Page:Greek and Roman Mythology.djvu/50

 36 GREEK AND ROMAN MYTHOLOGY worshiped in race courses and wrestling-schools. In harmony with the idea that he was god of the wind, he was equipped with wings, which he is usually rep- resented as wearing on his shoes or feet, and on his traveling-hat (Petasos) or head, but not, at least in the classical period, on his shoulders. Because the wind whistles, Hermes is said to have invented the flute and syrinx, and also, by an easy process of reasoning, the lyre. And because the wind, without any apparent reason, arbitrarily changes, Hermes is the god of chang- ing, unstable, fortune and chance, so that his herald's staff assumes the significance of a magic wand, which similarly among the ancient Germans was an attribute of the wind god Wodan. But as the traveler is dependent on the favor of wind and weather, and in a foreign land can always get his bearings by noticing the direction of the prevailing wind, so Hermes is the protector and guide of the wanderer. Sacred to him were the heaps of stones or the stone columns that served as way- marks, which were often adorned with a head of Hermes and called Hermae. 47. The wind gods are robbers ; and so Hermes too was looked upon as the one who drives away herds of cattle (clouds), and hence as god of thieves and deceivers. Boreas kidnaps a beautiful maiden; Hermes plays the impetuous lover with the nymphs. It was also in con- nection with this idea that he was regarded as the pro- moter of all sorts of rural fertility in animals and plants. Yet the fact that this attribute of his is brought forward prominently would appear striking, if he were not also, as the son of the rain goddess Maia, properly to be regarded as the rain bringer, dispensing fertility. In ancient