endeavour to see the heavens as viewed by the ancients who designed them.
By reason of the Precession of the Equinoxes, that slow change in the position of the heavens, which is constantly going on, the constellations bore different relations to the important points in the heavens than they do now. A Precessional globe enables us to see the star groups as they appeared at any period, and taking the date Maunder suggests, 2700 b.c., as the approximate time when the constellations were designed, and 40 degrees north latitude as the probable abode of those who planned them, we find in the grouping of the serpentine constellational figures several significant facts. The far-extended Hydra crawls along his full length, "going on his belly." The Serpent clasped tightly in the hands of the giant Ophiuchus writhes upward in his struggle to escape, while the Dragon, the great serpent of the north, twines around the crown of the sky, as if guarding the Pole.
Again Hydra lay at this time along the equator, taking seven hours out of the twenty-four to cross the meridian. The Serpent marked the intersection of the equator with one of the principal meridians of the sky, while the Dragon of the north linked the north pole of the celestial equator to the north pole of the ecliptic.
These facts seem significant, and tend to show that there was a definite plan in the minds of those who designed these star groups.
Further, Draco was supposed to represent the oblique course of the stars, while Hydra, the great southern serpent, symbolised the moon's course.
Hydra has been identified with the Flood, the River Jordan, and Plunket claims that it represents the demon Vrita, of the Rig-Veda, conquered by India. Between the first magnitude stars Procyon and Regulus, and between the ecliptic and equator, there is a group of stars in Hydra marking the head of the creature, a striking and conspicuous group, forming a rhomboidal figure. These stars were
