HERO HEROD AGRIPPA. 



711 



mutually press upon rach other. The simultaneous 

 contraction of the abdominal muscles and of the 

 diaphragm, which takes place on every violent 

 effort, is one of the chief of these cases. Hence 

 sneezing, coughing, leaping, playing on wind instru- 

 ments, &c., may be the occasions of a hernia. 



The symptoms of a hernia are the existence of a 

 tumour or swelling at any point of the abdomen, but 

 particularly towards the opening of the vessels. A 

 reducible hernia is not a very troublesome disease, 

 but may become so by acquiring an increase of size, 

 and the strangulation to which it is liable. A hernia 

 is said to be strangulated, when it is not only irre- 

 ducible, but also subjected to a continual constriction, 

 which may become fatal; this constriction may be 

 produced by different causes, but it is generally pro- 

 duced by the opening through which the hernia pro- 

 trudes. As soon as a patient perceives that he is 

 affected with a hernia, lie should have recourse to 

 medical advice, for the disease is then in its most 

 favourable state for treatment. The hernia is imme- 

 diately reduced, and must then be subjected to a 

 constant compression. This is done by means of 

 the truss. (See Truss.) An irreducible hernia 

 must be supported with great care. All violent 

 exercises, and excess in diet, must be avoided. The 

 strangulated hernia, presenting greater danger, 

 requires more prompt relief. The object of treat- 

 ment is to relieve the constriction. If the reduction 

 cannot be effected by other means, an operation will 

 be necessary. Tins consists in dividing the parts 

 which produce the constriction. The longer this 

 operation is delayed, the more dangerous it will 

 become. After the parts are healed, the opening 

 must be subject to compression, as in the case of a 

 simple hernia. 



HERO ; a priestess of Venus at Sestos, on the 

 coast of Thrace. The loves of Hero and Leander, 

 a youth of Abydos, situated on the other side of the 

 Hellespont, are related in a poem which bears the 

 name of Musaeus. Hero and Leander saw each 

 other at a festival in honour of Venus and Adonis, 

 at Sestos, at which many of the people of Abydos 

 were present, and immediately became enamoured 

 of each other. Favoured by the darkness of the 

 approaching night, Leander stole into the temple, 

 and confessed his flame to the blushing maid. But 

 the relations of Hero, and her sacred office, opposed 

 the union of the lovers. No difficulties, however, 

 could discourage Leander. He swam every night 

 across the Hellespont to his mistress, guided by a 

 torch which shone across the strait from the tower 

 of Hero. Leander continued his visits during the 

 stormy season of winter. On one occasion, however, 

 his strength failed him, and the waves carried his 

 lifeless body to the foot of the tower, where Hero 

 anxiously awaited him. Overcome with anguish at 

 the sight, she threw herself from the tower on the 

 corpse of her lover, and perished. 



HEROD THE GREAT (so called from his power 

 and talents), king of the Jews. He was a native of 

 Ascalon, in Judea, where he was born B. C. 61, being 

 the second son of Antipater, the Idumean, who ap- 

 pointed him to the government of Galilee. He at 

 first embraced the party of Brutus and Cassius, but, 

 after their death, reconciled himself to Antony, by 

 whose interest he was first named tetrarch, and after- 

 wards king of Judea. After the battle of Actium, 

 he so successfully paid his court to the victor, that 

 Augustus confirmed him in his kingdom ; and, on all 

 occasions, his abilities as a politician and commander 

 were conspicuous ; but his passions were fierce and 

 ungovernable. Although married to the celebrated 

 Mariamne, a princess of the Asmonean family, her 

 brother Aristobulus and venerable grandfather Hyr- 



canus fell victims to his jealousy of the ancient pre- 

 tensions of their race. His very love of Mariamne 

 herself, mingled as it was with the most fearful jea- 

 lousy, terminated in her execution ; and his repent- 

 ance and keen remorse at her death, only exasperated 

 him to further outrages against her surviving relations, 

 her mother, Alexandria, and many more falling vic- 

 tims to his savage cruelty. His own sons by Mariamne, 

 Alexander and Aristobulus, whose indignation at the 

 treatment of their mother, seems to have led them 

 into some intrigues against his authority, were also 

 sacrificed in his anger ; and their deaths crowned the 

 domestic barbarity of Herod. It was the latter event 

 which induced Augustus to observe, that it was better 

 to be Herod's hog than his son. He rebuilt the 

 temple at Jerusalem with great magnificence, and 

 erected a stately theatre and amphitheatre in that 

 city, in which he celebrated games in honour of 

 Augustus, to the great displeasure of the more zea- 

 lous of the Jews. He also rebuilt Samaria, which 

 he called Sebaste, and adorned it with very sumptuous 

 edifices. He likewise, for his security, constructed 

 many strong fortresses throughout Judea, the prin- 

 cipal of which he termed Caesarea, after the emperor. 

 On his palace, near the temple of Jerusalem, he 

 lavished the most costly materials, and his residence 

 of Herodium, at some distance from the capital, by 

 the beauty of its situation, drew around it the popu- 

 lation of a great city. Such indeed was his magni- 

 ficence, that Augustus said his soul was too great for 

 his kingdom. The birth of Jesus Christ took place 

 in the thirty-third year of the reign of Herod, which 

 important event was followed in a year or two by his 

 death, of a languishing and loathsome disease, at the 

 age of sixty-eight. According to Josephus, he 

 planned a scene of posthumous cruelty, which could 

 have been conceived only by the hardest and most 

 depraved heart. Having summoned the chief persons 

 among the Jews to Jericho, he caused them to be 

 shut up in the circus, and gave strict orders to his 

 sister Salome, to have them massacred at his death, 

 that every great family might weep for him ; which 

 savage order was not executed. Herod was the first 

 who shook the foundation of the Jewish government, 

 by dissolving the national council, and appointing the 

 high priests, and removing them at pleasure, without 

 regard to the laws of succession. His policy, ability, 

 and influence with Augustus, however, gave a great 

 temporary splendour to the Jewish nation. 



HEROD ANTIPAS, son of Herod the Great, by 

 his fifth wife, Cleopatra, was appointed tetrarch of 

 G alilee on his death. This was the Herod who put 

 to death St John the Baptist, in compliment to his 

 wife Herodias, in revenge for his reproaches of their 

 incestuous union ; Herodias having been united to, 

 and forcibly taken away from, his brother Aretas. 

 The ambition of Herodias stimulated hr r husband to 

 a measure which proved his ruin. His nephew 

 Agrippa, having obtained royal honours from Cali- 

 gula, she induced Herod to visit Rome to request the 

 same favour, where he was met by an accusation, on 

 the part of Agrippa, of having been concerned in 

 the conspiracy of Sejanus, and of being in secret 

 league with the king of Parthia. This accusation 

 being credited, he was stripped of his dominions, and 

 sent with his wife into exile at Lyons, or, as some 

 say, to Spain, where he died, after possessing his 

 tetrarchy for forty-three years. 



HEROD AGRIPPA, son of Aristobulus by Bere- 

 nice, daughter of Herod the G reat, and nephew to 

 the preceding, was partly educated at Rome with 

 Drusus, the son of Tiberius, on whose death he left 

 Rome with a dilapidated fortune ; but he returned 

 some years after, and, being suspected of an attach,. 

 mcnt to Caligula, was imprisoned by Tiberius. The 



