LT.-COL. G. MACKINLAY ON BIBLICAL ASTRONOMY. 163 



of you and Somaliland to the left. Is this an accident 1 I doubt 

 it. 



You have not referred in your table to the ordinary word for 

 "east," or to the strange word (darom) translated "south" in 

 several passages. There is a paper with a discussion on the 

 Egyptian and Assyrian points of the compass in the Proceedings 

 Soc. Bill. Arch., Feb. 1883, which is suggestive. 



6. I have no doubt that there was a ridgepole in the Sacred 

 Tent, but I never regarded the post which supports it as a protest 

 against sun-worship. 



7. There seems to be a strong consensus of opinion in favour of 

 a.d. 29 as the year of the crucifixion, but the evidence is not quite 

 decisive. 



8. Our Lord said, " in my Father's house are many mansions." 

 May this point to the existence of many habitable abodes somewhat 

 like our earth 1 or are we to follow the teaching of Dr. Wallace 1 



Lieutenant-Colonel Mackinlay, in reply, said : — I am grateful to 

 all who have taken part in the discussion : the statements of 

 Mr. H. Harding and of the Eev. W. F. Connor are specially 

 valuable, coming as they do from those who have lived for years 

 in Bible lands. I may here also express my gratitude to them and 

 to many others, residents in the East, who have helped me in the 

 preparation of this paper by replying to questions which I have 

 sent to them about the practical use of the heavens now made by 

 natives of various countries, and also about the words used in 

 several of their languages for the points' of the compass, etc. 



Colonel Conder, in a letter to me, draws attention to the fact 

 that the Hebrews of old proclaimed the new moon directly from the 

 result of observation, and Commander Caborne gives us an interesting 

 modern example of doing this in a Mahomedan country. I am 

 glad attention has been drawn to this arrangement, as it can only be 

 inferred from my condensed account of the need for a cycle in 

 ancient times. The Hebrews had no means of foretelling the 

 beginning of a lunation before the discovery of the Metonic cycle 

 about B.C. 432, and they probably did not make use of it for a long 

 time after that date, but the modern Jews employ this cycle. 



Commander Caborne and Professor Orchard each strongly 

 support the belief in the miraculous with special reference to the 

 sun standing still, and I fully agree with them, as we are pointedly 



