290 cosMoy. 



ta, in liis Hhtoria Natural y Moral de las Indias* unnark^. 

 that in the Spanish settlements of tropical America, the first 

 settlers were accustomed, even as is now done, to use, as a 

 celestial clock, the Southern Cross, calculating the hours from 

 its inclined or vertical position. 



In consequence of the precession of the equinoxes the star- 

 ry heavens are continually changing their aspect from every 

 portion of the earth's surface. The early races of mankind 

 beheld in the far north the glorious constellation of our south- 

 ern hemisphere rise before them, which, after remaining long 

 '.n visible, will again appear in those latitudes after the lapse 

 of thousands of years. Canopus was fully 1° 20' below the 

 horizon at Toledo (39^ 54' north latitude) in the time of Co- 

 lumbus, and now the same star is almost as much above the 

 horizon at Cadiz. While at Berlin and in the northern lati- 

 tudes the stars of the Southern Cross, as well as a and /3 Cen- 

 tauri, are receding more and more from view, the Magellanic 

 clouds are slowly approaching our latitudes, Canopus was^ 

 at its greatest northern approximation during the last century, 

 and is now moving nearer and nearer to the south, although 



holy lights, ' luci sante.'' The three stars which light the pole repre- 

 sent the theological virtues, faith, hope, and charity. The first of these 

 beiugs themselves reveals their double nature, chanting, ' Here we are 

 nymphs, in heaven we are stars ;' Noi sem qui ninfc, e ncl cielo semo 

 atelle. In the land of truth, in the terrestrial paradise there are seven 

 nymphs. In cerckio faceran di se claustro le setle ninfe. This is the 

 union of all the cardinal and theological virtues. Under these mystic 

 forms we can scarcely recognize the real objects of the firmament sepa 

 rated from each other, according to the eternal laws of the celestial mech 

 anism. The ideal world is a free creation of the soul, the product of 

 poetic inspiration." {Examen Crit., t. iv., p. 324-332.) 



* Acosta, lib. i., cap. 5. Compare my Relation Historique, t. i., p. 209. 

 As the stars a and y of the Southern Cross have almost the same right 

 ascension, the Cross appears perpendicular when passing tlie meridian; 

 but the natives too often forget that this celestial clock marks the houi 

 each day 3' 56" earlier. I am indebted to the communications of my 

 friend, Dr. Galle, by whom Le Verrier's planet was first discovered it? 

 the heavens, for all the calculations respecting the visibility of southern 

 stai's in northern latitudes. " The inaccuracy of the calculation, accord- 

 ing to which the star a of the Southern Cross, taking refraction into ac- 

 count, would appear to have begun to be invisible in 52° 25' north 

 .atitude, about the year 2900 before the Christian era, may perhaps 

 amount to more than 100 years, and could not be altogether set aside, 

 even by the strictest mode of calculation, as the proper motion of \h^\ 

 fixed stars is probably not uniform for such long intervals of time 

 The proper motion of a Crucis is about one third of a second annually, 

 chiefly in right ascension. It may be presumed that the uncertainty 

 produced by neglecting this does not exceed the above-meutidaod 

 limit." 



