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Of polish'd ivory was the covering wrought;

The matter vied not with the sculptor's thought; (!)

For in the portal was display'd on high, (The work of Vulcan) a fictitious sky; A waving sea the inferior earth embraced, And gods and goddesses the water graced."

The moral of this tale seems to have found a fainter echo on the shores of Greece, where the voice of fancy added its own inventions, or its applications of historical tradition to the original metaphor. Venus, a type of nature, or of the fertile earth, still lamented annually the death of Adonis ; but his revival seems generally to have been lost sight of, and, according to the story adopted by Ovid, he was converted into a flower. But traces of the original import of the fiction are to be found in other versions of it, which divided the possession of Adonis between Venus and Proserpine, giving hi.n to each of them for six months in the year; a distribution which can scarcely be considered as unconnected with the annual variations of the sun's apparent orbit.

The manner in which the classical fabulists adapted the sun's diurnal journey to human conceptions, is familiar to all in the Ovidian story of Phaeton: where the whole costume and demoanour of the solar god are depicted in the most brilliant colours, and with the most plausible consistency of contrivance. We may be allowed to extract some passages from it, which are most pertinent to our present discussio., though we wish we could subjoin a translation less pointless and prosaic than that of Addison. The descrip. tion of the sun's palace is like a vision from the Arabian nights :

"Regia solis erat sublimibus alta columnis

The day-god himself is well represented, and encircled with an appropriate train of attendants.

"Purpureâ velatus veste sedebat "In solio Phoebus, claris lucente smaragdis.*

A dextrâ lævâque Dies, et Mensis, et Annus,

Seculaque, et positæ spatiis æqualibus Hora:

Verque novum stabat, cinctum florente coronâ ;

Stabat nuda Estas, et spicea serta gerebat;

Stabat et Autumnus, calcatis sordidus uvis, Et glacialis Hiems, canos hirsuta capillos.' "The God sits high exalted on a throne Of blazing gems, with purple garments on ; The Hours in order ranged on either hand, And Days and Months and Years and Ages stand.

Here Spring appears with flowery chaplets bound;

Here Summer in her wheaten garland crown'd;

Here Autumn the rich trodden grapes be◄

smear;

And hoary Winter shivers in the rear."

The reception of Phaeton by his celestial father contains a trait which

Clara micante auro flammasque imitante has often been admired as natural and

pyropo:

Cujus ebur nitidum fastigia summa tenebat ; Argenti bifores radiabant lumine valvæ. Materiam superabat opus; nam Mulciber

illic

Equora celârat, medias cingentia terras, Terrarumque orbem, cœlumque quod imminet orbi.

Coeruleos habet unda Deos."

"The sun's bright palace on high columns raised,

With burnish'd gold, and flaming jewels blazed;

The folding gates diffused a silver light, And with a milder gleam refresh'd the sight;

pleasing, if it do not rather belong to the category of "pretty."

"Dixerat. At genitor circum caput

omne micantes

Deposuit radios, propiusque accedere jussit."

The tender sire was touch'd with what he

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Compare this with Milton's still more glowing description, and remember that Ovid was a favourite with him :

"High on a throne of royal state, which far
Outshone the wealth of Ormus and of Ind,
Or where the gorgeous East, with richest hand,
Showers on her kings barbaric pearl and gold,
Satan exalted sate."

very reverse of that by which sublimity is produced. The poet has laboured to bring down what is in nature vague, mysterious, and unearthly, to the opposite predicament of distinctness, intelligibility, and conformity with human analogies. The journey of the sun is made to differ not in kind, but in degree only, from that of any terrestrial charioteer; yet, within the limits to which it is thus confined, the representation is interesting and impressive, and brings with it sometimes a powerful though transitory illusion, not without an occasional feeling of the ludicrous at the grossness of the fiction.

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And steady reins must curb the horses' rage.

"Magna petis, Phaeton; et quæ nec vi- Tethys herself has fear'd to see me driven

ribus istis

Munera conveniant, nec tam puerilibus

annis.

Sors tua mortalis: Non est mortale quod optas.

Plus etiam quàm quod Superis contingere fas sit

Nescius affectas: placeat sibi quisque licebit ;

Non tamen ignifero quisquam consistere in axe

Me valet excepto: vasti quoque Rector Olympi,

Qui fera terribili jaculatur fulmina dextrâ, Non agat hos currus; et quid Jove majus habemus?

Ardua prima via est: et quâ vix mane recentes

Enitantur equi: media est altissima cœlo; Unde mare et terras ipsi mihi sæpe videre Fit timor, et pavidâ trepidat formidine pectus.

Ultima prona via est, et eget moderamine

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Down headlong from the precipice of Hea

ven.

Besides, consider what impetuous force Turns stars and planets in a different

course.

I steer against their motions; nor am I Borne back by all the current of the sky. But how could you resist the orbs that roll

Inadverse whirls, and stem the rapid pole? But you perhaps may hope for pleasing woods

And stately domes, and cities fill'd with gods;

While through a thousand snares your progress lies,

Where forms of starry monsters stock the skies."

We conclude our extracts, which we confine as much as possible within the limits of our subject, by transcribing the animated account of the preparation and departure of the chariot at the appointed hour; observing, that the poet assumes the licence of making the kindling dawn and vanishing stars give warning to the sun to set forth on his journey, instead of describing them as the effects of his approach. There are in this part of the nations, full of that pictorial grace and picture many other pleasing impersopoetical beauty for which the fictions of Grecian mythology are so eminently remarkable.

"Ergo, qua licuit genitor cunctatus, ad altos Deducit juvenem, Vulcania munera, currus. Aureus axis erat, temo aureus, aurea sum

Curvatura rota; radiorum argenteus ordo. Per juga chrysolithi, positæque ex ordine gemmæ,

Clara repercusso reddebant lumina Phœbo. Dumque ea magnanimus Phaeton miratur, opusque

They spring together out, and swiftly

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"When the fond father, for in vain he pleads,

At length to the Vulcanian chariot leads,
A golden axle did the work uphold,
Gold was the beam, the wheels were
orb'd with gold,

bear

The flying youth through clouds and yielding air:

With wingy speed outstrip the eastern wind,

And leave the breezes of the morn behind,"

Some of the Greek authors represent the fable of Phaeton as having an allegorical reference either to physical phenomena or to historical facts. But it seems allowable to regard it rather as a story of human incident and feeling, engrafted with much beauty and probability on the assumed reality of an original metaphor or superstition, and ingeniously adapted at the same time to explain the condition of those regions of the earth which lie

Solis."

-"sub curru nimium propinqui

Those who thus believed, or fabled, that the sun in his daily course traversed the heavens in his chariot, must have been somewhat puzzled to reconcile, with the early notions of cosmography, the fact of his invisible return before morning, from the west to the east. Most of the poets are silent on this subject, and leave the question to stand on the indefinite

The spokes in rows of silver pleased the footing which is given to it in some

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lines of Boethius :

"Cadit Hesperias Phoebus in undas; Sed secreto tramite rursus

Cursum solitos vertit ad ortus."

"Phoebus into the western main

Sinks headlong; but a secret track, Ere morning calls, conducts him back To his old starting-place again."

Some of the mythologists, however, attempted to theorise the facts more minutely, and after their accustomed fashion. A title in Athenæus, L. xi. c. 6. § 38, 39, cited by Mr Keightley in his Mythology, contains several passages from ancient authors, in which the sun is represented as passing at night horizontally along the ocean stream, from west to east, in a cup or caldron, manufactured by Vulcan for the purpose. We insert the verses there quoted from Mimnermus, who refers to this singular species of craft, under the more general description of a hollow bed, and we venture to subjoin a rough translation of them :

:

«'Ηέλιος μὲν γὰρ ἔλαχεν πόνον ήματα πάντα,
Ουδέποτ ̓ ἄμπαυσις γίνεται ἐδεμία

Ιπποισίν τε καὶ αὐτῷ, ἐπὴν ῥοδοδάκτυλος Ἠὼς
Ὠκεανὸν προλιπᾶσ ̓ ἐρανὸν εἰσαναβῆ.
Τὸν μὲν γὰρ διὰ κύμα φέρει πολυήρατος εὐνὴ
Κοίλη, 'Ηφαίστε χερσὶν ἐληλαμένη
Χρυσό τιμήεντος, υπόπτερος, ἄκρον ἐφ ̓ ὕδωρ
Ενδοιθ ̓ ἁρπαλέως, χώρες ἀφ ̓ Εσπερίδων,
Γαῖαν ἐς Αἰθιόπων· ἵνα οἱ θεὸν ἅρμα και ἵπποι .
Εστᾶσ ̓, ἔφρ ̓ Ἠὼς ἠριγένεια μόλη.
Ενθ' ἐπεβη ἑτέρων ὀχέων Ὑπερίονος υἱός.”
"Toil is the daily lot that Helios knows;
Nor ever find his steeds or he repose,
When once the morn, with rosy fingers
bright,

From ocean upward takes her heavenly
flight.

The grateful couch that glads his evening

having observed, and revealed, his fraudulent attempt to drink the ambrosia of the gods. The Indian fictions, however, bestow upon the deities in question, and particularly upon the sun, a magnificent equipage, exceeding what the homeliness of Teutonic paganism could afford, and rivalling in splendour the imaginations of classical poetry. On this subject, instead of quoting from the dull extravagance of Indian antiquaries, or from From the Hesperides to the Ethiop's Jones,† we prefer to adorn our pages the monotonous glitter of Sir William

hour,

Hollowed in purest gold by Vulcan's

power,

With winged whirl conveys him, sunk in sleep,

Along the bosom of the billowy deep,

land,

Where his swift car and coursers take their stand,

Till early morn shall summon him on high

Once more to journey through the kind. ling sky."

The moon, we must suppose, performed her evolutions much in the same manner. The poets generally represent her as drawn in a chariot and pair; but they have given us fewer details of her proceedings.

Less elegant and poetical were the attempts of the Teutonic mythologists to explain the course of the great heavenly bodies. The sun and moon were fabled by our ancestors as flying in fear through the heavens, pursued by two wolves of giant-breed that sought severally to devour them, an attempt in which, ultimately, it was believed they were destined to succeed.

It is remarkable that a somewhat similar fable is mixed up with the mythology of India, in which the dragon Rahu, an allegorical being supposed to represent, with Ketu, the lunar nodes, is made to persecute the sun and moon in revenge for their

with an apposite extract from the delightful poem of Kehama, in that exquisite description of Kailyal's too brief abode with both her parents, in the Holy Valley of Meru.

"Lovely wert thou, O flower of earth,

Above all flowers of mortal birth;
But, fostered in this blissful bower
From day to day, and hour to hour,

Lovelier grew the lovely flower.
O blessed, blessed company!
The sun careering round the sky

Beheld them with rejoicing eye,
And bade his willing charioteer
Relax his speed as they drew near:
Aurounin check'd the rainbow reins,
The seven green coursers shook their
manes,

And brighter rays around them threw;
The car of glory in their view
More radiant, more resplendent grew;
And Surya & through his veil of light
Beheld the bower and blest the sight!

The lord of night || as he sailed by
Stay'd his pearly boat on high;
And while around the blissful bower

He bade the softest moonlight flow,
Linger'd to see that earthly flower,

Forgetful of his Dragon foe,¶
Who, mindful of their ancient feud,
With open jaws of rage pursued."

* Grimm's Deutsche Mythologie, pp. 150 and 401.
See his Hymn to Surya, or the Sun, among his poems.
The sun's charioteer, the Dawn.

The Moon-god,

§ The Sun-god.

Rahu.

αλλα φρικη και θαμβος το στρατοπεδον κατείχεν, και λόγος ήσυχη δια πολλων

The persecutors of the sun and moon were supposed, in the utmost heat of their fury, to produce the eclipses of those bodies. In parti- gel, Barthews to Quoμa onceœrviv εκλειψιν."

cular, by a wide-spread superstition, the labours of the moon were ascribed to the successful attacks of the enemy, who seemed to be rapidly devouring or tearing to pieces the object of his hostility. It has been a usage accordingly, in many countries, to issue forth at such times in large multitudes, with sounding instruments and clamorous shouts, designed, as it would seem, to frighten the monster from his prey, and to encourage the fainting luminary to maintain the conflict against the powers of darkness. The cry of " Vince Luna" seems to have been the Latin watchword of encouragement on such occasions; and we find the early Christian preachers inveighing earnestly against the practice, as a remnant of heathenism. Maximus of Turin, an ecclesiastic of the fifth century, has a homily on the eclipse of the moon, and explains the object of the cere mony which he denounces.. -" Circa vesperam tanta vociferatio populi exstitit, ut irreligiositas ejus penetraret ad cœlum. Quod cum requirerem, quid sibi clamor hic velit, dixerunt mihi, quod laboranti lunæ vestra vociferatio subveniret, et defectum ejus suis clamoribus adjuvaret."* Plutarch, describing, in his Life of Paulus Emilius, the eclipse which occurred on the eve of a great battle with the Macedonians, represents the peculiar superstition we are now referring to as a customary observance of the Romans, while their adversaries were affected with that "fear of change which, in ignorant minds, the obscu ration of the lights of heaven so naturally inspires.

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“ Επει δε νυξ γεγονει, και μετα δειπνον ετράποντο προς ύπνον και αναπαυσιν, αιφνίδιον ή σεληνη, πλήρης εσα και μετε ωρος, εμελαινετος και το φωτος απολιποντος αυτην, χρόας αμείψασα παντοδαπας, ηφανίσθη. Των δε Ρωμαίων, ώσπες εστι νενομισμένον, χαλκς τε παταγοις ανακα λεμένων το φως αυτής, και πυρα πολλά δάλοις και δασιν ανεχοντων προς τον εδεν όμοιον επραττον οἱ Μακεδονές· sgavor,

"When they had supped and were thinking of nothing but going to rest, on a sudden the moon, which was then at full, and very high, began to be darkened, and after changing into various colours, was at last totally eclipsed. The Romans, acnoise, by striking upon vessels of brass, cording to their custom, made a great and held up lighted faggots and torches in the air, in order to recall her light; but the Macedonians did no such thing: horror and astonishment seized the whole multitude, that this appearance portended camp, and a whisper passed among the the fall of the king.'

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A picture of the same scene, but in a somewhat different aspect, is presented to us on the sketchy but powerful page of Tacitus, when describing a mutiny among the Pannonian legions on the accession of Tiberius.

"Noctem minacem, et in scelus erupturam, fors lenivit. Nam Luna claro repente cœlo visa languescere. Id miles, rationis ignarus, omen præsentium accepit, ac suis laboribus defectionem sideris adsimilans, prospereque cessura quæ pergerent, si fulgor et claritudo deæ redderetur; igitur

æris sono, tubarum cornuumque concentu
lætari aut morere, et postquam ortæ nubes
strepere; prout splendidior obscuriorve,

offecere visui, creditumque conditam tene-
perculsæ semel mentes, sibi æternum la-
bris, ut sunt mobiles ad superstitionem
deos lamentantur."†
borem portendi, sua facinora adversari

"The night that followed seemed big with some fatal disaster, when an unexpected phenomenon put an end to the commotion. In a clear and serene sky the moon was suddenly eclipsed. This appearance, in its natural cause not understood by the soldiers, was deemed a pro

gnostic denouncing the fate of the army. The planet, in its languishing state, represented the condition of the legions: if it recovered its former lustre, the efforts of the men would be crowned with success.

Το assist the moon in her labours, the air resounded with the clangor of brazen instruments, with the sound of trumpets, and other warlike music. The crowd, in the mean time, stood at gaze: every gleam the sudden gloom depressed their hearts of light inspired the men with joy; and

* Apud Grimm, Myth. 402. See also Hoffman and Du Cange, vo. Vince Luna. † Annal i. c. 28.

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