The first regulation of the calendar is therefore roughly empirical, and in fact is nothing but an occasional and arbitrary deviation, necessitated by the natural phases, from the existing series of months. The natural phases, however, as we saw in chapter IV, are determined in more accurate fashion by the stars, and particularly by their risings and settings. Consequently the months also can be named from stars, and a considerable number of such names of months was found in the lists of chapter VII. This phenomenon has hitherto been only briefly touched upon; for the regulation of the calendar it is of supreme importance, since the risings and settings of the stars accurately determine the date, so that the fluctuation of the natural phases is excluded. Where only one month is named after a star and determined by it, the series of months is immovably fixed. Just as the Pleiades play the most important part in the determination of time from the phases of Nature, so it is also in the naming of the months. The Konyag have a month named from this constellation, which is followed by one named after Orion[888]. Of the Diegueño of S. California it is stated that they divided the year into six months and observed the morning rising of five chief stars. The names of months are given, but unfortunately there is no information as to the sense[889]. The Hottentots and the Herero both have a Pleiades month[890]. On the islands of the Pacific Ocean the practice is carried so far that in some cases every month is described by the rising of a constellation, as is done by the Maoris[891], or even named from stars, as among the inhabitants of Mortlock’s Island[892] and, for most of the months, by tribes of the Torres Straits[893].