C 417 ] 



NOTES. 



( Î ) At the bottom flowed a rivulet called Achelous. There were 

 til Greece feveral rivers and rivulets which bare this name. 

 Care mull be taken not to confound the brook, which iflued from 

 Mount Lyceum, with the River of that name, which defcended 

 from Mount Pindus, and feparated Etolia from Acarnania. 

 This River Achelous, as the fable goes, changed himfelf into a 

 Bull, in order to difpute, with Hercuks, the pofleffion of D'éianira^ 

 daughter of Oeneus, King of Etolia. But Hercules, having feized 

 him by one of his horns, broke it off; and the difarmed River 

 was obliged to replace the loft horn, by affiiming one taken from 

 the head of the goat Amalthea. The Greeks were accuftomed to 

 veil natural truths under ingenious fiftions. The meaning of the 

 fable in q«eftion is this. The Greeks gave the name of Ache- 

 lous to feveral rivers, from the word AyiX'o, which fignifies herd 

 of oxen, either on account of the bellowing noife of their waters, 

 or, rather, becaufe their heads ufually feparated, like thofe of 

 oxen, into horns, or branches, which facilitate their confluence 

 into each other, or into the Sea, as has been obferved in the pre- 

 ceding Studies. Now, the Achelous being liable to inundations, 

 Hercules^ the friend of Oeneus, King of Etolia, formed a canal for 

 receiving the fuperflux of that river, according to Straèo's ac- 

 count, which weakened one of it's ftreams, and gave birth to the 

 fabulous idea, that Hercules had broken off one of his horns. 

 But as, on the other hand, there refulted from this canal a fource 

 of abundant fertility to the adjacent country, the Greeks added^ 

 that Achelous, in place of his bull's horn, had taken in exchange 

 that of the goat Amalthea, which, as iï well known, was the 

 fymbol of plenty. 



VOt, V. EC ^2) M'-.mnon, 



