Mythology

Maui is a demi god whose name should probably be pronounced Ma-u-i, i. e., Ma-oo-e. The meaning of the word is by no means clear. It may mean "to live," "to subsist." It may refer to beauty and strength, or it may have the idea of "the left hand" or "turning aside." The word is recognized as belonging to remote Polynesian antiquity.

The principal town of the Latin confederacy was Rome. It was situated on the river Tiber, at the distance of sixteen miles from its mouth. Romulus is commonly reported to have laid its foundations on Mount Palatine, A. M. 3251, B. C. 753, in the third year of the 6th Olympiad.

The first tale of Khamuas is remarkable from every point of view. It is one of the finest works of imagination that Egypt has bequeathed to us; it belongs to the best period of demotic writing, when the script was at once full and expressive yet free from corruptions and superfluities, and the existing copy contains very few mistakes.

The Dragons leading up to the steps of the temples and palaces of the Manchu emperors, and the superb dragon-screen guarding the approach to one of the royal palaces, are but two of the innumerable examples of the universal former belief in these mythical animals, and of the still prevailing beliefs among the common people of China.

WE may never know precisely when or where or how the legend of the unicorn began. It pervades recorded time and may be dimly visible even in the clouds that hover just above history's sunrise.

Naturally, there clusters about the sun a rich mine of folk-lore. The prominence of the orb of day, its importance in the maintenance and the development of life, the mystery that has ever enveloped it, its great influence in the well-being of mankind, have secured for the sun a history of interest equalled by none, to which every age and every race have contributed their pages.

THE prominent civilized nations--the Babylonians and Egyptians, the Hebrews and Hindus, the Persians, the Greeks and the Romans, as well as the Teutons and others--all began at an early stage to glorify their national heroes--mythical princes and kings, founders of religions, dynasties, empires, or cities--in a number of poetic tales and legends.