26 Gleanings from the 



OdyfTeus "Zeus enjoined on me hard adven- 

 tures, yea, and on a time he fent me hither to 

 bring back the hound of hell ; for he devifed no 

 harder taflc for me than this. I lifted the hound, 

 and brought him forth from out of the houfe of 

 Hades ; and Hermes fped me on my way to the 

 grey-eyed Athene." 1 The popular view is well 

 exprefled by Sophocles ("CEd. Col.," 1568), who 

 fpeaks of " the unconquerable brute who, as the 

 tale runs, fleeps in the gates of Hades, polifhed 

 by the entrance of fo many fouls, and, untam- 

 able guardian that he is, whines out of the 

 grottoes." The conception of a dog which 

 guarded Hades came to the claflical nations, to- 

 gether with the fable of Charon and his boat, from 

 the Egyptians. Orpheus is fuppofed to have in- 

 troduced thefe myths into Greek fancy. Hefiod 

 is the firft Greek to mention the name and 

 genealogy of Cerberus, and with him the dog is 

 " unapproachable, open to no foothing, ravenous, 

 the brazen-voiced hound of Hades, ihamelefs and 

 mighty with fifty heads." 2 After-poets fpoke of 

 him as three-headed, with ferpents for his tail and 

 mane. At length he becomes hundred-headed, 

 and rivals Oriental monfters in prodigality of 

 horrors. Hercules conquered another dog as well as 

 Cerberus, born (like him) of Typhaon and Echidna, 

 the dog of Geryones. It, too, from refembling 

 the guard of Hades, is fometimes called Cerberus. 



1 "Iliad," viii. 367 ; and "Odyffey," xi. 623 (Butcher and 

 Lang's Tranflation). 



2 Hesiod, "Thcog," v. 388. 



