VIRGIL, THE LADY, AND THE CHAIR.
“Now the golden chair wherein Juno was compelled to sit, by the artifice of Vulcan, means that the earth is the mother of riches, and with it that part of the air which cannot leave the earth, Juno being air.”—Natalis Comitis: Mythologia, lib. ii., 79 (1616).
“Thou wolt algates wete how we be shape!
Thou shalt hereafterward, my brother dere,
Come wher thee needeth not of me to lere,
For thou shalt by thine own experience
Conne in a chaiere rede of this sentence
Better than Virgile while he was on live
Or Dante also.”Chaucer: The Frere’s Tale.
There once lived in Rome a very great, rich, and beautiful Princess, but she was as bad at heart as could be, and her life was of the wickedest. However, she kept up a good appearance, and was really at last in love with a fine young man, who returned her affections.
But Virgil, knowing all, and pitying the youth, said to him that the woman would certainly be the cause of his ruin, as she had been of many others, and told him so many terrible things of her, that he ceased to visit the Princess.
And she, first suspecting and then learning what Virgil had done, fell into bitter hatred, and swore that she would be revenged on him.
So one evening she invited the Emperor and many nobles, among them Virgil, to a splendid supper.
And being petty and spiteful by nature, the Princess had devised a mean trick to annoy Virgil. For she had prepared with great craft a chair, the seat of which was of paper, but which seemed to be of solid wood. It appeared to be a handsome seat of great honour.
But when the great man sat on it, there was a great crash, and he went down, indeed, but with his legs high in the air. So there was a peal of laughter, in which he joined so heartily and said so many droll things over it, that one would have thought he had contrived the jest himself, at which the lady was more angry than ever, since she had hoped to see him angry and ashamed. And Virgil, taking all the blame of the accident on himself, promised to send her in return a chair to pay for it. And he requested leave to take the proper measure for it, so that she might be fitly taken in.
Which she was. For, having returned to his home, Virgil went to work and had a splendid chair made—con molto artifizio. With great art he made it, with much gold inlaid with pearls, studded with gems. It was all artificial. [72]
And having finished it, Virgil begged the Emperor to send it to the Princess as a gift.
The Emperor did so at the proper time, but there was in it a more cunning trick than in the one which she had devised. For there were concealed therein several fine nets, or snares, so that whoever sat in it could not rise.
Then the Princess, overjoyed at this magnificent gift, at once sent an invitation to her friends to come to a supper where she could display it; nor did she suspect any trick, having no idea that she had any enemy.
And all came to pass as Virgil planned. For the lady, having seated herself in great state, found herself caught, and could not rise.
Then there was great laughter, and it was proposed that everyone present should kiss her. And as one beginning leads to strange ending, the end thereof was that they treated her senza vergogna, saying that when a bird is once caught in a snare, everybody who pleases may pluck a feather.
The classical scholar will find in this tale a probable reminiscence of the chair made by Vulcan wherein to entrap Juno, in which he succeeded, so that she was made to appear ridiculous to all the gods. It is worth noting in this connection that such chairs are made even to the present day, and that without invisible nets or any magic. One is mentioned in a book entitled “The Life of Dr. Jennings the Poisoner” (Philadelphia, T. B. Peterson, Bros.). If any person sat in it, he or she fell back, and certain clasps closed over the victim, holding him or her down perfectly helpless, rendering robbery or violence easy. Since writing the foregoing, I have in a recent French novel read a description of such a chair, with the additional information that such seats were originally invented for and used by physicians to confine lunatic patients. A friend of mine told me that he had seen one in a house of ill-fame in New York.
The legend of the Lady and the Chair suggests a very curious subject of investigation. It is very probably known to the reader that, to make a mesmerized or hypnotized subject remain seated, whether he or she will or not, is one of the common experiments of the modern magicians. It is thus described by M. Debay in his work “Les Mystères du Sommeil et Magnetisme.”
The operator asks the subject, “Are you asleep?”
“No.”
“Rise from your chair.” (He rises.) “Tell all present that you are not asleep.”
“No. I am wide awake.”
The operator takes the subject by the hand, leads him to different persons present with whom he is acquainted, and asks him if he knows them. He replies:
“Certainly I know them.”
“Name them.”
He does so.
“All right. Now sit down.” (The subject obeys.) “And now I forbid you to rise. It is for you impossible—you cannot move!”
The subject makes ineffectual efforts to rise, but remains attached to the chair as if held fast by an invisible power.
The operator then says:
“Now you may rise. I permit you to do so. Rise—I order it!”
The subject rises from the chair without an effort.
I have frequently had occasion to observe that, in all of these legends which I have received from witches, the story, unlike the common fairy tale or novella of any kind, is only, as it were, a painted casket in which is enclosed the jewel of some secret in sorcery, generally with an incantation. Was not this the case with many of the old myths? Do they not all, in fact, really set forth, so far as their makers understood them, the mysteries of Nature, and possibly in some cases those of the wonder-works or miracles of the priests and magicians? There was a German—I forget his name—who wrote a book to prove that Jupiter, Juno, and all the rest, were the elements as known to us now, and all the wonders told of all the gods, with the “Metamorphoses” of Ovid, only a marvellous poetic allegory of chemical combinations and changes. That hypnotism was known to Egyptians of old is perfectly established—at least to his own satisfaction—by Louis Figuier in his “Histoire du Merveilleux dans les Temps Modernes,” Paris, 1861; and it is extremely possible. Therefore it may be that Juno in the chair is but the prototype of a Mademoiselle Adèle, or Angelique Cottin, or Marie Raynard, or some other of the “little Foxes,” who, by the way, are alluded to in the Old Testament.
VIRGIL AND THE GODDESS OF THE CHASE.
“Images, though made by men, are the bodies of gods, rendered perceptible to the sight and touch. In the images are certain spirits brought by invitation, after which they have the power of doing whatever they please; either to hurt, or to a certain extent to fulfil the desires of those persons by whom divine honours and duteous worship are rendered unto them. . . . Do you not see, O Asclepias, that statues are animated by sense, and actually capable of doing such actions?”—Hermes Trismegistus, ap. Augustine, C. D., viii. 23.
“And there withall Diana gan appere
With bowe in hand, right as an hunteresse,
And saydé, ‘Daughter—stint thin heavinesse. . . .’
And forth she went and made a vanishing.”Chaucer: The Knighte’s Tale.
There was in the oldest times in Florence a noble family, but one so impoverished that their giorni di festa, or feast-days, were few and far between. However, they dwelt in their old palace, which was in the street now called the Via Citadella, which was a fine old building, and so they lived in style before the world, when many a day they hardly had anything to eat.
Round this palace was a large garden in which stood an ancient marble statue of a beautiful woman, running very rapidly, with a dog by her side. She held in her hand a bow, and on her forehead was a small moon; it seemed as if, instead of being in a garden, she was in a forest hunting wild game. And it was said that by night, when all was still and no one present, and the moon shone, the statue became like life, and very beautiful, and then she fled away and did not return till the moon set, or the sun rose.
The father of the family had two children, a boy and a girl, of nine or ten years of age, and they were as good as they were intelligent, and like most clever children, very fond of curious stories.
One day they came home with a large bunch of flowers which had been given to them. And while playing in the garden the little girl said:
“The beautiful lady with the bow ought to have her share of the flowers.”
“Certainly,” answered her brother, “because I believe that she is as good as she is beautiful.”
Saying this, they laid flowers before the statue, and made a wreath, which the boy placed on her head.
Just then the great poet and magician Virgil, who knew everything about the gods and folletti, whom people used to worship, entered the garden, and said, smiling:
“You have made the offering of flowers to the goddess quite correctly, as they did in old times; all that remains is to make the prayer properly, and it is this. Listen, and learn it.” So he sang:
“Bella dea dell arco!
Bella dea delle freccie!
Delia caccia e dei cani!
Tu vegli colle stelle
Quando il sole va dormir,
Tu colla Luna in fronte,
Cacci la notte meglio del di
Colle tue Ninfe al suono
Di trombe—sei la regina
Dei cacciatori,
Regina della notte!
Tu che siei la cacciatrice
Più potente di ogni
Cacciator—ti prego
Pensa un poco a noi!”“Lovely Goddess of the bow!
Lovely Goddess of the arrows!
Of all hounds and of all hunting;
Thou who wakest in starry heaven
When the sun has gone to sleep;
Thou with moon upon thy forehead
Who the chase by night preferrest
Unto hunting by the day,
With thy nymphs unto the sound
Of the horn—thou Queen of Hunters!
Queen of night, thyself the huntress,
And most powerful, I pray thee,
Think, although but for an instant,
Upon us who pray unto thee!”
Then Virgil taught them the Scongiurazione, or spell to the goddess Diana:
“Bella dea dell’ arco del cielo,
Delle stelle e della Luna.
La regina più potente
Dei cacciatori e della notte;
A te riccoriamo,
E chiedamo il tuo aiuto
Che tu possa darci
Sempre la buona fortuna!”“Fair goddess of the rainbow!
Of the stars and of the moon!
The queen all-powerful
Of hunters and the night,
We beg of thee thy aid
To give good fortune to us!”
Then he added the conclusion:
“Se la nostra scongiurazione,
Ascolterai,
E buona fortuna ci darei,
Un segnale a noi lo darei!”
“If thou heedest our evocation,
And wilt give good fortune to us,
Then give us in proof a token.”
And having taught them this, Virgilio departed.
Then the children ran to tell their parents all that had happened, and the latter impressed it on them to keep it all a secret, nor breathe a word or hint of it to anyone. But what was their amazement, when they found early the next morning before the statue a deer freshly killed, which gave them good dinners for many a day—nor did they want thereafter at any time game of all kinds.
There was a neighbour of theirs, a priest, who held in hate all the idolatry of the olden time, and all which did not belong to his religion, [77] and he, passing the garden one day, beheld the statue crowned with roses and (other) flowers. And in a rage, seeing in the street a decaying cabbage, he rolled it in the mud, and threw it, all dripping, at the face of the statue, saying:
“Ecco male bestia d’idolo, questo e l’omaggio che io ti do, gia che il diavolo ti aiuta!”—(Behold, thou vile beast of an idol, this is the homage which I render thee, and may the devil help thee!)
Then the priest heard a voice in the gloom where the trees were thick, which said:
“Bene bene—tu mi hai fatto
L’ offrande—tu avrai
La tua porzione
Di caccia. Aspetta!”“It is well—since thou hast made
Thy offering, thou’lt get thy portion
Of the game—but wait till morning!”
All that night the priest suffered from horrible fancies and fears, and when at last, just before three, he fell asleep, he soon awoke from a nightmare, in which it seemed as if something heavy rested on his chest. And something indeed fell from him and rolled on the ground. And when he rose and picked it up, and looked at it by the light of the moon, he saw that it was a human head, half decayed. [78a]
Another priest who, hearing the cry which he had uttered, entered his room, said:
“I know that head. It is of a man whom I confessed, and who was beheaded three months ago at Siena.”
And three days after this the priest who had insulted the goddess died.
In a single incident this tale recalls that of Falkenstein, one of the synonyms of the wild huntsman in Germany, of whom it is said that as he passed by, a reckless fellow wished him luck, whereupon he heard the words, “Thou hast wished me luck; thou shalt share the game;” whereat there was thrown to him a great piece of carrion. And soon after he died. [78b] But the true plot of this narrative is the conduct of the goddess Diana, who rewards the children for their worship and punishes the priest for his sacrilege.
And, noting the sincere spirit of heathenism which inspires many of these legends, the belief in folletti and fate, and curiously changed forms of the gods of Græco-Roman mythology, still existing among the peasants, it is worth inquiring whether, as the very practical Emperor Julian believed, a sincerely religious and moral spirit, under any form, could not be adapted to the progress of humanity? The truth is that as the heathen gods are one and all, to us, as something theatrical and unreal, we think they must have been the same to their worshippers. Through all the Renaissance to the present day the pretended appreciation and worship of classic deities, and with them of classic art and mythology, reminds one of the French billiard-player Berger, who, when desirous of making a very brilliant exhibition of his skill, declared that he would invoke the god of billiards! They may seem beautiful, but they are dead relics, and the worst is that no one realizes now that they ever really lived, moved, and had a being in the human heart. And yet the Italian witch still has a spark of the old fire.
Diana Artemis is known to poets and scholars in certain varied characters thus summed up by Browning:
“I am a Goddess of the ambrosial courts,
And save by Here, Queen of Pride, surpassed
By none whose temples whiten this the world.
Through Heaven I roll my lucid moon along;
I shed in Hell o’er my pale people peace;
On Earth, I, caring for the creatures, guard
Each pregnant yellow wolf and fox-bitch sleep,
And every feathered mother’s callow brood,
And all that love green haunts and loneliness
Of men; the chaste adore me.”
But to her only believers and worshippers now left on earth—such as Maddalena—Diana is far more than this, for she is the queen of all witchcraft, magic, sorcery, the mistress of all the mysteries, of all deep knowledge, and therefore the greatest of the goddesses—all the rest, in fact, except Venus and Bacchus, who only exist in oaths, being now well-nigh forgotten and unknown to them.
VIRGIL AND THE SPIRIT OF MIRTH.
“’Tis an ancient tale that a boy for laughing at Ceres was turned into a stone. For truly too much merriment hardens us all.”—Comment on L. M. Brusonii ‘Facetiæ.’
In ancient times there lived in Florence a young lord who was very beautiful, and ever merry—and no wonder, because he was Il Dio della Allegria—the God of Mirth—himself.
He was greatly beloved, not only by his friends, but by all the people, because he was always so joyous, kind-hearted, and very charitable.
Every evening this spirit-lord went with his friends to the theatre, or to his parties (al circolo), and the name by which he was known was Eustachio. All awaited with impatience his arrival, for with it the merriment began, and when he came there was a joyous shout of “Evviva il Dio dell’ Allegria!”
It came to pass that in a theatre Eustachio met with a girl, a singer, of such marvellous beauty and wit, that he fell, like one lost, in love with her; which love being reciprocated, he took her to himself, and kept her in a magnificent home, with many fine attendants, and all that heart could desire. In those days every signore in Florence thus had an amante, and there was great rivalry among them as to who should keep his favourite in the best style—con più di lusso. And this lady so beloved by Eustachio, was not only the most beautiful, but the most magnificently entertained of any or all in the city.
Now, one evening there was a grand festival in a palazzo, where there was dancing and gay conversation, Eustachio being as usual present, for all his love for his lady did not keep him from the world, or making mirth for all. And as they diverted themselves or sung to music, there entered a group of young lords, among whom was Virgilio, the great poet. [80]
Then Eustachio rose and began to clap his hands and cry, “Evviva! Long live the great poet!” and those who were at table ceased to eat, and those who were dancing left the dance with their partners, and all in welcome cried, “Evviva il gran poeta!”
Then Eustachio begged Virgilio to sing, and the poet did so, for there was no one who would have refused anything to Eustachio, so winning were his ways.
So Virgil made him the subject of his song, telling in pleasing verse how free he was from care, ever laughing like sunshine, ever keeping himself free from thought, which kills joy and brings sorrow.
And Eustachio, singing and laughing, said that it was because he was ever among friends who banished thought, and so kept away melancholy.
Then Virgil, still softly singing, asked him whether, if he should lose his lady-love, he would not be melancholy for a time, despite the consolations of friends and relations.
Eustachio replied that he would indeed regret the loss, and it would make him sad for a time, but not as a settled grief or incurable sorrow, for that all things pass away, every night hath its morning, after every death new life, when the sea has sunk to its lowest ebb then it rises, and that he who knows this can never know trouble.
Virgil ended the dialogue of song by saying that he who believes he can never be sad knows not what sorrow and trials are, that grief must come some time or other to all, even to the God of Mirth himself, and offered to make a wager of a banquet for all present, if he could not within two weeks’ time cause Eustachio to know what grief, and a melancholy which should seem incurable, was like.
Eustachio assented, and said he would add a thousand gold crowns to the bet.
There was a statue named Peonia to whom Virgil had given life; and going to her, who was now as other women, he said:
“I can give life to a statue, but how to change a human being to marble is beyond my power; I pray thee, tell me how I may turn into an image, such as thou wert, this beautiful girl whom Eustachio adores.”
And Peonia, smiling, replied: “Before thou didst come hither I knew thy thought and thy purpose. Lo! here I have prepared a bouquet of flowers of such intense magic perfume that it will make Eustachio love to madness, as he never did before; but when his mistress inhales the perfume she will become a statue.”
And as she bid he did, and placed the bouquet in the lady’s chamber, and when she smelt at it she became a statue, and sat holding the flowers. And Eustachio seeing her sitting there in the dim twilight, knew not the truth, but also smelt of the perfume, and became more in love than man can dream, but when he found that the lady was petrified he was well-nigh mad with grief, nor could anyone console him. And this passed into an iron-like melancholy, nor would he leave the room where the statue sat.
Now, the friends of all, though they well knew that Virgilio had done this, still remembered that he had mighty and mysterious power, and then, thinking over the wager, concluded that he had been in some manner in the affair. So they went to him, praying that he would do something to keep Eustachio from madness or death.
Then Virgilio, the great master, went to the room where Eustachio sat in profound grief by the statue, and said, with a smile, “Caro giovane (My dear youth), I have won my wager, and expect to see thee this evening in the hall at the banquet and dance, bringing the thousand crowns.”
“Dear Virgilio,” answered Eustachio, “go to my parents or friends, and receive thy gold, and assemble them all to banquet or to dance; but do not expect me, for from this room I never more will stir.”
Then Virgilio, gently removing the magic bouquet from the hand of the statue, stepped to the window and threw it down into the street—when lo! the lady flushed into life, and with a laugh asked them what they were all doing there? And then Eustachio burst out laughing for joy, and they danced in a circle round Virgilio. Eustachio paid down the thousand crowns, which Virgil gave as a wedding present to the bride—for of course there was a wedding, and a grander banquet than ever. But though he was the God of Mirth himself, Eustachio never declared after this that he would or could never mourn or think of grief.
What is remarkable in this tale is the confusion between the conception of the hero as a spirit, or the God of Mirth, and his social condition as a young Italian gentleman about town. It is this transition from the god to the popular hero, a mere mortal, which forms the subject of Heine’s “Gods in Exile.”
There is another Florentine legend, in which this god appears by the more appropriate name Momo, evidently Momus, in which a young lord who had never laughed in his life is made merry for ever by having presented to him the image of a laughing goblin, which one of his peasants had dug up in a ruin. Whenever he looks at it, he bursts into a roar of laughter, which has the effect of changing his character very much for the better.
What is perhaps most significant in this tale is the name Peonia. Pæonia in classic mythology was Minerva, as a healing goddess. As such, alone, she bears the serpent. Esculapius is termed by Claudian the Pæonio—dragon or snake. In reference to which I find the following in the “Dizionario Mitologico”:
“Peonia, an additional name of Minerva, worshipped . . . as guardian of health. Therefore she has for a tribute the serpent, as emblem of the art of healing. Peonico was a surname of Apollo.”
When medicine was synonymous with magic, Peonia-Minerva would naturally appear as one familiar with occult arts. The changing to a statue and being revived from a statue to life is a very evident symbol of raising from death to life. Æsculapius, who was the male equivalent of Peonia, revived corpses. As Minerva and other deities were familiar to the people as statues, in which there was believed to be a peculiar spirit or life, we can readily understand how any image of a goddess was supposed to be at times revived.
Peonia in our story works her miracle by means of flowers. This, if we are really dealing with an archaically old Italian tradition, is marvellously significant. The pœonia, or peony, or rose de Nôtre Dame, was believed in earliest Roman times to be primus inter magnos, the very first and strongest of all floral amulets, or to possess the greatest power in magic. This was due to its extreme redness, this colour alone having great force to resist the evil eye and sorcery. The most dreaded of all deities among the earliest Etrusco-Latin races was Picus, who appeared as a woodpecker, to which bird he had been changed by Circe. “Nam Picus, etiam rex, ab eadem Circe virga tactus, in volucrem picum evolavit,” as Tritonius declares. When people dug for treasure which was guarded by this dreaded bird, he slew them unless they bore as a protecting amulet the root of the peony. But there is a mass of testimony to prove that the pæonia, or peony, was magical. Many classic writers, cited by Wolf in his work on amulets, 1692, declare its root drives away phantasms and demons. It was held, according to the same writer, that the same root protected ships from storms and houses from lightning. It is true that this writer evidently confuses the peony with the poppy, but the former was from earliest times strong in all sorcery.
It is also curious that, in old tradition, Pygmalion the sculptor is represented as indifferent to women. Venus punishes him by making him fall in love with a statue. Eustachio, the Spirit of Mirth, declares that the death of his love would not cause him deep grief and for this Pæonia and Virgil change the lady into a marble image. It is the very same story, but with the plot reversed.
Peonia, or peony, regarded as the poppy, since the two very similar plants were beyond question often confused, had a deep significance as lulling to sleep—a synonym for death, a reviving force—and it was also an emblem of love and fertility (Pausanias, II., 10). Peonia lulls the lady to sleep with flowers, that is, into a statue.
I do not regard it as more than probable, but I think it possible that in this story we have one of the innumerable novelle or minor myths of the lesser gods, which circulated like fairy-tales among the Latin people, of which only a small portion were ever written down. That there were many of these not recorded by Ovid, and other mythologists, is very certain, for it is proved by the scraps of such lore which come to light in many authors and casual inscriptions. It requires no specially keen imagination, or active faculty of association, to observe that in this, and many other legends which I have collected and recorded, there are beyond question very remarkable relics of old faith and ancient tradition, drawn from a source which has been strangely neglected, which neglect will be to future and more enlightened antiquaries or historians a source of wonder and regret.
A certain Giovanni Maria Turrini, in a collection of odds and ends entitled “Selva di Curiositá,” Bologna, 1674, declares that “the peony, if patients be touched with it, cures them of epilepsy, which results from the influence of the sun, to which this plant is subject, the same effect resulting from coral.” Here we also have the restoring to life or reason, as if from death; that is to say, from a fit or swoon. Truly, the ancients did not know botany as we do, but there was for them far more poetry and wonder in flowers.
Some time after all the foregoing was written I found—truly to my great astonishment—that in a novel by Xavier Montepin there is a student named Virgil, who has a mistress named Pivoine—the title of the book—which word is in Latin Pæonia. This, according to the kind of criticism which is now extensively current, would settle the whole business, and determine “the undoubted original.” I believe it to be a mere chance coincidence of names—strange, indeed, but nothing more. For, in the first place, I am sure that my collector or her informants are about as likely to have read the Sohar, or “Book of Light,” or Hegel’s “Cyclopædia,” as any novel whatever. But the great part of what is curious in my narrative is not that Virgil loves Pæonia, but that Pæonia-Minerva depresses people to, or raises them from, death by means of flowers. Very clearly in the Italian tale, as in others, Virgil is a physician, and Pæonia is his counterpart, of all which there is no hint in the French novel.
So it once befell that in a very strange Italian tale of Galatea, the Spirit of the White Pebble, there was a narrative agreeing in names with one in a romance by Eugene Sue. But on carefully examining the account of the Virgins of Sen, given by Pomponius Mela (Edition 1526, p. 34, for which purpose I expressly purchased the book), I found that the legend, as known to Maddalena, and also to an old woman whom she did not know, contained the main element as given by Mela, which is not to be found in the French story, namely, the transmigration of the soul or metamorphosis into different forms. The Latin writer states that such enchantresses are called Gallicenas. Now, there was at one time a great infusion of Celtic blood into Northern Italy, and if it was in correspondence with the Gauls, it may possibly be that the story of Sen and Galatea of the White Stone passed all round.
It may be observed, however, that there may linger among French peasants some legend of Virgil and Pivoine, or Pæonia, which Montepin had picked up, and should this be so, doubtless there is some folklorist who can confirm it. This is far more likely than that my authority took the names from a French novel.
The Spirit of Mirth in this story has really nothing in common with Momus, who was, in fact, the God of Sneering, or captious, petty criticism of the kind which objects to great and grand or beautiful subjects, because of small defects. The Virgilian spirit is that of the minor rural gods, or the daughters of the dawn, who were all smiling sub-forms of the laughing Venus. These play the principal part in the mythology of the Tuscan peasantry. This spirit differs from that of Momus as an angel from a devil.
Psellus held that there was a soul in all statues.
That the God of Mirth, or Laughter, is in this tale also a gay young cavalier in Florentine society is paralleled or outdone by Chaucer in the “Manciple’s Tale,” in which Apollo is described as follows:
“Whan Phebus dwelled here in erth adoun,
As oldé bookes maken mentioun,
He was the mosté lusty bacheler
Of all this world, and eke the best archer. . . .
Thereto he was the semelieste man
That is or was sithen the world began.”
That is, this “flour of bachelerie as well in fredom as in chivalrie” was simply human while here below, having “a wif which that he loved more than his lif.” Chaucer wrote this evidently with conscious humour of the naïve paradox by which those of his age could thus confuse gods and common mortals, even as a Red Indian vaguely confuses the great beaver or wolf with a human being. It is a curious reflection that, at the present day in Italy, there are believers in the old gods who regard the latter in the same way, as half divine and half like other folk.