Notwithstanding the fact that in the Mahabharata, Rudra, like Hercules, is described as the “destroyer of serpents,” he is in the same poem identified with Mahadeva, and hence he is evidently the same as Siva, who has the title of King of Serpents. The primitive character of Siva, as the Vedic Rudra, is now almost lost, but the identity of the two deities may be supported by reference to an incident related in the myth of Hermes and Apollo. It is said that, in return for the sweet-sounding lyre, Apollo gave to Hermes the magical “three-leafed rod of wealth and happiness.” Sometimes this rod was entwined with serpents instead of fillets, and there is no difficulty in recognising in it the well-known emblem of Siva, which also is sometimes encircled by serpents. It can be shown that the Hindu deity is a form of Saturn, one of the Semitic names for whom was Set or Seth. It was the serpent-symbol of this God[216] which was said to have been elevated in the wilderness for the healing of the people bitten by serpents, and curiously enough Rudra (Siva) was called not only the _bountiful_, the _strong_, but the _healer_. The later Egyptian title of the god Set was Typhon, of whom Mr. Breal says that “Typhon is the monster who obscures the heaven, a sort of Greek Văritra.” The myth of Indra and Vritra is reproduced in Latin mythology as that of Hercules and Căcus. Căcus also is analogous to Typhon, and as the former is supposed to have taken his name from, or given it to, a certain wind which had the power of clothing itself with clouds, so the latter bore the same name as a very destructive wind which was much dreaded by the Phœnicians and Egyptians. Moreover, the name Typhon was given by the Egyptians to anything tempestuous, and hence to the ocean; and in Hebrew the allied word “Suph” denotes a “whirlwind.” There is another point of contact, however, between Siva and the god Set or Typhon, who was known to the Egyptians also as the serpent Aphôphis, or the giant. An ancient writer states that one of the names of El, or Chronos, was Typhon, and the serpent and pillar symbols of the Phœnician deity confirm the identification between Set or Saturn, and the Siva of the Hindu Pantheon.