GRACES _or_ CHARITES. Among the multitude of ancient divinities, none had more votaries that the Graces. Particular nations and countries had appropriate and local deities, but their empire was universal. To their influence was ascribed all that could please in nature and in art; and to them every rank and profession concurred in offering their vows. Their number was generally limited, by the ancient poets, to three: _Euphrosyne_, _Thalīa_, and _Aglaia_; but they differed concerning their origin. Some suppose them to have been the offspring of Jupiter and Eunomia, daughter of Oceănus; but the most prevalent opinion is, that they were descended from Bacchus and Venus. According to Homer, Aglaia, the youngest, was married to Vulcan, and another of them to the god of Sleep. The Graces were companions of _Mercury_, _Venus_, and the _Muses_. Festivals were celebrated in honor of them throughout the whole year. They were esteemed the dispensers of liberality, eloquence, and wisdom; and from them were derived simplicity of manners, a graceful deportment, and gaiety of disposition. From their inspiring acts of gratitude and mutual kindness they were described as uniting hand in hand with each other. The ancients partook of but few repasts without invoking them, as well as the Muses. SIRENS were a kind of fabulous beings represented by some as sea-monsters, with the faces of women and the tails of fishes, answering the description of mermaids; and by others said to have the upper parts of a woman, and the under parts of a bird. Their number is not determined; Homer reckons only two; others five, namely, Leucosia, Ligeia, Parthenŏpe, Aglaŏphon, and Molpe; others admit only the three first. The poets represent them as beautiful women inhabiting the rocks on the sea-shore, whither having allured passengers by the sweetness of their voices, they put them to death. Virgil places them on rocks where vessels are in danger of shipwreck; Pliny makes them inhabit the promontory of Minerva, near the island Capreæ; others fix them in Sicily, near cape Pelōrus. Claudian says they inhabited harmonious rocks, that they were charming monsters, and that sailors were wrecked on their coasts without regret, and even expired in rapture. This description is doubtless founded on a literal explication of the fable, that the Sirens were women who inhabited the shores of Sicily, and who, by the allurements of pleasure, stopped passengers, and made them forget their course.