Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 10.djvu/569

Rh a large conical mountain; and accordingly as the sun disappears and emerges at points higher or lower is the varying length of day and night. On his view the stars were impelled by angels, who either carried them on their shoulders, rolled them in front of them, or drew them behind, it being remarked that "each angel that pushes a star takes great care to observe what the others are doing, so that the relative distances between the stars may always remain what they ought to be."

The learned Bede, known as the Venerable, who lived in the eighth century, regarded the earth as formed upon the model of an egg. He says:



It is said that a great number of the maps of the world, at the period of Bede, followed this idea, although the necessity was