677 



HERO, HEROIC, HEROISM. 



HEROIC VERSE. 



C73 



means employed should be the continued application of cold by ice or 

 a rapidly evaporating lotion laid over the tumour, and kept there 

 unless it produces much pain, till all the tissues are contracted and 

 hard, for it is by their equable and powerful contraction on the intes- 

 tine, and by the diminution of its volume, that reduction is sometimes 

 thus effected even without manipulation. A hernia may be sometimes 

 reduced by placing the patient under the influence of chloroform. 

 Should this fail, and the symptoms of strangulation be increasing, the 

 only means left before operation is the tobacco enema. Great caution 

 is necessaiy in employing it ; it should never be used except in other- 

 wise healthy and tolerably strong persons, nor till the other means 

 have failed. A dram of tobacco being steeped in a pint of boiling 

 water for ten minutes, half the infusion thus made should be used 

 first ; and if it produce no evidently depressing effect, the other half 

 may be injected in half an hour afterwards. The usual consequence is 

 an extreme degree of languor and sinking, a kind of deadly coldness and 

 paleness, and the last stage of depression : in this state a last attempt 

 at reduction should be made ; and if still unsuccessful, an operation 

 must be resorted to. The tobacco enema should not be employed 

 unless the symptoms of strangulation be quite evident. If the hernia 

 seem merely irreducible, but is not strangulated, and if cold, and 

 warm bath and bleeding (if deemed advisable), have failed, the patient 

 should be left, and an active dose of aperient medicine given him, for 

 sometimes the bowels will, under the operation of these means, return 

 of themselves into the abdomen. 



When the hernia has been completely reduced, its recurrence must 

 be prevented by the wearing of a truss. A truss consists of a circular 

 pad, having one side convex and soft, and the other flattened and made 

 very firm by a plate of steel, by which the pad is riveted into the spring, 

 which is a narrow band of highly tempered and very elastic steel, 

 forming when extended somewhat more than a semicircle. In apply- 

 ing a truss, the soft convex surface of the pad should be placed accu- 

 rately over the part where the neck of the tumour was situated, that is, 

 over the ring through which the intestine first protruded, and which 

 may be felt by the weakness of the abdominal walls, so that the finger 

 may be easily pushed almost into the abdomen, carrying the skin and 

 subjacent tissues before it. The pad being held there, the spring should 

 be made to pass round the haunch to the back, so as to reach just 

 beyond the spine ; its elasticity, tending to bring its two extremities 

 together, will thus act so as to press with a certain force upon the 

 ring or the canal through which the hernia was protruded, and thus 

 supply the defect of weakness at that part of the abdominal walls. At 

 that extremity of the spring which is applied near the spine there is 

 affixed, in what are called common trusses, a leathern band, which is to 

 be passed round the opposite haunch, and buckled or buttoned on the 

 pad, BO as to prevent its shirting its position during exercise ; and in 

 some cases, where this is apt to occur, another baud should pass from 

 behind under and inside the thigh and be fixed to the pad. Another 

 very useful form of truss is that commonly called Salmon and Ody's 

 or the self-adjusting truss, which has a second pad, to be placed behind 

 on the spine, and which requires no bands to keep it fixed, but, by the 

 steady pressure of its two pads towards each other, maintains a firm 

 pressure on the ring, and permits the spring to move up and down 

 upon the haunch during exertion. In applying this, one pad must be 

 placed on the ring, the spring must pass round the opposite haunch, 

 and the hinder pad must rest on the spine, just below the loins, where 

 it is least moveable. When there is a hernia on each side, a double truss, 

 that is, one with a pad for each side, and one or two springs long enough 

 to reach quito round the body, must be worn : if there be two springs, 

 they should be connected by a cross-band - and buckle, so that they 

 may be tightened or loosened behind, and another band should pass 

 from one pad to the other to maintain them in their proper position. 

 To determine the necessary length for the spring of the truss, a measure 

 may be taken by a string fixed at one end over the centre of the ring, 

 at that part where, when the patient coughs, the intestine may be felt 

 endeavouring to protrude, and thence carried round in an oblique 

 direction between the most prominent part of the hip and the top of 

 the haunch-bone to an inch beyond the spine. The pad should be of 

 rife proportioned to that of the ring, and the spring should be 

 strong enough to make firm but not painful pressure. 



HKRO, HEROIC, HEROISM. These words flow directly from the 

 original Greek word'Hpai, which denoted (at least in the times subse- 

 quent to the Homeric poems) a person intermediate between gods and 

 men, and usually of divine descent on at least one side. , Such were 

 worshipped with divine honours by those cities and races of men which 

 claimed them as their founders or ancestors. This divine origin 

 however was not essential : thus Philippus of Crotona, who fell in 

 brittle against the Phrcnicians and Egesfccans, was made a hero for his 

 beauty; a heroon, or shrine, was built on the spot where he was 

 buried, and sacrifices were offered to him. ('Herod.,' v. 47.) At a later 

 age Aratus and Brasidas were worshipped as heroes at Sicyon and 

 Arnphipolis ; and the Athenians slain at Marathon received similar 

 ". Concerning these last, legends were current which show 

 that a supernatural .and mythological character was really ascribed to 

 them, and they probably were the latest of the Greeks to whom such a 

 character was attributed. The Heroic age, properly so called, appears 

 however to have terminated with the immediate descendants of the 

 Greeks who returned from Troy, and to have extended backwards for 



an uncertain length, estimated by Mr. Thirlwall at six generations, or 

 about 200 years. This is the fourth or Heroic age of Hesiod, in 

 which Zeus ' made the divine brood of heroes, better aud braver than 

 the third or brazen race " (' Days aud Weeks,' 157), the princes and 

 warriors of mythological history, such as Theseus, Perseus, and those 

 who fought in the sieges of Thebes and of Troy. In Homer the word 

 hero occurs frequently, but in quite a different sense: it is applied 

 collectively to the whole body of fighters, Argeii, Danai and Aehsei, 

 without reference to individuals of peculiar merit ; and indeed often 

 appears to be used for little more than an expletive, when he, or the 

 man, or the soldier, would have done equally well. Indeed the appli- 

 cation of the word is not even limited to warriors ; but is applied to 

 heralds, wise counsellors, kings, &c. It has been suggested, with con- 

 siderable plausibility, that the word originally denoted the members of 

 those 'roving bands who in the earliest times overran Greece, issuing 

 forth from the south of Thessaly and giving extension to the name, 

 first of Achseans, and afterwards of Hellenes, as we learn from the 

 legends in Pausanias and Thueydides ; so that in the same sense the 

 Normans who colonised Italy, or the Saxons who settled in England, 

 might justly be called heroes. The root of the word seems to be her, 

 whence the Latiu and German forms of herus and herr (master), here, 

 hertha, heracles, vir, virtus, &c. The same root seems to exist in the 

 word Arimann, which denoted a particular order of freemen among the 

 Lombards, existing at the time of the establishment of their empire 

 after the Lombard conquests. There seems little doubt that this 

 class originated in the warrior caste of the Lombard invaders, and the 

 establishment of the name thus furnishes an analogy to the theory 

 suggested above as to the origin of the Homeric use of the word hero. 

 Even the name of German, and the meaning of brother attached to the 

 word in Latin, may originate in the same sense of a member of an 

 armed family or body : the root in all cases appearing to involve the 

 notion of might or mastery. The Sanscrit word sura appears to 

 contain the same element as " heros." 



The promiscuous (or Homeric) use of the word hero disappeared in 

 the age succeeding the Homeric poems. It seems probable that the 

 Hellenic invasion, commonly called the Return of the Heraclidje, put 

 an end to it. The new conquerors of Southern Greece do not seem 

 themselves to have borne or used the title ; and afterwards, when 

 they, or their descendants, looked back to the warlike legends of the 

 earlier race who had borne the title, the lays, exploits, and persons 

 were called heroic ; and from the combined effect of poetical exag- 

 geration, reverence for antiquity, and traditions of national descent, 

 the more modern Greek use of the word arose, carrying with it notions 

 of mythical dignity, and of superiority to the later races of mankind. 

 The custom of showing respect or affection by making precious 

 offerings, and celebrating costly sacrifices at the tombs of the dead ; 

 the imaginative temper of the Greeks, which, as it loved to ascribe a 

 divine genealogy to the great, was equally willing to admit them to a . 

 share of the divine nature and enjoyments after death ; and the love of 

 magnifying past ages, common to all nations, will sufficiently explain 

 the change of earthly leaders into protecting genii or daemons, who 

 were believed immortal, invisible, though frequenting the earth, 

 powerful to bestow good or evil, and therefore to be appeased or pro- 

 pitiated, like the gods themselves. In the age of Hesiod, as is evident 

 from the passage above referred to, the age of heroes was past, and 

 they were already invested with their mythological character, which 

 appears to furnish one, among other reasons, for believing him to have 

 lived after the Homeric age. 



In the common English use of the words a hero denotes only the 

 chief or most distinguished person, the hero of a victory, or the hero of 

 a novel. Hudibras is the hero of Butler's poem ; but hero and heroism 

 still preserve then- original characteristics, and are applied to actions 

 evincing an unusual or even superhuman degree of bravery and virtue. 



(Thirlwall's History of Greece, ch. v. ; Philolog. Mus, No. 4, ' On the 

 Homeric use of the word "Upas;' Wachsmuth's Hell. Alt.; Von 

 Savigny's Histvry of the Roman Law during the Middle Ages, vol. i., 

 ch. 4.) 



HERO'DIANS ('HpwSiayoi', Matt. xxii. 16; Mark iii. 6; xii. 13; see 

 also Mark viii. 15), were in all probability a political party in Judaea, 

 who were anxious to preserve the government in the hands of Herod's 

 family. By some the Herodians are thought to have been a religious 

 sect ; but they are not mentioned either by Philo, or by Josephus in 

 his enumeration of the Jewish sects. In their religious opinions they 

 probably belonged to the sect of the Sadducees, since that which is called 

 by Mark (viii. 15) " the leaven of Herod" is styled by Matthew (xvi. 6) 

 " the leaven of the Sadducees." They were no doubt the partisans and 

 followers of Herod the Great. This view is supported by the Syriac 

 version of the New Testament, which renders Herodians, by servants 

 of Herod. Politically, they advocated compliance with the idolatries 

 and customs of the Romans, to which the Pharisees were opposed ; and 

 this opposition throws light upon the snare laid for Christ in the ques- 

 tion propounded by both sects (Matt. xxii. 16, 17) as to the lawfulness 

 of paying tribute to Caesar. As the answer seems rather in favour of the 

 Herodians, the leaven of Herod must have consisted of the idolatry.' 



HEROIC AGE. [HERO.] 



HEROIC VERSE, in its ancient sense, means that which was the 

 vehicle of Greek, and subsequently of Latin, epic poetry, of which the 

 actions of the heroes were the appropriate subject, [HEXAMETER.] In 



