Winter 'Arthur' ... a word itself signifying the 

 Stars. Great or Wondrous Bear) were often confused. 

 Sometimes, too, Arcturus stood for the whole 

 constellation of Ursa Major or, as we 

 commonly call it, the Plough or the Wain, as, 

 for example, in Scott's lines : 



" Arthur's slow wain his course doth roll, 

 In utter darkness, round the Pole." 



But it is obvious Gawain Douglas did not 

 mean this to be understood, for in the second 

 line he speaks of ' Charlewane,' i.e., Charles's 

 Wain . . . the Wain or Waggon being then, 

 as it still is among country-folk, even more 

 familiar a term than the Great Bear or than 

 the Plough itself. Probably, then, he had in 

 mind the Pole Star, the ' House of Arthur ' of 

 the ancient British. His choice of the ' rain- 

 betokening Hyades ' may be taken here as 

 including the Pleiades, these ' greater seven ' 

 in whom centres so much poetry and 

 old legend. A previous paper has been 

 devoted to the Milky Way, so that there 

 is no need to explain why Watling Street 

 should be analogous with the Galaxy. The 

 * Home ' is the Little Dipper or Ursa 

 Minor. Than ' fierce Orion with his glistering 

 sword ' there is no constellation so universally 

 familiar. If, then, to this category of the old 



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