augury, and kings and their subjects became the recipients of his bounty.  As long as he maintained this appearance no foreign ruler could install himself in Chaldaea, tyranny would be divided against itself, equity would prevail, and a strong monarch bear sway; while the landholders and the king would be confirmed in their privileges, and obedience, together with tranquillity, would rule everywhere in the land.  The number of these observations increased to such a degree that it was found necessary to classify them methodically to avoid confusion.  Tables of them were drawn up, in which the reader could see at one and the same moment the aspect of the heavens on such and such a night and hour, and the corresponding events either then happening, or about to happen, in Chaldaean, Syria, or some foreign land.  If, for instance, the moon displayed the same appearance on the 1st and 27th of the month, Elam was threatened; but “if the sun, at his setting, appears double his usual size, with three groups of bluish rays, the King of Chaldaea is ruined.”  To the indications of the heavenly bodies, the Chaldaeans added the portents which could be deduced from atmospheric phenomena:  if it thundered on the 27th of Tammuz, the wheat-harvest would be excellent and the produce of the ears magnificent; but if this, should occur six days later, that is, on the 2nd of Abu, floods and rains were to be apprehended in a short time, together with the death of the king and the division of his empire.  It was not for nothing that the sun and moon surrounded themselves in the evening with blood-red vapours or veiled themselves in dark clouds; that they grew suddenly pale or red after having been intensely bright; that unexpected fires blazed out on the confines of the air, and that on certain nights the stars seemed to have become detached from the firmament and to be falling upon the earth.  These prodigies were so many warnings granted by the gods to the people and their kings before great crises in human affairs:  the astronomer investigated and interpreted them, and his predictions had a greater influence than we are prepared to believe upon the fortunes of individuals and even of states.  The rulers consulted and imposed upon the astronomers the duty of selecting the most favourable moment for the execution of the projects they had in view.  From an early date each temple contained a library of astrological writings, where the people might find, drawn up as in a. code, the signs which bore upon their destinies.  One of these libraries, consisting of not less than seventy clay tablets, is considered to have been first drawn up in the reign of Sargon of Agade, but to have been so modified and enriched with new examples from time to time that the original is well-nigh lost.  This was the classical work on the subject in the VIIth century before our era, and the astronomers-royal, to whom applications were accustomed to be made to explain a natural phenomenon or a prodigy, drew their answers ready-made from it.