The Fates.
The Furies were deities who searched out all wicked people and punished them for their crimes, pursuing them with whips and snakes. The Furies were really friends to man, because they wished him to repent of his guilty deeds, live a better and truer life, and do good and not evil in the world.
The nine Muses, those gracious daughters of Jupiter and Memory, sang their songs and joined in a graceful dance on Mount Parnassus. Apollo, god of poesy and song, was their teacher, and from him they learned how to inspire artists, poets, and musicians with thoughts of harmonies more beautiful than ordinary mortals know.
The Hours attended Apollo, as he drove his flaming chariot through the heavens.
“The rosy Hours, with agile grace, attend
Apollo, when, as god of the sun, he makes
His joyful journey through the heavens.”
Another group of four graceful beings Keats thus describes in his poem, “Endymion,”—
“An ethereal band
Are visible above: The Seasons four,—
Green-kirtled Spring, flush Summer, golden store
In Autumn’s sickle, Winter’s frosty hoar.”
GIVE.
See the rivers flowing
Downwards to the sea,
Pouring all their treasures
Bountiful and free:
Yet to help their giving
Hidden springs arise;
Or, if need be, showers
Feed them from the skies!