"Di me omnes magni minutique et patellarii."
Cistell. II. 1. 46.
and
"Sed quæ de septem totum circumspicit orbem
Collibus, imperii Roma Deumque locus."
is from Ovid (Trist. I. 5. 69.).
J.E.B MAYOR.
Marlborough College.
The Sun Feminine in English (Vol. ii., p. 21).—MR. COX may perhaps be pleased to learn why the northern nations made the sun feminine. The ancient Germans and Saxons—
"When they discovered how the sun by his heat and influence excited venereal love in creatures subserviant to his dominion, they then varied his sex, and painted him like a woman, because in them that passion is most impotent, and yet impetuous; on her head they placed a myrtle crown or garland to denote her dominion, and that love should be alwaies verdant as the myrtle; in one hand she supported the world, and in the other three golden apples, to represent that the world and its wealth are both sustained by love. The three golden apples signified the threefold beauty of the sun, exemplified in the morning, meridian, and evening; on her breast was lodged a burning torch, to insinuate to us the violence of the flame of love which scorches humane hearts."—Philipot's Brief and Historical Discourse of the Original and Growth of Heraldry, pp. 12, 13. London, 1672.