The Birmingham age-herald., 1920-05-02
THE STARRY SKIES IN MAY


Already one-half of the bright win ter cancellations have disappeared in the west, but the face of the sky on these late spring evenings is very beautiful. Jupiter and Saturn shine very conspicuously a little past the meridian, the former with a steady, golden radiance and the latter with a somewhat greenish light, while the reddish and very brilliant Mars is now high in the south and during this month will be a most interesting ob- ject to watch. either with the naked eye or in a small telescope. Mars will run rapidly throughout the entire month passing two degrees north oi the bright Spica, at A, Figure 1, on May 22; on June 1 It's retrograde mo- ton will cease and its eastward mo . ton will be resumed, in the course of which it will again pass Spica on June 12. In fact, if the observer will care- fully mASl1 the positions of Mars from dime to time during the newt few weeks on star chart, he will find that the planet in its apparent motion makes 8 loop on the sky. It will not, howeve-. enter among the stars of the striking summer constellation Scorpio until next September.
 The observer will now see the Great Dipper, almost in its zenith, where 1t looks much smaller than when 1t is near the horizon below the Pole. Be- tween the Great Bear and Bootes are the two faint groups of the Hunting Dogs and the Maiden's Hair. The lat ter Cat c, Figure D Is an especially beautiful little star group in a pair of opera glasses. The observer will see here a great number of faint stars, ap parently covering this part of the sky with a filmy web. To the early Arab ians this group was known as the Pond, into which the Gazelle Cknown to us as the Lesser Lion) Is springing.
 Almost in straight line between the last star in the handle of the Great Dipper and the brightest star in the Hunting Dogs, but much nearer the former, Is the celebrated Whirlpool Nebula, perhaps the finest example of a spiral nebula in the entire heavens. In a quite small glass 1t Is a rather disappointing object seen only as a small, misty patch of light, but with a large aperture It's very intricate struc- ture is revealed. There is a great cen tral nebulous mass, enveloped with curving spiral arms, one of which joins the central mass with another great nebulous cloud. It was formerly thought that this type of nebulas were probably solar systems in process of formation, but it is now practically certain that their dimensions are far too great for this to be possible. It is very probable, however that, unlike the spherical clusters, they are within our own cloud and are not distant uni verses of stars.
 The observer should also trace out the delicate little Corona and also the large groups of Hercules and Virgo. This too, is the best month of the year to become familiar with the stars of the very long Water Snake whose head is just below Cancer, but which so stretches entirely across the southern heavens that his tail Is almost at Scor- pio The faint stars above Hydra form the two little groups of the Crow and the Cup, which the great Water Snake is bearing on his back. The upper left hand star of the former group Is an interesting double, the principal star being of yellow color while the faint companion, almost due south of it, is of a deep blue.
 ECLIPSES DURING MAY
 Two interesting eclipses will occur dur. ing this month, but only one of them will
 
 States. Early on Sunday evening" May ?, the full moon will pass into the shadow of the earth and be darkened and on the early morning of May IS our satellite will pass between the earth and the sun and cover ninety-seven hundredths of the suns bright disc It is the former eclipse which will be visible to us.
 The great shadow of the earth always stretches out into space for an instance of S57 900 miles. It has the form of a cone. which envelops the earth and whose vor- tex is always exactly opposite to the sun. As our moon is moving around the earth at a distance away of only 240,00O miles, it may sometimes plunge into tNis shadow, and so be hidden from the light of the sun.
 In Figure the shaded circle represents a section of the shadow of the earth where the moon passes through it. Here the shadow cone is 5,700 miles in diame- ter, and as the diameter of our satellite is but 2,163 miles, and as the moon moves eastward an amount equal to this dis tarce in about one hour, it may remain within the shadow for considerable time In the present eclipse, however, the moon passes through the shadow so far from the center that the duration of the total eclipse is comparatively very snort. The center of the moon will reach the position A and the eclipse will begin ae ' hours minutes 4S second D. m. East ern standard time); it will reach the posi- tion B and the eclipse become total at hours IA minutes 42 seconds; it will reach D and the total eclipse will be over at hours 27 minutes seconds. and finally it will reach the position B and the entire eclipse will terminate at lo