Saturn Now Visible

Abstract

> THE ABSENCE of prominent planets from the evening skies during the last two months will be relieved in August when Saturn appears. On the first of the month it rises almost directly east about two hours after sunset. Each following night Saturn comes up a little earlier, appearing about an hour after sunset at the end of August. After rising, Saturn remains in view the rest of the night, standing in the constellation of Pisces, the fishes. The accompanying maps show how the sky looks about 11:00 p.m., your own kind of daylight saving time, on Aug. 1. It looks about the same at 10:00 p.m. Aug. 15 and 9:00 p.m. at the month's end. Saturn is shown low in the east on the southern sky map, with one star of Pisces above it. Vega, the brightest star of the summer evening, shines almost directly overhead, in Lyra, the lyre. Directly east of Lyra, shown partly on each of the maps, stands Cygnus, the swan, with the bright star called Deneb. Below Vega toward the south is Aquila, the eagle, of which Altair is the brightest star. Low in the south is Scorpio, the scorpion, with Antares. To the left stands Sagittarius, the archer. Both of these are constellations of the zodiac, the band across the sky through which the sun, moon and planets seem to move. Actually, it is the distant background that we see behind these objects. Twelve principal constellations make up the zodiac and seven of them are now at least partly visible, stretching across the southern sky. The others are Libra, the scales, and Virgo, the virgin, west of Scorpio; and Pisces, the fishes, Aquarius, the water carrier, and Capricornus, the horned goat, all to the east of Sagittarius. In the northwest is the familiar Big Dipper, which is really part of Ursa Major, the great bear. In the Dipper's bowl, which is now at the bottom, are the two pointers whose direction, followed to the right, brings you to Polaris. This is the pole star, which stands almost directly over the North Pole of the earth. All the other stars seem to circle daily around this part of the sky.