so imposing and grandiloquent an abstraction The 



as < Imbrifer ' ! Shades 



Truly a fit Constellation of late autumn, ya ' 

 Capricornus. 



" Thy Cold, for Thou o'er Winter Signs dost reign, 

 Pulls t back the Sun ..." 



as a .bygone astronomical versifier has it. 

 Perhaps he had in mind Horace's 'tyrannus 

 Hesperiae Capricornus undae,' who in turn may 

 have recalled an earlier poet still, English'd 

 thus : 



"... Then grievous blasts 

 Break southward on the Sea, when coincide 

 The Goat and Sun : and then a heaven-sent cold." 



Many of us will remember with a thrill 

 Milton's magnificent image 



"... Thence down amain 

 As deep as Capricorn/' 



and others will recall the often-quoted line of 

 Dante in the Paradiso (relative to the Sun's 

 entrance into Capricorn between January 18 

 and February 14). 



" The horn of the Celestial Goat doth touch the Sun." 



May and November are the two ' fatal ' 

 months with the Celtic peoples : the first 



281 



