M. Never trouble yourself; what I undertake I will surely perform. But would you have us stay here all day without our dinner? Let us dine, and we will soon return again to our business. Come, you shall dine with me in my house.

P. Excuse me, Sir; I will not give you that trouble, I had rather dine at my own inn.

M. What do you talk of trouble? I know no person whose company is more obliging and grateful. Let us go, I say: you are not your own master to-day. Obey then.

P. I do so: I wait upon you.

PART II.

OF THE TERRESTRIAL DEITIES.

1040

CHAPTER I.

SECT. 1.- SATURN. HIS IMAGE, FAMILY, AND ACTIONS.

P. Now, certainly since we have dined so well, you will speak, and I shall mind better. Come on: Whereabout would you have me look?

M. Look upon the wall on the right hand. On that wall, which is the second part of the Pantheon, as well as of our discourse, you see the terrestrial deities divided into two sorts; for some of them inhabit both the cities and the fields indifferently, and are called in general the terrestrial gods: but the others live only in the countries and the woods, and are properly called bthe gods of the woods. We will begin with the first.

Of the terrestrial gods (which are so called, because their habitation is in the earth) the most celebrated are Saturn, Janus, Vulcan, Æolus, and Momus, The ter restrial goddesses are Vesta, Cybele, Ceres, the Muses, and Themis; they are equal in number to the celestial gods and goddesses. We will begin with the eldest, Saturn, whose image you see there.

P. Is that decrepid, wrinkled old man, Saturn, with a long beard and hoary head? His shoulders are bowed

a Dii terrestes urbes et campos promiscuè incolunt. utem sylvestres rure tantum et in sylvis degunt.

7.

like an arch, his jaws hollow and thin, his eyes full of corruption, and his cheeks sunk; his nose is flat, his forehead full of furrows, and his chin turned up; his lips are black and blue, his little ears flagging, and his hands crooked; his right hand holds a rusty scythe, and his left a child, which he is about to devour.

b

M. It is indeed, Saturn, the son of Terra (or Vesta) and Calum, Calus, or Calius, who was the son of Ether and Dies, and the most ancient of all the gods. This Calum (according to the story) married his own daughter Vesta, and begat many children of her. The most eminent of them was Saturn, whose brothers were the Cyclops, Oceanus, Titan, the hundred-handed Giants, and divers others; his sisters were Ceres, Tethys, and Ops, or Rhea, whom he afterward married. The sisters persuaded their mother Vesta to exclude Titan, or Titanus, the eldest son, and to appoint Saturn heir of his father's kingdom. When Titan saw the fixed resolution of his mother and sisters, he would not strive against the stream, but voluntarily quitted his right, and transferred it upon Saturn, under condition that he should not bring up any male children, that so, after Saturn's death, the kingdom' might return to the children of Titan.

P. Did Saturn accept that condition?

M. He not only accepted, but sincerely kept it, while he could; but at last his design was prevented. For his wife Ops, perceiving that her husband devoured all her male children, when she brought forth the twins, Jupiter and Juno, she sent only Juno to him, and sent Jupiter to be nursed in mount Ida, by the priestesses of Cybele, who were called Curetes, or Corybantes. It was their custom to beat drums and cymbals while the sacrifices were offered up, and the noise of them hindered Saturn from hearing the cries of Jupiter. By the same trick she also saved Neptune and Pluto from her devouring husband.

a Martian. apud Lil. Gyr. b Græcè dicitur Ovpavòs. Nonn. 1. 21. Dionys. Lact. Placid, in Thebaid. 1. 6. d Centimani.