one late red-figured vase[314]. The emphasis laid on the initiation of Herakles and the tradition that he was admitted at the Lesser Mysteries mark the fact that he was a stranger. It is possible to go a step further. Herakles was not merely no true-born Athenian citizen, but an actual foreigner, an Oriental. It is therefore no surprise to us to learn from the best of authorities on Athenian ritual, Apollodorus[315], that ‘sacrifice was offered to Herakles Alexikakos at Athens after a special and peculiar manner.’ It would be out of place here to enter upon any detailed examination of the Oriental elements in the worship of Herakles generally, but as regards his worship at Athens, and especially in Melite[316], some points must be noted. Melite, all authorities seem to agree, is _Malta_[317], the place of refuge. Diodorus[318] gives us a full description of the original Melite-Malta and emphasizes, if emphasis were needed, its harbourage and generally its maritime convenience, its wealth in arts and crafts and manufactures. ‘This island is a colony of the Phenicians, it lay in mid-ocean and had good harbour, hence when they extended their trade to the western Ocean it served them as a refuge.’ Of another island of refuge called Melite Strabo[319] tells us ‘the Korybantes removed to Samothrace which was formerly called Melite.’ This Samothrace, according to Diodorus[320], was called in ancient days _Saonnesos_, Safe-island, which of course is merely a translation of its Semitic name. In this _Saonnesos-Melite_ the inhabitants down to the time of Diodorus still in _their sacrificial ceremonies_ used many words of a dialect peculiar to them and, according to tradition, the island got its name in connection with the story—always a Semitic note—of the Flood. The inhabitants set up all round the island boundary stones ‘of salvation.’ In the light of _Melite_, ‘Refuge,’ we begin to understand why Herakles was worshipped there under the special cultus title of _Alexikakos_, ‘Preserver-from-Evil[321].’ He is Alexikakos, not merely as the hero of the Labours but by divine right; _as a god_ even if an immigrant. Diodorus[322] records that while the Thebans and others did honour to Herakles as a hero ‘the Athenians were the first to offer sacrifices to him as a god’; their pious example influenced, he says, first the rest of Greece and afterwards the whole habitable world. Strabo[323] hits the mark when he says ‘as in other matters the Athenians were hospitable in what concerned the gods.’