Chap. 23.] 
ACCOUNT or THE WOELD. 
57 
generally in tliat white part of it wMch has obtained the 
name of the Milky Way. Aristotle informs as that several 
of them are to be seen at the same time\ but this, as far as 
I know, has not been observed by any one else ; also that 
they prognosticate high winds and great heat^. They are 
also visible in the winter months, and about the south pole, 
but they have no rays proceeding from them. There was a 
dreadful one observed by the Ethiopians and the Egyptians, 
to which Typhon, a king of that period, gave his own name ; • 
it had a fiery appearance, and was twisted like a spiral ; its 
aspect was hideous, nor was it like a star, but rather like a 
knot of fire^. Sometimes there are hairs attached to the 
planets and the other stars. Comets are never seen in the 
western part of the heavens. It is generally regarded as a 
terrific star, and one not easily expiated ; as was the case with 
the civil commotions in the consulship of Octavius, and also 
in the war of Pompey and Caesar^. And in our own age, 
about the time when Claudius Csesar was poisoned and 
left the Empire to Domitius Nero, and afterwards, while the 
latter was Emperor^, there was one which was almost con- 
stantly seen and was very frightful. It is thought important 
to notice towards what part it darts its beams, or from what 
star it receives its influence, what it resembles, and in what 
places it shines. If it resembles a flute, it portends some- 
on the contrary, remarks that comets are less frequently produced in the 
northern part of the heavens ; Meteor. Hb. i. cap. 6. p. 535. 
1 TTbi supra, 2 gee Aristotle, ut swpra^ p. 537. 
3 " Yidetur is non cometes fuisse, sed meteorus quidam ignis ; " Alex- 
andre in Lemaire, i. 296. 
^ Yirgil, G-eor. i. 488 et seg[., Manilius, i. 904 et seq., and Lucan, i, 
526 et seq., all speak of the comets and meteors that were observed 
previous to the civil wars between Pompey and Caesar. In reference to 
the existence of a comet about the time of Juhus Caesar, Playfair remarks, 
that Halley supposed the great comet of 1680 to have been the same that 
appeared in the year 44 A.C., and agam in Justinian's time, 521 P.O., and 
also in 1106 ; Elem. Nat. Phil. ii. 197, 198. See Ptolemy's Cent. Diet, 
no. 100, for the opinion, that comets presented an omen especially un- 
favouralDle to kings. To this opinion the following passage in the 
Paradise Lost obviously refers; "And with fear of change perplexes 
monarchs." 
^ Seneca refers to the four comets that were seen, after the death of 
Caesar, in the time of Augustus, of Claudius, and of Nero ; Quaest. Nat. i. 7. 
Suetonius mentions the comet which appeared previous to the death of 
Claudius, cap. 46, and Tacitus that before the death of Nero, Ann. xiv. 22. 
