ingenius in such operations, to fix himself near to Tartessus; and this
making him pass also for a wealthy prince, procured for him the name of
Pluto, instead of that of Agelestus.

The situation of Pluto's kingdom, which was low in respect to Greece,
occasioned him to be looked on as the god of hell; and as he continually
employed laborers for his mines, who chiefly resided in the bowels of
the earth, and there commonly died, Pluto was reputed the king of the
dead. The ocean, likewise, upon whose coasts he reigned, was supposed to
be covered with darkness. These circumstances united, appear to have
been the foundation of the fables afterwards invented concerning Pluto
and his realms of night. It is probable, for example, that the famous
Tartarus, the place so noted in the empire of this god, comes from
Tartessus, near Cadiz: the river Lethe not unlikely from the
Guada-Lethe, which flows over against that city; and the lake Avernus,
or the Acheronian fen, from the word Aharona, importing, _at the
extremities_, a name given to that lake, which is near the ocean.

Pluto was extremely revered both by the Greeks and Romans. He had a
magnificent temple at Pylos. Near the river Corellus, in Boeotia, he had
also an altar, for some mystical reason, in common with Pallas. His
chief festival was in February, and called Charistia, because their
oblations were made for the dead. Black bulls were the victims offered
up, and the ceremonies were performed in the night, it not being lawful
to sacrifice to him in the day time, on account of his aversion to the
light. The cypress tree was sacred to Pluto, boughs of which were
carried at funerals.

He is usually represented in an ebony chariot, drawn by his four black
horses, Orphnaeus, AEthon, Nycteus, and Alastor. As god of the dead, keys
were the ensigns of his authority, because there is no possibility of
returning when the gates of his palace are locked. Sometimes he holds a
sceptre, to denote his power; at other times a wand, with which he
directs the movements of his subject ghosts. Homer speaks of his hemlet
as having the quality of rendering the wearer invisible; and tells us
that Minerva borrowed it when she fought against the Trojans, that she
might not be discovered by Mars. Perseus also used this hemlet when he
cut off Medusa's head.

Mythologists pretend that Pluto is the earth, the natural powers and
faculties of which are under his direction, so that he is monarch not