Those of Eleusis were a manifest imitation of the Levitical feast of ingathering or tabernacles. They were celebrated at the same season,—immediately after the bringing in of the harvest; and were in honor of Demeter, or Ceres, the patroness of agriculture. The celebration proper, continued for seven days, after which there was an additional eighth day, appropriated to the initiation of those who had been too late for the regular observances. This, again, was followed by a ninth day, which was named _plēmochoai_, from a vase called _plēmochoē_. “Two of these vessels were on this day filled with water or wine,” (Should it not be “water _and_ wine?”) “and the contents of one thrown to the east, and those of the other to the west, while those who performed this rite uttered some mystical words.”[57] From the appropriating of a ninth day to the outpouring of the water and wine, it seems probable that the mysteries were originally imitated from the Levitical feast before the festival of the outpouring was instituted; and that when the latter rite was introduced, an additional day was appropriated to it, so as to avoid any change in what had become the established and consecrated order of the preceding days. Footnote 57: Smith, _article_ “Eleusinia.” Compare above, p. 144. These mysteries were of two orders. The less were celebrated at Agræ, and were essential as a preparation for the greater at Eleusis. In the preparatory rites, the candidates were required to keep themselves continent and unpolluted for nine days; and were purified with water sprinkled on them, by an officer who was thence called the _hydranos_.[58] At Eleusis they offered sacrifices and prayers, wearing garlands of flowers; and, standing on the skin of a sacrificial animal, were again purified by the sprinkling of water by the _hydranos_. Footnote 58: “Ὑδρανος (hydranos), a waterer, a sprinkler with water; from ὑδραινο to water, to sprinkle any one with water, to pour out libations.”—Liddell & Scott’s Greek Lexicon. That the observances thus illustrated were corrupted forms derived from the rites and institutions of Moses, is apparent. So manifest is this, that in the third and fourth centuries it was made the ground of a specious theory by means of which the advocates of paganism sought to stay the progress of Christianity. “Among those who wished to appear wise, and to take moderate ground, many were induced to devise a kind of reconciling religion, intermediate between the old superstition and Christianity, and to imagine that Christ had enjoined the very same things which had long been represented by the pagan priests, under the envelope of their ceremonies and fables.”[59] Footnote 59: Mosheim, Eccl. Hist., Book II., Part i, § 18.