Polestar

or Polaris, or North Star, a prominent star in the northern heavens. It is so called because it is almost directly above the north pole. To an observer on the equator the polestar lies in the horizon. As one advances northward, its position becomes higher and higher. At the north pole it is overhead. It is not visible to observers living in the southern hemisphere. For people in the northern hemisphere, the pole-star is the one star that does not change position. Most stars rise in the east, pass over through an arc, and set in the west. The stars inside of a large circle, supposing one lives in the north temperate zone, seem to wheel about the polestar once every twenty-four hours in a direction contrary to the hands of a watch; but, night or day, the polestar is the one heavenly body that remains in the same identical position--due north. As a matter of astronomical exactness the pole of the heavens, or point through which the line of the earth's axis passes, is changing, wandering around the circumference of a small circle. In about 5,600 years this point will be near another star, but for the present we may regard the pole-star as due north. Before the day of the mariner's compass, sailors out of sight of land were sure of their course only at night, when they could see the polestar. Wind, sun, moon, and constellations shifted; the polestar was the one unchanging guide. Hence such poetical allusions as the pole-star of one's hopes. Even now the navigator and surveyor are sure of their compasses only when they have opportunity to test them by the north star. The polestar may be found readily by following the line of the pointers in the Great Bear, or Big Dipper. It should be remembered that the Big Dipper seems to revolve about the polestar and may be in any apparent direction from it. See Arctic Regions