Page:The Life of Lokamanya Tilak.djvu/412

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(i) The Sun will always be to the South of the Zenith of the observer.

(2) A large number of stars are circum-polar; the rest rise and set, but revolve in more oblique circles.

(3) The year is made up of three parts:—(a) one long continuous night lasting for a period of greater than 24 hours and less than six months according to the latitude of the place (b) one long continuous day to match (c) a succession of ordinary days and nights during the rest of the year, never exceeding a period of 24 hours.

(4) The dawn, at the close of the long continuous night, lasts for several days but its duration and magnificance is proportionally less than at the North Pole. The other dawns will only last for a few hours.

We can take these differentae as our unerring guides in the examination of the Vedic evidence bearing on the point at issue. If a Vedic description or tradition discloses any of the characterestics mentioned above, we may safely infer that the tradition is Polar or circum-Polar in origin, and the phenomenon, if not actually witnessed by the poet, was at least known to him by tradition, faithfully handed down from generation to generation. Such references in the Vedic literature may be divided into two parts : the first comprising those passages which directly refer to the long night or the long dawn and the second consisting of myths or legends which corroborate and indirectly support the first.

We find passages in the Rig-veda (X, 89, 4. II, 15.2. IV, 56, 3 X, 89, 2) which compare the motion of the heavens to that of a wheel and state that the celestial