'O þou maker of þe whele þat bereþ þe sterres, whiche þat art fastned to þi perdurable chayere, and turnest þe heuene wiþ a rauyssyng _sweighe_, and constreinest þe sterres to suffren þi lawe'; pp. 21, 22. 'þe regioun of þe fire þat eschaufiþ by þe swifte _moeuyng of þe firmament_'; p. 110. The original is-- 'O stelliferi conditor orbis Qui perpetuo nixus solio _Rapidum caelum turbine uersas_, Legemque pati sidera cogis'; Boeth. Cons. Phil. lib. i. met. 5. 'Quique _agili motu_ calet _aetheris_'; id. lib. iv. met. 1. (See the same passages in vol. ii. pp. 16, 94). To the original nine spheres, as above, was afterwards added a tenth or crystalline sphere; see the description in the Complaint of Scotland, ed. Murray (E. E. T. S.), pp. 47, 48. For the figure, see fig. 10 on Plate V., in my edition of Chaucer's Astrolabe (in vol. iii.). Compare also the following passage:-- 'The earth, in roundness of a perfect ball, Which as a point but of this mighty all Wise Nature fixed, that permanent doth stay, Wheras the spheres by a _diurnal sway_ Of the first Mover carried are about.' Drayton: The Man in the Moon. 299. _crowding_, pushing. This is still a familiar word in East [150] Anglia. Forby, in his Glossary of the East Anglian Dialect, says--'_Crowd_, v. to push, shove, or press close. To the word, in its _common_ acceptation, _number_ seems necessary. With us, _one_ individual can _crowd_ another.' To _crowd_ a wheelbarrow means to push it. The expression '_crod_ in a barwe,' i. e. wheeled or pushed along in a wheelbarrow, occurs in the Paston Letters, A.D. 1477, ed. Gairdner, iii. 215. 302. A planet is said to ascend directly, when in a direct sign; but tortuously, when in a tortuous sign. The tortuous signs are those which ascend most obliquely to the horizon, viz. the signs from Capricornus to Gemini inclusive. Chaucer tells us this _himself_; see his Treatise on the Astrolabe, part ii. sect. 28, in vol. iii. The most 'tortuous' of these are the two middle ones, Pisces and Aries. Of these two, Aries is called the mansion of Mars, and we may therefore suppose the ascending sign to be Aries, the lord of which (Mars) is said to have fallen 'from his angle into the darkest house.' The words 'angle' and 'house' are used technically. The whole zodiacal circle was divided into twelve equal parts, or 'houses.' Of these, four (beginning from the cardinal points) were termed 'angles,' four others (next following them) 'succedents,' and the rest 'cadents.' It appears that Mars was not then situate in an 'angle,' but in his 'darkest (i. e. darker) house.' Mars had _two_ houses, Aries and Scorpio. The latter is here meant; Aries being the ascendent sign, Scorpio was below the horizon, and beyond the western 'angle.'