the third season of the year, when the harvest and fruits are gathered in. Autumn is represented in painting, by a man at perfect age, clothed like the vernal, and likewise girded with a starry girdle; holding in one hand a pair of scales equally poised, with a globe in each; in the other hand a bunch of divers fruits and grapes. His age denotes the perfection of this season; and the balance, that sign of the zodiac which the sun enters when our autumn begins.

Autumn begins on the day when the sun's meridian distance from the zenith, being on the decrease is a mean between the greatest and the least; which in these countries is supposed to happen when the sun enters Libra. Its end coincides with the beginning of winter. Several nations have computed the years by autumns; the English Saxons, by winters. Tacitus tells us, that the ancient Germans were acquainted with all the other seasons of the year, but had no notion of autumn. Lidyat observes of the beginning of the several seasons of the year, that

Dat Clemens hymenem, dat Petrus ver cathedratus, Æstuat Urbanus, autumnat Bartholomaeus.

Autumn has always been reputed an unhealthy season. Tertullian calls it tentator valetudinum; and the satirist speaks of it in the same light. Autumnus Libitine gustus acerbe.