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Updated: June 17, 2025
IX. When Herodotus informs us that Egypt imparted to Greece the names of almost all her deities, and that his researches convinced him that they were of barbarous origin, he exempts from the list of the Egyptian deities, Neptune, the Dioscuri, Juno, Vesta, Themis, the Graces, and the Nereids . From Africa, according to Herodotus, came Neptune, from the Pelasgi the rest of the deities disclaimed by Egypt.
The death of Icarus is told in the following lines by Darwin: "... with melting wax and loosened strings Sunk hapless Icarus on unfaithful wings; Headlong he rushed through the affrighted air, With limbs distorted and dishevelled hair; His scattered plumage danced upon the wave, And sorrowing Nereids decked his watery grave; O'er his pale corse their pearly sea-flowers shed, And strewed with crimson moss his marble bed; Struck in their coral towers the passing bell, And wide in ocean tolled his echoing knell."
The blue sea spread before them, the full moon mirrored on its scarcely heaving surface like a tremulous column of pure and shining silver. The murmur of the ripples came up from the strand as soothing and inviting as the song of the Nereids; and if a white crest of foam rose on a wave, she could fancy it was the arm of Thetis or Galatea.
With this was pleasantly intermixed the conception that the inhabitant of these planets may have his 'home in subterranean cities warmed by central fires, or in crystal caves cooled by ocean tides, or may float with the Nereids upon the deep, or mount upon wings as eagles, or rise upon the pinions of the dove, that he may flee away and be at rest, with much more in the same fanciful vein.
Her passion for that work grew wonderfully, and might be accounted for by the fascination of perfect success; for her coronets and garlands and bouquets and baskets were arranged with so much lightness and elegance, and the different-colored shells were so tastefully combined, that they looked less like manufactured articles than like flowers that grew in the gardens of the Nereids.
Meanwhile, the Queen had no sooner stepped on the bridge than a new spectacle was provided; for as soon as the music gave signal that she was so far advanced, a raft, so disposed as to resemble a small floating island, illuminated by a great variety of torches, and surrounded by floating pageants formed to represent sea-horses, on which sat Tritons, Nereids, and other fabulous deities of the seas and rivers, made its appearance upon the lake, and issuing from behind a small heronry where it had been concealed, floated gently towards the farther end of the bridge.
And he observes with surprise, that this wickedness, which is at a furnace-heat in the superior gods, becomes fainter and paler as you descend. Amongst the semi-deities, such as the Oreads or Dryads, the Nereids or Naiads, he feels not at all offended. The odor of corruption, the saeva mephitis, has by this time exhaled. The uproar of eternal outrage has ceased.
They are much more spirits of nature than the dryads and nereids and mermaids conceived by the Germans to express in symbol the natural forces. Nothing suggests the use of models, all has the look of spontaneity as though the artist had made his notes in passing, without the slightest regard to producing a picture, with only the idea of reproducing life.
I must away, but I will not fear. The gods look down upon us. Ye who slay me unoffending, when I am no more, your time of trembling shall come. Ye Nereids, receive your guest, who throws himself upon your mercy!" So saying, he sprang into the deep sea. The waves covered him, and the seamen held on their way, fancying themselves safe from all danger of detection.
'Sweet, and didst thou find aught of sweet, when thou, like thy Daphnis, didst 'go down the stream, when the whirling wave closed over the man the Muses loved, the man not hated of the Nymphs? Perchance below those waters of death thou didst find, like thine own Hylas, the lovely Nereids waiting thee, Eunice, and Malis, and Nycheia with her April eyes.
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