[2] An allusion to the sacrifice of Iphigenia.
[4] When we were ready to set out, our host muttered some words in the ears of our cattle. See a Voyage to the North of Europe in 1653.
[5] The Bramins expose their bodies to the intense heat of the sun.
[6] Ridens moriar. The conclusion of an old Runic ode.
[7] In the Bedas, or sacred writings of the Hindoos, it is written: “She, who dies with her husband, shall live for ever with him in heaven.”
[8] The Fates of the Northern Mythology. See MALLET’S Antiquities.
[10] See that fine description of the sudden animation of the Palladium in the second book of the Æneid.
[13] So numerous were the Deities of Egypt, that, according to an antient proverb, it was in that country less difficult to find a god than a man.
[15] The Catacombs, in which the bodies of the earliest generations yet remain without corruption, by virtue of the gums that embalmed them.
[16] “The Persians,” says Herodotus, “reject the use of temples, altars, and statues. The tops of the highest mountains are the places chosen for sacrifices.” I. 131. The elements, and more particularly Fire, were the objects of their religious reverence.
[17] An imitation of some wonderful lines in the sixth Æneid.
[19] This remarkable event happened at the siege and sack of Jerusalem, in the last year of the eleventh century. Hume, I.221.
VERSES WRITTEN TO BE SPOKEN BY MRS. SIDDONS.[1]