places the habitations of the Gods on each side of it,
and adjoining the palace itself. The mythologists also invented a
story, that the Milky Way was a track left in the heavens by the
milk of Juno flowing from the mouth of Hercules, when suckled by
her. Aristotle, however, suspected what has been since confirmed
by the investigations of modern science, that it was formed by the
light of innumerable stars.]

[Footnote 38: _The ennobled Deities._--Ver. 172. These were the
superior Deities, who formed the privy councillors of Jupiter, and
were called 'Di majorum gentium,' or, 'Di consentes.' Reckoning
Jupiter as one, they were twelve in number, and are enumerated by
Ennius in two limping hexameter lines:--

'Juno, Vesta, Minerva, Ceres, Diana, Venus, Mars,
Mercurius, Jovis, Neptunus, Vulcanus, Apollo.']

[Footnote 39: _The Gods of lower rank._--Ver. 173. These were the
'Dii minorum gentium,' or inferior Deities.]

[Footnote 40: _Shook the awful locks._--Ver. 179. This awful nod
of Jupiter, the sanction by which he confirms his decrees, is an
idea taken from Homer; by whom it is so vividly depicted at the
end of the first book of the Iliad, that Phidias, in his statue of
that God, admired for the awful majesty of its looks, is said to
have derived his conception of the features from that description.
Virgil has the same idea in the AEneid, book x; 'Annuit, et totum
metu tremefecit Olympum.']

[Footnote 41: _Nereus._--Ver. 187. He was one of the most ancient
of the Deities of the sea, and was the son of Oceanus and Tethys.]

[Footnote 42: _The Nymphs._--Ver. 192. The terrestrial Nymphs were
the Dryads and Hamadryads, who haunting the woods, and the
duration of their existence depending upon the life of particular
trees, derived their name from the Greek word +drus+, 'an oak.'
The Oreades were nymphs who frequented the mountains, while the
Napeae lived in the groves and valleys. There were also Nymphs of
the sea and of the rivers; of which, the Nereids were so called
from their father Nereus, and the Oceanitides, from Oceanus. There
were also the Naiads, or nymphs of the fountains, and many
others.]

[Footnote 43: _Thus when an impious band._--Ver. 200. It is a
matter of doubt whether he here refers to the conspiracies of
Brutus and Cassius against Julius Caesar,