33^ THE ANCIENT EGYPTIANS. CHAP. XV. 



by the light of a torch, kmdled in the flames of 

 Etna. 



" 6. The sixth was called laxrpi^o^, from lacchus, 

 the son of Jupiter and Ceres, who accompanied the 

 Goddess in her search for Proserpine, with a torch 

 in her hand ; whence it was that his statue held a 

 torch. This statue was carried from the Ceramicus 

 to Eleusis in solemn procession, called after the 

 hero's name Irxx^os. The statue, and the persons 

 that accompanied it, had their heads crowned with 

 myrtle. They were named lax^oycoyoif and all the 

 way danced and sang, and beat brazen kettles. The 

 road by which they issued out of the city was called 

 isf/tx ooog, ' the sacred way,' — the resting place, ispot 

 (Tuxri, from a Jig-t7^ee which grew there, and w^as 

 (like all other things concerned in this solemnity) 

 accounted sacred. It was also customary to rest 

 upon a bridge built over the river Cephissus, where 

 they made themselves merry by jesting on those 

 who passed by. Having crossed this bridge they 

 went to Eleusis, the way into which was called 

 the mystical entrance. 



"7- Upon the seventh day were sports, in which 

 the victors were rewarded with a measure of barley, 

 that grain being the first sown in Eleusis. 



'* 8. The eighth was called ' the Epidaurian day-* 

 because it once happened that iEsculapius, coming 

 from Epidaurus to Athens, and desiring to be in- 

 itiated, had the lesser mysteries repeated. Whence 

 it became customary to celebrate them a second 

 time upon this day, and to admit to initiation such 

 persons as had not before enjoyed that privilege. 



