The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1902-04-06

April, the fourth month in the year,
presents many attra ctions for those who
follow with unWaVeIing interest the ever
changing movements of the heavenly
bodies. The scene of beauty has, how
ever, shifted to the early morning hours,
if one would see the planets in their glory.
so that it takes an early riser to CLEAN
from the heavens the really choice bits,
unless a telescope is at hand. The stars
are, however, always to be relied upon,
and just now in the northern section OF
the heavens we see the Little Bear pass
ing above the horizontal position which he
had not quite reached last month, while
the Great Bear is overhead and inverted.
King CepheuS is now Immediately below
the pole, and, like some earthly monarchs,
is standing on his head in most I'M
hngly attitude. Cassiopeia is where it
always can be found, on the opposite side
of the pole from that occupied by the
Great Bear, so that the Lady in the
Chair need never fear being Rugged by
this fierce denizen of the Arctic regions
In the southern sky the great sea serpent.
Hydra, occupies the leading position This
is the longest and nearly the largest of
the consultations The ruling elliptic
constellation for the month is the Lion
easily distinguished by the Sickle. in the
handle of which is the bright star Regu-
lus- In the east there is Bootes, under
meath which are the stars of the Serpent
but the fangs of the latter are innocuous
for presumably they cannot pierce the
boots Of the former, who tramples fear
lessly upon him. In the west Taurus is
passing from sight. The Twins followed
by Procyon, the Lesser Dog, are ap-
preaching the midwest, or prime YER
teal and hang like glorious crowns over
Orion, as he passes to his setting place,
says the New York Sun.
While contemplating these worlds, shin
ing so brightly in the morning and in the.
evening, we may, without TOO great al
effort of the imagination, think that they
contain beings moving with all the activ-
lty of life; nations, civilizations cities
like Babylon, -Tnebes Or even something
approaching our own cosmopolitan Goth
am-human beings in a word, who are
everything that we are, under different
physical FORMS but no doubt reasoning
by the aid of the same principles of logic
which govern our thought, though their
manner of perception may be totally diff
ferent from our own. Perhaps they have
escaped more quickly from the limbo of
barbarism and form intelligent. enIight-
ened, pacific and fraternal societies. wor-
shipping the beautiful, the true, and the
good.
The month opens with the sun de-
grees north of the equator, and the days
twelve hours forty-One minutes in length
The declination Increases more than 20
degrees to the northward with the add-
ton of one hour and nineteen minutes to
the days length. This should cause all
nature to bloom and put on it's lovely
spring coloring. On the Sth there is par
tial eclipse of the sun, one of three allot-
ed TO this year. We are not among the
favored this time, however, as the vari-
Gus phenomena attending the en-
trance into the shadow and the depart
thA1.c HI
tGde
The moon is quite generous with us this
month, as it presents five phases, the last
quartering taking place on the first and
last days of the month, the new moon
coming on the Sth, the day of the partial
eclipse of the sun, first quartering coming
on the 18th, and the full moon coming on
the 22d. People are wont to judge of tie
chances of there being a dry or wet
month throughout April by the pos.tion~of
the horns of the crescent moon. 1t is an
excellent illustration of the persistence
with which the belief in lunar influence
upon mankind still fingers, though re-
peatedly proved to be false. The early
Chaldeans believed in the influence of the
position of the heavenly bodies upon hui
man life, and their system was later
elaborated by the Greeks If we once as
sumo that there is a relation between the
confguration of stars and planets in the
sky and affairs on the earth, it is not
difficult to find condolences which ap-
parently prove that relation. 1t is curl
Gus fact that the Greek astrology ascrib-
ed an influence to the appearance of the
moons horHs, which the later belief in
| its effect on rainfall seems to have sup
| planted. Saturn is twice in conjunction
with the moon, once on the I'd and again
en- the 18th. On the 18th the planet is in
l quadrature, or halfway between conjunc-