For my own part, I think we may not only regard the story of the ship Argo as in reality a version, though much modified, of the account of Noah's deluge, but consider the series of constellations, Aquarius, Cetus, Eridanus, Argo, Corvus, Centaurus, Ara, and Sagittarius, as typifying the same narrative. It is somewhat curious that if we place these constellations in their original position,--that is, as they were before the changes which the earth's great gyration has introduced during the last four thousand years or so,--we find the following coincidences with the account of the deluge. First comes Aquarius (whose beginning would correspond with the sun's position on or about the seventeenth day of the second month of the old Pleiades year) pouring water. His range on the ecliptic (or the space he occupies in the annual range represented in the zodiac temple) is about forty days. Then came the watery constellations Eridanus, the river, and Cetus, the sea monster, having, with the ship Argo, a range of about 150 days of the annual circuit. About forty days later in the circuit we find Corvus, the raven, whose feet rest on Hydra, the great celestial sea-serpent, as though no dry land could be found by the bird. A dove also, if we accept the interpretation above given of the Argo narrative, may have been represented in this part of the star temple. Next we have the Centaur, originally we know represented as a man only, offering an animal as sacrifice on the altar Ara. There is a cloud of stars rising from the altar: we may recall Manilius's account of the constellation,-- "Ara, ferens thuris, stellis imitantibus, ignem."[16] In this cloud is the Bow of Sagittarius, the bow being originally alone shown, as it is indeed the only figure which can be imagined among the stars of this region. So that these constellation figures seem to typify Noah offering sacrifice on the Altar, and the Bow of Promise set in the cloud above the altar. It is curious, too, that while the time of Noah's leaving the ark was a year and ten days from the beginning of the rains, the constellation Sagittarius overlaps the conjoined watery signs Capricornus and Aquarius (running south of them) by about so much as would correspond to ten days of the annual circuit of the heavens. The objections to the view of matters above indicated are, first, that the constellations referred to seem to have been formed because of real resemblance between the star-groups and the figures associated with them; and, secondly, that the Zodiac temples were probably erected by star-worshippers, and would scarcely have been employed to typify such a narrative as that of the Deluge. The theory that the narrative itself was an attempt to interpret pictures represented on a Zodiac temple will, of course, be objectionable to many readers; though they may not be unwilling to believe that the fable of the Argonautic expedition had its origin in some such way.