Australia Twice Traversed - The Romance Of Exploration, Through Central South Australia, And Western Australia, From 1872 To 1876 By Ernest Giles
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One Evening A Discussion Arose About The Moon, And Saleh Was Trying To
Teach Tommy Something, God Knows What, About It.
Amongst other
assertions he informed Tommy that the moon travelled from east to
west, "because, you see, Tommy," he
Said, "he like the sun - sun travel
west too." Tommy shook his head very sapiently, and said, "No, I don't
think that, I think moon go the other way." "No fear," said Saleh,
"how could it?" Then Peter Nicholls was asked, and he couldn't tell;
he thought Saleh was right, because the moon did set in the west. So
Tommy said, "Oh, well, I'll ask Mr. Giles," and they came to where Mr.
T, Mr. Y., and I were seated, and told us the argument. I said, "No,
Saleh, the moon travels just the other way." Then Tommy said, "I tole
you so, I know," but of course he couldn't explain himself. Saleh was
scandalised, and all his religious ideas seemed upset. So I said,
"Well, now, Saleh, you say the moon travels to the west; now do you
see where she is to-night, between those two stars?" "Oh, yes," he
said, "I see." I said, "If to-morrow night she is on the east side of
that one," pointing to one, "she must have travelled east to get
there, mustn't she?" "Oh, no," said Saleh, "she can't go there, she
must come down west like the sun," etc. In vain we showed him the next
night how she had moved still farther east among the stars; that was
nothing to him.
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