising about this time. Perhaps the stars which you see are the stars in the belt of Orion.”
“In the belt of Orion?” repeated Rollo.
“Yes,” said his father. “The most beautiful constellation in the sky is Orion; and early in the winter it rises in the evening. Orion was a hunter, and he has a belt: and in his belt are three beautiful stars, all in a row.”
“Well, father,” said Rollo, “tell me some other stars that ought to be near, if it is really the belt of Orion that I see, and then I will tell you if they are there.”
“Very well,” said his father. “If they are the three stars in the belt of Orion, they lie in a line one above the other, not one by the side of the other. I mean by that, that, if there was a line drawn through them, and continued each way, it would be a line running up and down in the sky, not a line extending from one side to the other.”
“Yes, sir,” said Rollo; “this row of stars is in a line up and down.”
“And off on each side of the little row of stars are two other bright stars, on each side.”