HEL. 



llth century, the eruption of 1845- 

 46 lasting continuously from Sept. 

 to April. In March. 1878, there was 

 another violent outburst. The prin- 

 cipal rocks are basalt and lava ; the 

 mountain is devoid of vegetation. 



Hel. In Norse mythology, daugh- 

 ter of Loki. She is described in the 

 Prose Edda as purely evil, care 

 being her bed, hunger her dish, and 

 starvation her knife. In other 

 myths she was the guardian of the 

 plains under the earth, peopled by 

 the happy dead, as well as of the 

 caves of punishment.eeMythology. 



Hela. German cruiser. She 

 was torpedoed, Sept. 13, 1914, by 

 the British submarine E 9, 6 m. 

 S. of Heligoland, being the first 

 ship sunk by a British submarine. 

 The Hela displaced 2,000 tons, 

 was 328 ft. long, 36 ft. in beam, 

 and had engines of 6,000 horse- 

 power, giving a speed of 20 knots. 

 She carried only a few light guns. 



Helcosal. Name applied to 

 bismuth pyrogallate employed in 

 the treatment of disorders of the 

 digestive tract. 



Helder. Small seaport of the 

 Netherlands, in the prov. of N. 

 Holland. It stands at the N. ex- 

 tremity of the prov., and is sepa- 

 rated from the island of Texel by 

 the Mars Diep, a channel 2 m. in 

 width. It is about 40 m. due N. 

 of Amsterdam, with which it is 

 connected by the North Holland 

 canal. The place is protected from 

 the sea by a dyke 5 m. long and 

 30 ft. wide, sloping 200 ft. into the 

 sea. About a mile E. of the town, 

 at the entrance to the North Hol- 

 land canal, is the harbour of 

 Nieuwe Diep, where are docks 

 and shipyards, a naval cadet school, 

 and a meteorological station. 



Formerly a small fishing hamlet, 

 Helder has developed considerable 

 importance, owing to its position 

 at the entrance to the Zuyder Zee. 

 Off here, in 1673, the Dutch under 

 Van Tromp and De Ruyter de- 

 feated the combined English and 

 French fleets. It was fortified by 

 Napoleon in 1811. Pop. 29,891. 



3920 



Helen of Troy stolen from her husband's house by Paris. A 15th century 

 rendering of the classical story, by Benozzo Gozzoli, 1420-98 



National Gallery, London 



Helderberg Formation. Rocks 

 of the Upper Silurian system. It is 

 found chiefly in the eastern part 

 of N. America, e.g. New York, 

 the Catskills, New Brunswick, 

 Nova Scotia, and Montreal. Vary- 

 ing in thickness up to 600 ft., these 

 rocks are noted for their fossils. 



Helen (Gr. Helene). In Greek 

 legend, the woman of surpassing 

 beauty whose seizure by Paris 

 was the cause of the Trojan War. 

 According to the earlier stories 

 she was the daughter of Tyndareus 

 and Leda, Castor and Pollux being 

 her brothers. In a later version, 

 Leda was visited by Zeus in the form 

 of a swan, and gave birth to an egg, 

 from which Helen, Castor and Pollux 

 came forth. 



Helen became the wife of Mene- 

 laus, king of Sparta, and when Paris, 

 son of Priam, king of Troy, came 

 there on a visit, Aphrodite, in ful- 

 filment of a promise to give Paris 

 the most beautiful woman in the 

 world, caused her to 

 fall in love with the 

 handsome visitor. 

 After the capture 

 of Troy Helen re- 

 turned to Sparta 

 with her husband, 

 though, according 

 to some legends, 

 they sojourned for 

 eightyears in Egypt 

 before reaching 

 home. The word 

 is a favourite 

 feminine Christian 

 name, as also its 



Helder, Holland. Typical street of the seaport at the variants Ellen 

 entrance to the Zuyder Zee and Helena. The 



form Helenus is occasionally used 

 as a masculine name. See Troy ; 

 consult also Helen of Troy, A.Lang, 

 1882 ; The Legend of Fair Helen, 

 E. Oswald, 1905. 



Helena. City of Montana, 

 U.S.A., the capital of the state 

 and the co. seat of Lewis and 

 Clark co. Situated 3,955 ft. high 

 at the foot of the Rocky Moun- 

 tains, on the edge of the valley of 

 the upper Missouri river, it is 

 73 m. N.E. of Butte, and is served 

 by the Northern Pacific and the 

 Great Northern Rlys. Here are the 

 Montana Wesleyan University, S. 

 Vincent's Academy, and Mount St. 

 Charles College. Other buildings 

 are the capitol, the Federal build- 

 ing, a state and other libraries, and 

 the Y.M.C.A. building. Helena 

 lies in a rich mining region, con- 

 taining gold, silver, copper, and 

 other minerals, and the city is 

 situated at the mouth of the cele- 

 brated Last Chance Gulch, where 

 gold was found in 1864, and from 

 which more than 6,000,000 of 

 gold has been recovered. 



The neighbouring mountains are 

 clothed with forests of fir and pine, 

 whose timber feeds several large 

 sawmills. Sheep and cattle are 

 reared, and there are foundries and 

 machine shops, a large smelter and 

 quartz mills, rly. workshops, and 

 candle and soap factories. In the 

 vicinity are medicinal hot springs. 

 Laid out as a mining town in 1864, 

 Helena became the capital of Mon- 

 tana in 1874 on its organization as a 

 territory, and received a city charter 

 in 1881. It was damaged by fire in 

 1869 and in 1874. Pop. 20,000. 



