DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.18975#0446
394
THE LAWS OF FESOLE
unknown to those who love a sedentary life. It seemed
painful to me to renounce the hope of beholding those
beautiful constellations which border the southern pole.
Impatient to rove in the equinoctial regions, I could not
raise my eyes toward the starry vault without thinking of
the Cross of the South, and without recalling the sublime
passage of Dante, which the most celebrated commentators
have applied to this constellation:
" Io mi volsi a man destra, e posi mente
All' altro polo, e vidi quattro stelle
Non viste mai, fuor ch' alia prima gente,
Goder paresa, 1 ciel di lor fiammelle.
O settentrional vedovo sito,
Poi che privato se' di mirar quelle !" i
" The two great stars which mark the summit and the
foot of the Cross having nearly the same right ascension,
it follows hence that the constellation is almost perpen-
dicular at the moment when it passes the meridian. This
circumstance is known to every nation that lives beyond the
tropics or in the southern hemisphere. It has been ob-
served at what hour of the night, in different seasons, the
Cross of the South is erect, or inclined. It is a timepiece
that advances very regularly near four minutes a day; and
no other group of stars exhibits, to the naked eye, an ob-
servation of time so easily made. How often have we
heard our guides exclaim, in the savannahs of the Vene-
zuela, or in the desert extending from Lima to Truxillo,
' Midnight is past, the Cross begins to bend!' How often
those words reminded us of that affecting scene where Paul
and Virginia, seated near the source of the river of Lataniers,
conversed together for the last time, and where the old
man, at the sight of the Southern Cross, warns them that
it is time to separate ! " "
* i. 23-28. ]
3 [See p. 156 of the illustrated edition, published by Curmer, 1838.]
THE LAWS OF FESOLE
unknown to those who love a sedentary life. It seemed
painful to me to renounce the hope of beholding those
beautiful constellations which border the southern pole.
Impatient to rove in the equinoctial regions, I could not
raise my eyes toward the starry vault without thinking of
the Cross of the South, and without recalling the sublime
passage of Dante, which the most celebrated commentators
have applied to this constellation:
" Io mi volsi a man destra, e posi mente
All' altro polo, e vidi quattro stelle
Non viste mai, fuor ch' alia prima gente,
Goder paresa, 1 ciel di lor fiammelle.
O settentrional vedovo sito,
Poi che privato se' di mirar quelle !" i
" The two great stars which mark the summit and the
foot of the Cross having nearly the same right ascension,
it follows hence that the constellation is almost perpen-
dicular at the moment when it passes the meridian. This
circumstance is known to every nation that lives beyond the
tropics or in the southern hemisphere. It has been ob-
served at what hour of the night, in different seasons, the
Cross of the South is erect, or inclined. It is a timepiece
that advances very regularly near four minutes a day; and
no other group of stars exhibits, to the naked eye, an ob-
servation of time so easily made. How often have we
heard our guides exclaim, in the savannahs of the Vene-
zuela, or in the desert extending from Lima to Truxillo,
' Midnight is past, the Cross begins to bend!' How often
those words reminded us of that affecting scene where Paul
and Virginia, seated near the source of the river of Lataniers,
conversed together for the last time, and where the old
man, at the sight of the Southern Cross, warns them that
it is time to separate ! " "
* i. 23-28. ]
3 [See p. 156 of the illustrated edition, published by Curmer, 1838.]