HOURS

(Yunanca köken — orijinale bakınız.) In Mythology, divinities regarded in two points of view — as the godde es of the seasbns, and hours of the day; and their number is stated in different ways accordingly. Their duty was to hold the gates of heaven, which they opened to send forth the chariot of the sun in the morning, and receive it again in the evening. No cla ical poet has described them with greater beauty than Shelley, in a celebrated pa age of his Pro me the us Unbound. These godde es are often depicted as forming the train of Venus. (See Homer, Hymn. ad Ven. 145.; Hes., Erg. ver. 75., and Hymn, ad Apoll. ver. 194.; see also Gray's Ode on the Spring.) \IOURS, [s. 578]