the name from the circumstance that the figures or symbols of the signs are Egyptian hieroglyphics, designed to represent those facts in Natural History peculiar to each month, as the Sun appears to pass progressively through the zodiac. At the time of the vernal equinox, sheep yean their lambs; and the sign of the zodiac corresponding to that period of the year was typified by their male parent the ram.

Eusebius mentions that Ammon, the symbol of the Sun in Aries, was represented with a disk over his head. When the vernal equinox took place with the Sun in Taurus, Aries and Libra were then the uppermost signs in the lower hemisphere, which was expressed hieroglyphically by a wilderness. Hence Jupiter Ammon was fabled to have lived in a desert until he was brought out of it by Isis. Aries then seems to be the symbol of the Sun, who, after having descended to, and returned from, the lower hemisphere, contends for his place in the upper hemisphere, and the antients accordingly represent him as struggling against the constellations, which they typified by a ram butting with his horns. Among the Hebrew leaders, Aries was the ensign of Gad.

'On the ruins of Persepolis, rams, bulls, lions, and archers, are the common ornaments; and Francklin, who has given a minute sketch of this anticnt city, has furnished us with the means of determining the period when it was built. The Persian MS. which he has translated says, "King Gemsheed held a great festival, when the Sun, quitting the sign Pisces, entered that of Aries, and the year commenced;'at which period he commanded all his people to assist at the building of the temple." About 4000 years ago, the ram, or lamb, became the leader of the signs, and the year opened with this new conductor of the heavenly host. For 2000 years, Aries was Princeps signorum, and 2000 years have passed away since Pisces became Duces exercitus Zodiaci. Persepolis must, then, have been built in the time of Abram.

Alexander the Great is said to have burnt it about the year 330 B.C. If, however, we take the mean between the destruction of this city and the commencement of the year with Aries, it had been built before the chronology of the Arundelian Marbles began, in 1582 B.C., or perhaps about the time that Atlas the astronomer flourished. Thus Astronomy becomes the parent of Chronology.'

This sign Aries embraces 66 stars, but only one of them is of the 2d magnitude, one of the 3d, and two of the 4th. The principal of these is a Arietis, which is situated in the forehead of the Ram; but as most of the others are small, he does not present any conspicuous figure by which he can be readily distinguished, like either of those already described. The declination of a, as given by Mr. J, in the work above referred to, is 22° 36′ 30′′, and its right ascension 29° 15′ 30′′. It rises at the N.E. E. point of the compass, at London. Its time of rising, and passage over the meridian, on the first of each month, are as in the following table; its meridian altitude is 61° 5' 30".

This is the second of the spring signs, which the Sun, according to the astronomical account, enters on the 20th of April, but in reality not till about the 12th of May. The Earth being now in Scorpio, the Sun appears in Taurus, and the length of day on the north side of the equator increases, while the light is diffused over a large track round the north pole during several complete revolutions of the Earth on its axis.

Grecian fable assigns the origin of this sign to the animal into which Jupiter is supposed to have

transformed himself when he carried off Europa; but in this symbol that ingenious and inventive people were doubtless anticipated; for the Bull was worshipped by many oriental nations, ages before the Greeks had a zodiac. In the days of Abram, this animal was considered as the leader of the signs, and the conductor of the heavenly hosts. The Indian and Persian monuments, as well as the Egyptian worship of Apis, so fully established by the Pentateuch, sufficiently show that this sign did not originate with the Greeks. One of the most natural modes of accounting for its derivation is, that at this period of the year the cattle usually bring forth their young, which was commemorated by placing the Bull in the heavens.

The vernal equinox took place about 4000 years ago, when the Sun was in Taurus; and for the space of nearly half that period the Bull was the prince and leader of the heavenly host. Numerous oriental monuments show how closely Eastern idolatry was connected with this symbol, representing the passage of the Sun from the lower to the upper hemisphere; and as long as the year commenced with the Sun in Taurus, the Persians represented Mithras as slaying a young bull. Even after the Ram or Lamb became the leader of the signs, the golden Calf, or golden Bull, the symbol of Apis, obtained the reverence of mankind.”

Passing by various other conjectures respecting the origin and meaning of this sign, the following remarks appear more deserving of attention: The installation of Apis, in which the soul of the great Osiris was supposed to subsist, was exceedingly splendid, and his festivals were annually attended with great veneration and pomp for seven successive days. The festival commenced about the 12th or 13th of the month Payn, which corresponded with the 17th or 18th of June, and was called the birth of Apis. Before the 32d Pharaoh, called Aseth, the solar year consisted of 360 days: this prince added

five days more to complete its course; and in his reign a Calf was placed among the gods, and named Apis-Taurus excelsus. The intercalation of the five days introduced into the mythology Osiris, Arueris, Typhon, Isis, and Nephte. This was the reformation of the Calendar which the kings at their inauguration were obliged to swear they would not alter, by inserting months or days, but that it should remain` as established by the antients. The discovery of the real period of the solar year did not, however, prevent the use of the civil and of the vague year among the Egyptians, which was not remedied except among the learned. The worship of Apis among the Egyptians probably suggested the first idea of making altars with horns. I apprehend "the embalmed Bull," which M. Belzoni found in one of the sepulchres of the Egyptian kings at Gournou, was the symbol of the god Osiris, or perhaps of the Sun in Taurus. Thebes, says this enterprising traveller, in the vicinity of which Gournou is situated, had arrived at its glory, under Osiris, in a period of "antiquity that reaches far beyond all historical notice.""

Taurus has Gemini on the east, Orion and Eridanus on the south, and Aries on the west. It con

B

Pleiades.

3

tains 141 stars, the principal of which may readily be found in the heavens by means of the following combinations and the diagram. Aldebaran (a); the Pleiades, with 8 and 2 in the tips of the horns (which 3 are on the borders of the milky way), form a trapezoid. The Pleiades, Aldebaran, and ẞ in the tip of

the northern horn, constitute an obtuse angled triangle, with the angle at Aldebaran a little more than a right angle. Aldebaran, 8 and 3, also form an acute angled triangle, the angle at the last of these three stars falling very little short of a right angle.

Though the Hyades and the Pleiades are sometimes represented as distinct constellations, they are only component parts of that of Taurus. The Hyades are the feigned daughters of Atlas and Pleone. They are composed of numerous small stars surrounding Aldebaran, which forms the right eye of the Bull, and is a star of the 1st magnitude, whose latitude is 5° 29′ 40′′ south, and longitude 6° 32′ 9' of Gemini. The Arabians call it Ain-altor, "the bull's eye;" but Al-Debiron signifies "he went before, or led the way," points to a period in the history of astronomy, when this star was the foremost, or most illustrious among the celestial host, Taurus being then the first of the signs. The Hyades, it is also said, were antiently called Debaroth. of which the brilliant was named Al-Debaran; but al or el was the name of Sol, and Deborah or Debaran has been translated order, march, series; the march of the celestial hosts would then be typified by the asterism Aldebaran.' The declination of Aldebaran, in 1820, was 16° 8′ 24′′ N. and its right ascension 66° 23′ 52". It rises at London nearly on the N.E. by E. E. point of the compass. Its meridian altitude is 54° 37′ 24′′, and the time of its rising and culminating, or passing the meridian of that city, is given in the following table: