VOL. LXVII.] PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. 217 



letter to the Astronomer Royal, requires little other confirmation. Mr. Call 

 says, tliat as he was lying on his back, resting himself in the heat of the day, 

 in a choultry at Verdapetah in the Madura country, near Cape Commorin, he 

 discovered the signs of the zodiac on the ceiling of the choultry : that he found 

 one, equally complete, which was on the ceiling of a temple, in the middle of a 

 tank before the pagoda Teppecolum near Mindurah ; and that he had often met 

 with several parts in detached pieces. See Philos. Trans., 1772, p. 353, or 

 vol. 13, p. 321, of these abridgments. These buildings and temples were the 

 places of residence and worship of the original Bramins, and bear the marks of 

 great antiquity, having perhaps been built before the Persian conquest. Besides, 

 when we know that the manners and customs of the Gentoo religion are such 

 as to preclude them from admitting the smallest innovation in their institutions; 

 when we also know that their fashion in dress, and the mode of their living, 

 have not received the least variation from the earliest account we have of them; 

 it cannot be supposed they would engrave the symbolical figures of the Persian 

 astronomy in their sacred temples; the signs of the zodiac must therefore have 

 originated with them, if we credit their tradition of the purity of their religion 

 and customs. 



Mr. Fraser, in his History of the Mogul Emperors, speaking of time says, 

 " the lunar year they reckon 354 days, 22 gurris, 1 pull; the solar year they 

 reckon 365 days, 15 gurris, 30 pulls, 22^ peels; 6o peels making 1 pull, 6o 

 pulls, 1 gurri, and 6o gurris 1 day. This is according to the Bramins or Indian 

 priests, and what the Moguls and other Mahommedans in India chiefly go by." 

 Thus far Mr. Fraser; and it serves to strengthen the argument for supposing 

 that the Bramins had a knowledge of astronomy before the introduction of 

 Mahometanism into Hindostan. 



Dimensions of the larger equinoctial sun-dial, pi. 3. 



Feet. In. Ft. In. 



Length of the gnomon at the base bb. ... 34 8 Thickness gg 1 o 



Oblique length of the gnomon cc 38 8 Breadth of the gnomon hh 4 6 



Radius of the quadrants aa 9 2 Whole extent of the instrument ii 37 4 



Height of the gnomon at d 'ii 3 Lat. of the place taken by double alt 25° 10* 



Breadth of the quadrants ff. 5 10 



XXXI. A short Account of Dr. Maty's Illness, and of the Appearances in the 



Dead Body, which was examined on the 3d of Aug., 1776, the Day after 



his Decease. By Dr. Hunter and Mr. Henry fValson, FF. R. S. p. 608. 



About 1 weeks before he died. Dr. Maty was taken with a violent oppressive 



pain, just above the pit of the stomach, which made him feel as if he was very 



near dying. He was bled, and gradually recovered ; yet so imperfectly, that any 



motion of his body, or any pressure on that part with the point of a finger, 



instantly brought on such pain, that he was convinced the least addition to what 



VOL. XIV. F p 



