Directly south of Orion lies the small constellation of Lepus, The Hare, which is made up of third-magnitude and fourth-magnitude stars. The four brighter stars are arranged in the form of a small, but distinct, quadrilateral, or four-sided figure, which may be easily seen in our latitudes. The small constellation of Columba, The Dove, which lies just south of Lepus, is so close to the horizon that it can not be seen to advantage in the mid-latitudes of the northern hemisphere. Neither Lepus nor Columba contain any object of unusual interest.
Due north of Orion, and lying in the zenith at this time, is Auriga, The Charioteer, represented, strange to say, with Capella, a goat, in his arms. The beautiful first-magnitude star Capella, golden-yellow in color, serves us in identifying the constellation. Close at hand are The Kids, represented by a group of three faint stars. Capella is one of the most brilliant stars of the northern hemisphere. It is almost exactly equal in brightness to Arcturus and Vega, stars conspicuous in the summer months, and it is a shade brighter than magnificent blue-white Rigel in Orion. Capella is about fifty light-years distant from the earth and is fully two hundred times more brilliant than our own sun. At the distance of Capella, the sun would appear to be considerably fainter than any one of the three stars in the nearby group of The Kids.
Capella is attended by a companion star so close to its brilliant ruler that it can not be seen as a separate star save with the aid of the most powerful telescopes. Its distance from Capella has been very accurately measured, however, by means of the interferometer, which is giving us the measurements of the diameters of the giant stars. It is known that this companion sun is closer to Capella than our planet earth is to the sun.
At no time of the year shall we find near the meridian so many brilliant and beautiful stars as appear in the month of February at this time in the evening. In addition to Capella, which is one of the three most brilliant stars in the northern hemisphere of the heavens, we have, in Orion alone, two stars of the first magnitude, Betelgeuze and Rigel, and five stars of the second magnitude, Bellatrix and Saiph and the three stars in the Belt. In addition, we have not far distant in the western sky, fiery Aldebaran in Taurus, and close on the heel of Orion in the east, Sirius, the brightest star in the heavens, in the constellation of Canis Major, The Greater Dog, as well as the first-magnitude star Procyon in Canis Minor, The Lesser Dog. Of these two groups we shall have more to say under the constellations for March.