Sketcher.

Alexandra Herald and Central Otago Gazette, Issue 429, 4 August 1904, Page 3

Sketcher.

tho moat casual glance at a jgjlfjs planisphere or celestial globe one jggjfflß is led- to associate the noble and sublime science of astronomy with shepherd life. In the pastures of the newly-created world the first human beings had very little society, and all they saw.from day to day wa3 their flooka graziag and frisking about them.' Then) were several signs, however, by means of which, if they were only observant, they could have roughly calculated the flight of time. Thus the departure of the birds in the autumn and the ''fall of the' leaves warned them of the approach of winter, and ~ fixed, an epoch-recurring with • periodic regularity. "But in. their wanderings in search of new pastures, the necessity of an unerring guide became of paramount .'importance, and naturally the heavenly bodies came to be .adopted as a great compass or wondrous directing and date-marking machine, flung the regular periodic, flow of time. Thus the heliacal rising of ono" certain star heralded the advent of the shearing seasqn, while the appearance of the Pleiades in the east pre? eluded the seedtime ;'and thus two 'dates of the utmost importanca to a primitive and pastoral people came to be fixed,, And as in this simple astronomy the shepheide traced the annals of the stars among their flocks and herds, so in like manner they traced the history of their flooks aajtong the stars. '■■' Thus the course of the sua came to lie amid sbeepfolds and their, surround ingß. At one time of the year the zodiacal constellation Taurus, the ball, the lord of the herd, marked where ' the father of day' was located. At another tima the Rim, the master; 61 the fold, served to designate hia position. ' .*'*.*•• —•'-••■ The lion,, the terror of herdsmen, was also placed in the sky, together with the dreaded.scorpion; and besides these concomitant a of the life of a shepherd, he placed likewise abov.3 him still dearer associations, such as the children of hia household, Geminij the virgin, Virgo; the ear of corn, Spica .Virginia* and his instruments of husbandry, the Plough and the Sickle.' ":\ "*' .'" IS V- '•>/;

The best possible proof of ho w far the stars had entered into the life of man may be foa.nd.in .the worship of fchp Sabsans- of antiquity, who adored tho starry Infinite God.; ButlM3 l epl>Bft yt jnysterjr evidently preceded the s dawn-ol'-obitorvatf tioa, and the moat impostantl period in connection 'with the" subj lot of ; time. measuring commenced when men began to turn the celestial sphere into * mighty luetic habitation, modelled on tho basis of fchek'own immediate surroundings, Even the dog, the typa of watchfulness, -. was. translated to the heavens; ;the bright star Skiue, whose heliacal rising in the days of ancient Egypt presaged the overt flowing of the Nile, a periodic event of the. greatest national importance. /