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became known as it were by a new birth, and probably about the same time, they are together aptly designated in the sign by two infants, thence called Gemini, or the Twins. In conformity with this same idea, the country of America is frequently typified in the inscriptions on ancient gems, under the name of the City of Naples, NEα TOλs, and its inhabitants as Neapolitans, NɛαTOAITW, just as the part of America first discovered on the European side, is at this day, so long after that event, cailed Newfoundland. Many ancient writings also treat of America under the name of Naples, or Neα TOλis, and hence it was that a certain disease, which unquestionably had its origin in America, has been said to have become first known in Europe at the siege of Naples, about three centuries ago, (that is, about the time of the supposed first discovery of America,) but we should be nearer the real truth if we understand thereby not the city of that name in Italy, but the undiscovered country of America. The number of proofs that America was perfectly well known to the ancients is without limit, some of which will appear in the future progress of this volume, and others, most conclusive, in the next; but, to return to my subject, the reason for designating the third sign by the name of Gemini or the Twins, is not merely (as above in

part assigned,) the circumstance of the continent of America being divided into two great separate portions. The true prototype of the sign is to be found in the West Indian Gulf, which lies in the middle between those two divisions of the continent, which gulf will be seen on inspecting the map, to resemble two boys, the head and face of the one situate in the smaller gulf of Mexico, and those of the other in the gulf of Panama, by Terra Firma, with their arms apparently intertwined together, as they are copied from their prototype in

Fig. 152.

I conclude this article with observing, that a reason for ascribing the sign of the Twins to the double continent of America, yet stronger than either of the two above noticed, will result from

a consideration of the physical matters which are reserved.

Cancer. Behind America, westward, comes next in succession that vast portion of the terraqueous globe, called the Pacific Ocean, and this, I apprehend to be represented by the set of stars composing the sign Cancer, or the Crab. The head of the animal is to be conceived as fronting the south, with its eyes situate at the openings between the different groupes of islands in that sea, the Society, the Friendly, and the Marquesas islands. Its legs are formed by the outlines of the different projections in the coasts of Tartary and China, (such as Kamschatka, Corea, the Isles of Japan, and the rest,) on the one side; and by those of the islands on the north-west coast of America, and the promontory of California, on the other; while, on this last side its left claw, or pincher, will be formed by South America, as cleft in two by the river Plate; and its right claw, more open, by the great island Van Diemen, (or New Holland,) which, on its southern side opens itself into two pointed promontories. As the line of the tropical circle crosses the upper part of the Pacific, or the body of the watery space thus pointed out as resembling a crab; so, in conformity thereto, is Cancer the sign in which the sun comes to the tropic in the heavens. This

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sign, as drawn from a general view of the Pacific, is exhibited in

Fig. 153.

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Leo. In proceeding still westward, the con

stellation called Leo, the next station of the sun in the heavens, seems clearly to have been designed to represent China and its dependencies; since that country is situate directly to the westward of the prototype of the last sign, and may be seen to resemble a lion, in half profile, fronting the Pacific. Its left eye may be conceived to be formed of the circular or oval sea of Corea, as lying between Japan and Tartary; the left cheek, in profile, by the Isles of Japan; the right eye by

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the gulf of Pekin; the nose by the Province of Corea; the mouth, by the Yellow Sea; and the beard by the groupes of the Lequeo and Formosa Isles. The body of the lion will be made up of China proper; the two fore legs, the two fore legs, by the Philippine Islands, and the haunches, upon which the animal may be supposed to be sitting, of the countries of Cochin China, and Malay. The figures of China lions, in the posture just now described, are familiar to every body; and it was probably from the circumstance of that country being the prototype of the sign Leo, that those figures are such general ornaments there, and decorate the Fig. 154.

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