CHAP. XIII. THE LOTUS AND NELUMBO. 411 



but he was distinct from Venus, or the Morning 

 Star.* 



The resemblance, indeed, between Ehooii, or 

 Peho, " Mtr diuj^''' m Egyptian, and Eos, the Greek 

 Aurora, is sufficiently striking : and if for the 

 " Sun " rising every morning from a lotus flower, 

 we substitute the " day^'' we find the remark of 

 Plutarch justly applies to this Deity : and we may 

 readily pardon his error in mistaking him for Har- 

 pocrates, whom he so much resembles. 



It may, then, be supposed that he represents 

 the day ; and he is with justice considered the 

 child of Athor, or night, from which every new 

 day was supposed to spring. 



I must, in conclusion, make this remark on the 

 lotus plant on which he is represented seated, — 

 that it is always the Nymphjiia Lotus, and in no in- 

 stance the Nelumbo. And though this last is men- 

 tioned by several ancient authors among the plants 

 of Egypt, it is never introduced into the sculptures 

 as a sacred emblem, nor, indeed, as a production of 

 the country ; a fact which goes far to disprove one 

 of the suj)posed analogies of the Egyptian and 

 Indian objects of veneration. With regard to the 

 common lotus, so frequently represented as a fa- 

 vourite flower in the hands of the Egyptians (as 

 the rose or others might be in the hands of any 

 modern people), there is no evidence of its having 

 been sacred, much less an object of worship, though 

 it is an emblem of the God Nofre-Atmoo. 



* Vide supra, p. 387. 



