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Inde ubi sacrificas cum conjuge venit ad aras
Æsonides, unaque adeunt pariterque precari
Incipiunt. Ignem Pollux undamque jugalem
Prætulit ut dextrum pariter vertantur in orbe.
The above passage forms a striking comment upon our text. Cp. also Plutarch in this life of Camillus (
Greek characters). It is possible that the following passage in Lucretius alludes to the same practice—
Nec pietas ulla est velatum sæpe videri
Vertier ad lapidem atque omnes accedere ad aras.
Dr. Fergusson is of opinion that this movement was a symbol of the cosmical rotation, an imitation of the apparent course of the sun in the heavens. Cp. Hyginus Fable CCV. Arge venatrix, cum cervum sequeretur, cervo dixisse fertur: Tu licet Solis cursum sequaris, tamen te consequar. Sol, iratus, in cervam eam convertit. He quotes, to prove that the practice existed among the ancient Celts, Athenæus IV, p. 142, who adduces from Posidonius the following statement "(Greek characters)." The above quotations are but a few scraps from the full feast of Dr. Fergusson's paper. See also the remarks of the Rev. S. Beal in the Indian Antiquary for March 1880, p. 67.
