ed rewards and punishments according to their
several deserts. Pluto was therefore called the infernal Jupiter, and
oblations were made to him by the living, for the souls of their friends
departed.

Although Pluto was brother of Jupiter, yet none of the goddesses would
condescend to marry him, owing to the deformity of his person, joined to
the darkness of his mansions. Enraged at this reluctance in the
goddesses, and mortified at his want of issue, Pluto ascended his
chariot, and drove to Sicily, where chancing to discover Proserpine with
her companions gathering flowers in a valley of Enna, near mount AEtna,
the grisly god, struck with her charms, instantly seized her, and
forcing her into his chariot, went rapidly off to the river Chemarus,
through which he opened himself a passage to the realms of night.
Orpheus says, this descent was made through the Cecropian cave in
Attica, not far from Eleusis.

His whole domains are washed with vast and rapid rivers, whose peculiar
qualities strike horror into mortals. Cocytus falls with an impetuous
roaring; Phlegethon rages with a torrent of flames; the Acharusian fen
is dreadful for its stench and filth: nor does Charon, the ferryman, who
wafts souls over, occasion any less horror; Cerberus, the triple-headed
dog, stands ready with open mouths to receive them; and the Furies shake
at them their serpentine locks.

Thus far the common fable; but the following seems the true foundation
of the story which has been so much disguised; Pluto having retired into
Spain, applied himself to the working of the mines of silver and gold,
which in that country, were very common, especially on the side of
Cadiz, where he fixed his abode. Boetica, his residence, was that
province now called Andalusia, and the river Boetis, now Guadalquiver,
gave that name to it. This river formed of old, at its mouth, a small
island, called Tartessus, which was the Tartessus of the ancients, and
whence Tartarus was formed.

It may be remarked, that though Spain be not now fertile in mines, yet
the ancients speak of it as a country where they abounded. Posidonius
says, that its mountains and hills were almost all mountains of gold;
Arienus, that near Tartessus was a mountain of silver; and Aristotle,
that the first Phoenicians who landed there, found such quantities of
gold and of silver, that they made anchors for their ships of those
precious metals. This, doubtless, is what determined Pluto, who was