HILLS. 267 



season of the longest days. Now nothing would 

 be necessary but to place these two objects with 

 so much exactness, that the westerly limb of the 

 sun, at setting, might but just clear the winter 

 heliotrope to the west of it on the shortest day, 

 and that the whole disc of the sun, at the longest 

 day, might exactly, at setting, also clear the sum- 

 mer heliotrope to the north of it. 



By this simple expedient, it would soon appear 

 that there is no such thing, strictly speaking, as 

 a solstice ; for, from the shortest day, the owner 

 would, every clear evening, see the disc advan- 

 cing, at its setting, to the westward of the object ; 

 and, from the longest day, observe the sun re- 

 tiring backwards every evening, at its setting, 

 towards the object westward, till, in a few nights, 

 it would set quite behind it, and so by degrees 

 to the west of it ; for when the sun comes near 

 the summer solstice, the whole disc of it would 

 at first set behind the object ; after a time the 

 northern limb would first appear, and so every 

 night gradually more, till at length the whole 

 diameter would set northward of it for about three 

 nights but on the middle night of the three, 

 sensibly more remote than the former or follow- 

 ing. When beginning its recess from the summer 

 tropic, it would continue more and more to be 

 hidden every night, till at length it would descend 

 quite behind the object again ; and so nightly 

 more and more to the westward. 



XLV. 



" Mugire videbis 

 Sub pedibus terrain, et descendere montibus ornos." 



WHEN I was a boy I used to read, with asto- 

 nishment and implicit assent, accounts in Baker's 



