There is a Basque legend told of the giant Tartaro, who caught a young man in his snares, and confined him in his cave for dessert. When, however, Tartaro fell asleep, the young man made the giant’s spit red hot, bored out his one eye, and then made his escape by fixing the bell of the bell-ram round his neck, and a sheep-skin over his back. Tartaro seized the skin, and the man, leaving it behind, made off.--_Basque Legends._ A very similar adventure forms the tale of Sindbad’s third voyage, in the _Arabian Nights_. He was shipwrecked on a strange island, and entered, with his companions, a sort of palace. At nightfall, a one-eyed giant entered, and ate one of them for supper, and another for breakfast next morning. This went on for a day or two, when Sindbad bored out the giant’s one eye with a charred olive stake. The giant tried in vain to catch his tormentors, but they ran to their rafts; and Sindbad, with two others, contrived to escape. ⁂ Homer was translated into Syriac by Theophilus Edessenes in the caliphate of Hárun-ur-Ráshid (A.D. 786-809). =Polypheme and Galatea.= Polypheme loved Galatēa, the sea-nymph; but Galatea had fixed her affections on Acis, a Sicilian shepherd. The giant, in his jealousy, hurled a huge rock at his rival, and crushed him to death. The tale of Polypheme is from Homer’s _Odyssey_, ix. It is also given by Ovid in his _Metamorphoses_, xiv. Euripidês introduces the monster in his _Cyclops_; and the tragedy of Acis and Galatea is the subject of Handel’s famous opera so called. (In Greek the monster is called _Polyphêmos_, and in Latin _Polyphēmus_.) =Polyphe´mus of Literature=, Dr. Samuel Johnson (1709-1784). =Polypho´nus= (“_big voiced_”), the Kapăneus and most boastful of the frog heroes. He was slain by the mouse Artophăgus (“the bread-nibbler”). But great Artophagus avenged the slain, ... And Polyphōnus died, a frog renowned For boastful speech and turbulence of sound. Parnell, _Battle of the Frogs and Mice_, iii. (about 1712). =Polyx´ena=, a magnanimous and most noble woman, wife of Charles Emmanuel, king of Sardinia (who succeeded to the crown in 1730).--R. Browning, _King Victor and King Charles, etc._ =Pomegranate Seed.= When Perseph´onê was in Hadês, whither Pluto had carried her, the god, foreknowing that Jupiter would demand her release, gathered a pomegranate, and said to her, “Love, eat with me, this parting day, of the pomegranate seed;” and she ate. Demēter, in the mean time, implored Zeus (_Jupiter_) to demand Persephonê’s release; and the king of Olympus promised she should be set at liberty, if she had not eaten anything during her detention in Hadês. As, however, she had eaten pomegranate seeds, her return was impossible. Low laughs the dark king on his throne-- “I gave her of pomegranate seeds” ... And chant the maids of Enna still-- “O fateful flower beside the rill, The daffodil, the daffodil.” (See DAFFODIL.)