Chinese history, or fable, begins 2205 b. c.

Orion was a giant hunter, noted for his beauty.

Puck and Robin Goodfellow. are identical myths.

The Ogri were giants said to feed on human flesh.

Euphrasia was the name of '"the Grecian Daughter."

Olympus, in Greece, was on the confines of Macedonia.

In Vulcan's mirror were seen the past, present and future.

The toadstool is called in Ireland the "fairy's mushroom."

A task that makes no progress is likened to Penelope's web.

At the age of one year Jupiter was making war on the Titans.

All known languages have a story of "Jack the Giant-Killer."

Loki was the god of strife and evil in Scandinavian mythology.

Jupiter chose the eagle as the best preservative against lightning.

The original Tom Thumb was a dwarf knighted by King Arthur.

The obi superstitions of the negro are still prevalent in the South.

The leprechaun was an Irish goblin who could direct you to hidden gold.

Apotheosis was the deification, or raising of a mortal to the rank of a god.

The pagan priests of Egypt were the first to reduce mythology to a system.

As late as 1805 a woman was tried for witchcraft at Kircudbright, Scotland.

The oak is sacred to Jupiter because he first taught mankind to live upon acorns.

Where fable ends and real history begins is an obscure line in the annals of all nations.

The chief astronomers, from Ptolemy down to Kepler, were all believers in astrology.

According to Homer Mesopotamia had a breed of asses which never fled from an enemy.

"Born in the foam of the sea," is the signification of Aphrodite, the Greek name for Venus.

The goat was the animal usually sacrificed to Bacchus, on account of its propensity to destroy the vine.

It is Memnon's statue, at Thebes, which is said to make musical sounds when struck by the morning sun.

The ordinary events of nature transformed into allegory would explain very many of the legends of the ancients.

The gypsies are said to be wanderers because they refused shelter to the Virgin and Christ Child on the flight into Egypt.

The peculiar term "Black Art," is applied to the jugglery of conjurers and wizards who profess to have dealings with the devil.

The wave-crests in Killarney Lake, Ireland, are called by the fishermen, the "white horses of O'Donoughue," from a chieftain of that ilk who perished in its waters.

The proper name of Confucius was "Kong," but his followers added "fu-tse," meaning master or teacher. His books are regarded by the Chinese as the fountain of all wisdom.

Davy Jones is a sailor's familiar name for a malignant sea-spirit or the devil generally. The common phrase "Davy Jones' locker" is applied to the ocean as the grave of men drowned at sea.

In all ancient mythologies the sneeze is significant. If a Hindoo, while performing his morning ablutions in the Ganges, should sneeze before finishing his prayers, he immediately begins them over again.

It was at one time a common belief that infants were sometimes taken from their cradles by fairies, who left instead their own weakly and starveling elves. The children so left were called "changelings."

In the northern mythology the Walkyri are either nine or three times nine divine maidens who cleave their way through air and water to lead to Odin those who have fallen in battle and who are worthy of Walhalla.

Dagon, the national god of the Philistines, half-man, half-fish, is mentioned in the Old Testament as having temples at Gaza and Ashdod, Several names of places prove that the worship of Dagon existed also in other parts of Palestine.

The supposed spirits which pervade the stars, each star having its own spirit (or soul), are termed astral spirits. Paracelsus taught that every human being had an astral spirit; hence the influence of a person's particular star on his life.

According to the ancient German superstition, the werewolf was a man-wolf, who had the form of a man by day and that of a wolf by night. Lycanthropy, or wolf-madness, was prevalent in Europe, and especially in Germany, in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries.

The name of the favorite charger of Alexander the Great was Bucephalus, and this was probably also the name of a peculiar breed of horses in Thessaly. The young hero was the first to break in the steed, and thus fulfilled the condition stated by an oracle as necessary for gaining the crown of Macedon.

Cynosure is the Greek name for the constellation of the Little Bear, which contains the pole star, by which the Phoenician mariners steered their course. The name is metaphorically applied to anything that attracts attention, or to which all eyes are turned.

The Scottish brownie has a rival in Spain who is called the Ancho, and who haunts the shepherds' huts, warms himself at their fires, tastes their clotted milk and cheese, converses with the family, and is treated with familiarity mixed with terror. The Ancho hates church bells.

Sibylline books in Roman history contained the prophecies of the Cumaean Sibyl, bought by Tarquin the Proud, and preserved in the temple of Jupiter Capitolinus, with which they were burnt, 83 B. c. They were consulted by order of the senate, in cases of prodigies and calamities.

An amulet was any object worn as a charm. It is often a stone, or a piece of metal, with an inscription or some figures engraved on it, and is generally suspended from the neck, and worn as a preservative against sickness or witchcraft. Its origin, like its name, seems to be oriental.

The cockatrice is a fabulous monster, often confounded with the basilisk and regarded as possessing similar deadly powers. To the charms of the basilisk it added a dragon's tail, armed with a sting; and it shared also its power of destroying by a glance, so often referred to in Shakespeare and other early writers.