the northern fables of the gods, which serve as a back-ground to
the legend of Nibelungen, bear to our German ballad, only that here
the separation is much greater still--MULLER.

Homer makes use of this fable, without reference to its meaning as
an allegory. Briareus seems to symbolize a navy, and the fable
refers to some event in remote history, when the reigning power was
threatened in his autocracy, and strengthened by means of his
association with the people against some intermediate
class.--E.P.P.

27. {epaurontai}.

28. [A name by which we are frequently to understand the Nile in
Homer.--TR.]

29. Around the sources of the Nile, and thence south-west into the
very heart of Africa, stretching away indefinitely over its
mountain plains, lies the country which the ancients called
Ethiopia, rumors of whose wonderful people found their way early
into Greece, and are scattered over the pages of her poets and
historians.

Homer wrote at least eight hundred years before Christ, and his
poems are well ascertained to be a most faithful mirror of the
manners of his times and the knowledge of his age. * * * * *

Homer never wastes an epithet. He often alludes to the Ethiopians
elsewhere, and always in terms of admiration and praise, as being
the most just of men, and the favorites of the gods. The same
allusions glimmer through the Greek mythology, and appear in the
verses of almost all the Greek poets, ere yet the countries of
Italy and Sicily were even discovered. The Jewish Scriptures and
Jewish literature abound in allusions to this distant and
mysterious people, the annals of the Egyptian priests are full of
them, and uniformly, the Ethiopians are there lauded as among the
best, the most religious, and most civilized of men.--CHRISTIAN
EXAMINER.

The Ethiopians, says Diodorus, are said to be the inventors of
pomps, sacrifices, solemn meetings, and other honors paid to the
gods. From hence arose their character of piety, which is here
celebrated by Homer. Among these there was an annual feast at
Diospolis, which Eustathius mentions, when they carried about the
statues of Jupiter and other gods, for twelve days, according to
their number; to which, if we add the ancient custom of setting
meat before statues, it will appear to be a rite from which this
fable might easily have arisen.

30. [The ori