PRODIGIES AT SEA IN ANCIENT TIMES. 353 



Horace, lamenting at Virgil's departure for Athens, rebukes 

 the impiety of the first mariner, who ventured, in the auda- 

 city of his heart, to go afloat, and cross the briny barrier 

 between nations. He esteems a merchant favored specially 

 by the gods should he twice or thrice return in safety from 

 a distant cruise. He tells us he himself had known the ter- 

 rors of the dark gulf of the Adriatic and had exuerienced 

 the treachery of the western gale. 



Ancient writers are diffuse in the description of prodi- 

 gies Avitnessed by mariners at sea, many of which, doubtless 

 originating from simple causes, received the addition of a 

 divine interposition. The sudden breaking up of a dense 

 fog, and tlie sun shining in undimed splendor, was attributed 

 to the appearance of Apollo himself, as the saints in later 

 ages were supposed to miraculously intervene for the pro- 

 tection of seamen. ApoUonius of Rhodes, the Greek poet, 

 describes the Argonauts (Greek heroes who, under the com- 

 mand of Jason, went in search of the Golden Fleece) as sud- 

 denly benighted at sea in broad daylight by a dense black 

 fog. They pray to Apollo, and he descends from heaven, 

 and alighting on a rock, holds up his illustrious bow, which 

 shoots a guiding light farther to an island. The delusions 

 of these pagan times continued through succeeding ages, 

 modified only by the change of religion and a better knowl- 

 edge of navigation. These notions, under various forms, 

 still prevail in some foreign countries, where the divine 

 light of evangelical truth has not pierced, while other 

 phases of superstition still linger among our own sailors as 

 regards omens, gook luck, and a number of other senseless 

 notions. 



Legends of a ridiculous character abound in most all of the 

 old writings, but we will now pass on to later superstitions. 

 You have no doubt heard of the " Phantom Ship," which 

 was supposed, Avhen seen by sailors — or rather present in 

 their imaginations only — to foretell disaster. This story 



