The Moly that Hermes to Ulysses gave, is the wild garlick, [Greek: molu] by some thought the wild rue. (_Odyss_. b. x. 1. 302.) It is the [Greek: moluza] of Hippocrates, who recommends it to be eaten as an antidote against drunkenness. But of _Haemony_ I have been unable to find any reference among our ordinary medical authorities, Paulus Aeginata, Celsus, Galen, or Dioscorides. A short note of reference would be very instructive to many of the readers of Milton.
_Ventriloquism_.--What evidence is there, that _ventriloquism_ was made use of in the ancient oracles? Was the [Greek: pneuma puthonos] (Acts, xvi. 16.) an example of the exercise of this art? Was the Witch of Endor a ventriloquist? or what is meant by the word [Greek: eggastrimuthos] at Isai. xix. 3., in the Septuagint?
"Plutarch informs us," says Rollin (_Ancient History_, vol. i. p. 65.), "that the god did not compose the verses of the oracle. He inflamed the Pythia's imagination, and kindled in her soul that living light which unveiled all futurity to her. The words she uttered in the heat of her enthusiam, having neither method nor connection, and coming only by starts, to use that expression [Greek: eggastrimuthos] from the bottom of her stomach, or rather from her belly, were collected { 89} with care by the prophets, who gave them afterwards to the poets to be turned into verse."
If the Pythian priestess was really a ventriloquist, to what extent was she conscious of the deception she practised?
_Statue of French King, Epigram on_.--Can any of your readers inform me who was the author of the following epigram, written on the occasion of an equestrian statue of a French king attended by the Virtues being erected in Paris:--
"O la belle statue! O le beau Piedestal! Les Vertus sont à pied, le Vice est à cheval!"
_Lux Fiat_.--Who was the first Christian or Jewish writer by whom _lux fiat_ was referred to the creation of the _angels_?
_Hiring of Servants_.--At Maureuil, in the environs of Abbeville, a practice has long existed of hiring servants in the market-place on festival days. I have observed the same custom in various parts of England, and particularly in the midland counties. Can any of your correspondents inform me of the origin of this?