it was observed, more especially during the darkness of the night, that two brilliant glancing lights played evermore about the masts and yards, shooting hither and thither, and kindling up the crest of the surge by their luminous appearance. These were the Dioscuri, the tender and affectionate brothers of Helen, whose benevolence towards mankind in general was only to be equalled by their attachment to each other. When matters came to extremities and the waves appeared ready to engulf both crew and passengers, all on board became keenly sensible to the irregularities of their past lives, and the whispered interrogation passed round the bark: “have you been initiated?” Because those to whom the truths treasured up in the sanctuary of Eleusis had been revealed, were supposed to be better prepared than other men for meeting death, and appearing at the judgment-seat of heaven. It was now that vows and prayers were heard, and that feelings of repentance were sincere, and it would have required a more than ordinary degree of apathy to forget such circumstances when, by an unlooked-for interposition of Providence, they were snatched from the jaws of death, and restored to their kindred and their homes. We may remark here, by the way, that, to passengers labouring under the effects of sea-sickness, a decoction of a species of thyme[1712] (thymum tragoriganum) was administered. ----- Footnote 1708: Plat. Phædr. t. i. p. 34. Footnote 1709: Aristoph. Eq. 548. Footnote 1710: Suid. v. κελευστὴς. Stallb. ad Plat. Rep. i. 198. Footnote 1711: Schol. Aristoph. Vesp. 909. Footnote 1712: Dioscor. iii. 35. ----- In their political predilections,[1713] the mariners of Greece were almost invariably observed to be democratic, probably because being possessed of superior energy they naturally spurned all control save that of the laws, and were ready at all times and under all circumstances to contend for liberty. This was more especially the case with the Athenian seamen, who, in the flourishing periods of Hellenic history bore much the same relation to the other seafarers of Greece, as the sailors of England do to those of the neighbouring European states. ----- Footnote 1713: Plut. Themist. § 19. ----- Although the mariners’ compass had not yet been invented, the ancient sailors did not, as appears to be generally supposed, creep timidly from headland to headland along the shore, but traversed boldly the open sea, directing their course by the constellations, more particularly that of the greater bear. In this practice the Arabs of Phœnicia led the way as in most other early improvements connected with seamanship.