The mirror., 1922-06-08

which Mr.. Hamilton translates as folioWS:
"Conspicious among the stars, its horns
widespread over the heavens, is the Lyra,
with which Orpheus was wont to captivate
everything to which he addressed his song,
and even made journey through Hades
itself, and put to sleep the internal laws.
Hence its celestial honor; and, by the
same power with which it then drew rocks
and trees along, it now leads the stars and
whirls along the immense orb of the re-
volving world" "This last line," con-
tinues Hamilton, "shows that the con-
selation Lyra, as an emblem of union of
ampifcation of the attribute of 'fascina-
ton ascribed to the rattlesnake," which
was advocated by many Southern states
men of the day as the proper emblem.
John Adams was chairman of the War
Board when the law establishing the Star
Spangled Banner as the national flag was
passed by Congress, and he is credited
with being the one who stood up in the
Continental Congress that memorable day
and called for the adoption of the resou-
tion. If his son, John Quincy Adams,
had in mind this beautiful conception of
the import of Lyra as "a symbol of har-
mony among nations" when he placed the
harp on the passports of the United States
it may well be conceived that his father
who so strongly advocated the adoption of
stars for the union of the flag, to repre-
sent "a new constellation" was like-minded
If not the originator of the idea. This in
depreciation gives clear meaning to the
phrase, representing a new constellation"
which was entered in the law establish
ing the American flag.
10 the astronomer of today there is
much in the history of the constellation
Lyra in favor of this view of the case:
particularly so as the idea seems to have
originated in the Old Bay State, the lati-
tude of which on the earth is about the
same as that of the heavenly bodies used
as a prototype of the union of States on
the celestial sphere-about 40 degrees north
declination. Thus situated in the ecliptic
OF Boston, as it were, beautiful Vega, the
leader OF the Lyra group, is practically
overhead at some period of each astro-
nomical day, and, during its apparent ro-
tation around the earth, is longer visible
to the observer in that locality than any
other star of the first magnitude in the
northern heavens. 1t is below the horizon
barely quarter of the twenty four hours
of the day. Thus Alpha Lyrae is veri-
table lodestar to cultured Bostonians; and,
in fact, it is the point in the dome of hea-
ven toward which the whole solar system
is speeding at the enormous rate of thou
sands of miles a minute.
Moreover, the constellation Lyra pos
sesses other features of symmetry with our
new constellation" in that Vega shows a
marked blush tint which, together with
its remarkable white rays scintillating
through the ether around its golden CEN
ter, forms an effulgent glow in strong
affinity with the red, white, and blue OF
the American flag. Curously enough, also
while to the naked eye there appear to be
but ten stars in the entire celestial con-
stellation of Lyra, three-inch telescope
which was about the hghest-powered in.
strument used one hundred and fifty year.
ago, shows Epsilon Lyrae as a double
binary, thus augmenting the number thir
teen, the original number of the Unitee
States of North America.
This beautiful conception of using star
as a device for an American ensign wa
not new at the time the Stars and Stripe
were born. A flag made up of the thir
teen stripes and single star had beer
carried by several New England ship
some three years before-a fact which tn
New England delegates to the Continenta