198 CULTIVATED VEGETABLES. 



manufactory, exposed in their festivals an 

 image, bearing in its right hand the beam 

 or instrument round which the weavers rolled 

 the warp of their cloth. This image was 

 called Minerva, from Manevra, a weaver's 

 loom. The name of Athene, that is also 

 given to this goddess, is the very word de- 

 noting in Egypt the flaxen thread used in 

 their looms. Near this figure, which was 

 intended to warn the inhabitants of the ap- 

 proach of the weaving or winter season, they 

 placed another of an insect, whose industry 

 is supposed to have given rise to this art, 

 and to which they gave the name of Arachne, 

 (from arach, to make linen cloth) to denote 

 its application. All these emblems, trans- 

 planted to Greece, were by the genius of a 

 people fond of the marvellous, converted 

 into real objects, and indeed afforded ample 

 room for the imagination of their poets to 

 invent the fable of the transformation of 

 Arachne into a spider. Ovid, who has set this 

 story in a beautiful light, says, Arachne was 



" One at the loom so exquisitely skill'd, 

 That to the goddess she refused to yield. 

 Low was her birth, and small her native town, 

 She from her art alone obtained renown. 



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