Anise

“ Anise seems to have been grown in England as a potherb prior to 1542, for Boorde in his Dyetary of Helth, printed in that year, [1187] says of it and fennel,—“these herbes be seldom vsed, but theyr seedes be greatly occupyde.”
In common with all other foreign commodities, anise was enormously taxed during the reign of Charles I., the duties levied upon it amounting to 75s. per 112 lb. ”

“ Take of Cinnamon, Ginger, Galangal, Cloves, Nutmegs, Grains of Paradise, the Seeds of Anise, sweet Fennel, and Caraway, of each one Ounce; of the Leaves of Thyme, Mother of Thyme, Mint, Sage, Penniroyal, Rosemary, Flowers of red Roses, Camomile, Origanum, and Lavender, of each eight Handfuls; of clean Proof Spirit twelve Gallons, Water two Gallons; digest all twenty-four Hours, and then draw off ten Gallons, or till the Faints begin to rise. Dulcify with fine Sugar to your Palate. ”

“ The two Anios are less limpid, for they are drawn from a river, and are often muddy even in good weather, because the Anio, although flowing from a lake whose waters are very pure, is nevertheless made turbid by carrying away portions of its loose crumbling banks, before it enters the conduits—a pollution to which it is subject not only in the rainstorms of winter and spring, but also in the showers of summer, at which time of the year a more refreshing purity of the water is demanded. ”

“ Tumble-bug said, "Gentleman servant cutting bread-nut fo' gentleman horse." Say, "Hear any news?"--"Yes."--"What you hear?"--"Anansi kill Tumble-bug,--life for life!" Anansi start running an' Tumble-bug after him. He run out to a place call 'Dead man country', get among the dry trash, and that's where he live ever since.
[1. A soiled garment should never be left about lest it be used by the sorcerer to bewitch the owner. Burning such a garment produces a skin disease exactly like a burn, according to the common belief.] ”

“ They wind the hill, and thro' the blissful meadows go.
But old Anchises, in a flow'ry vale,
Review'd his muster'd race, and took the tale:
Those happy spirits, which, ordain'd by fate,
For future beings and new bodies wait-
With studious thought observ'd th' illustrious throng,
In nature's order as they pass'd along:
Their names, their fates, their conduct, and their care,
In peaceful senates and successful war.
He, when Aeneas on the plain appears,
Meets him with open arms, and falling tears.
"Welcome," he said, "the gods' undoubted race! ”

“ I know of no marsh capable of provoking in human pulses a fever more violent that that which at times steals up to us from the shadows of a silent canal. Nor do those men who, at noontide in the midsummer heat, lie among the ripe grain, feel in their veins a more fiery wave of blood than that which suffuses our eyes when we lean too intently over these waters, to see whether, perchance, we may descry in their depths some old sword or ancient diadem. ”

“ Yes, all was Ashes; life, death, the human kind; destiny itself which had produced them.
And yet in that supreme hour, shadowed by that figure of aged Fate, which seemed Death in waiting,—in the presence of the remains of that most wretched of all the daughters of men, who, after doing and suffering wrong in all its manifestations, had died for another's good,—Anania felt that among the ashes lurks the spark, the seed of the luminous and purifying flame; and Hope returned to him, and he felt that he loved life still. ”

“ Thirdly, there is a phial labelled Aqua Theriacalis Stillatitia—in plain English, distilled treacle-water. A spoonful of this couldn't hurt me. Fourthly, a packet of powders, entitled Manus Christi—an excellent mixture. Fifthly, a small pot of diatesseron, composed of gentian, myrrh, bayberries, and round aristolochia. I must just taste it. Never mind the doctor! He does not know what agrees with my constitution as well as I do myself. Physic comes as naturally to me as mother's milk. Sixthly, there is Aqua Epidemica, commonly called the Plague-Water of Matthias—delicious stuff! ”

“ DRYDEN, AEneid, BOOK VI.
Anchises told his son much about the dwellers in Elysium. On the banks of the river Lethe—the river of forgetfulness—was a countless multitude of spirits which, he said, were yet to live in earthly bodies. They were the souls of unborn generations of men. Amongst them, he pointed out to AEneas, the spirits of many of those who were to be his own descendants in the kingdom he was to establish in Italy. ”

“ His glitt'ring helm, which terribly was grac'd
With waving horsehair, nodding from afar;
Then spurr'd his thund'ring steed amidst the war.
Love, anguish, wrath, and grief, to madness wrought,
Despair, and secret shame, and conscious thought
Of inborn worth, his lab'ring soul oppress'd,
Roll'd in his eyes, and rag'd within his breast.
Then loud he call'd Aeneas thrice by name:
The loud repeated voice to glad Aeneas came.
"Great Jove," he said, "and the far-shooting god,
Inspire thy mind to make thy challenge good!" ”

“ Anania climbed on the heap of shining shale which marked the summit, and flung himself on the ground to escape the fury of the blasts which blew from all sides. The whole island was stretched out before him, with its blue mountains and its silver sea, glittering under the midday sun. Overhead the heaven was immense, infinite, void as human thought. The wind raged furiously in the great emptiness. Its assaults invested Anania in mad fury, in the violent anger of a formidable wild beast, which would permit the approach of no other being to the aereal cave where it was resolved to reign alone. ”

“ A living ocean of molten fire glowed in the abyss beneath her, and blending with the shrieks of the damned, and the triumphant shouts of the fiends, rendered horror more horrible than imagination. Ten millions of souls were writhing in the fiery flames, and as the boiling billows dashed them against the blackened rocks of adamant, they cursed with the blasphemies of despair; and each curse echoed in thunder cross the wave. The stranger rushed towards his victim. ”

“ This day was even more prosperous than usual for Pale Annie, for the grey weather and the chilly air made men glad of the warmth, both external and internal, which Pale Annie possessed in his barroom. ”

“ Thou also, Caieta, nurse of Aeneas, gavest our shores an everlasting renown in death; and still thine honour haunts thy resting-place, and a name in broad Hesperia, if that be glory, marks thy dust. But when the last rites are duly paid, and the mound smoothed over the grave, good Aeneas, now the high seas are hushed, bears on under sail and leaves his haven. Breezes blow into the night, and the white moonshine speeds them on ”

“ Perhaps thereafter in the streets of Troy Anchises made people think suddenly of early dawns on the mountain-side when the silver car of the moon hangs low over the sea and the nightingale sings and the bleating flocks answer the pipe’s ethereal cry. In Athens a transient shepherd, with his crook and his coat of fleece, may fling the townsman’s thoughts abroad to the men he has seen among the hills of Arcadia, where as of old a misty night is hateful to shepherds and goatherds, and a bright moon their heart’s delight ”

“ Lost in thought, the noise and the purple passage of the royal equipage—a sort [Pg 214] of brilliant, gleaming comet, which for an instant had lit up the darkness of the cloud-ensombred twilight—had escaped her. She seemed to be unable to tear herself away from the sight of the austere Aniene, with its gelid waters. He saw her bend over several times, as if she were trying to mirror herself in the river, or to discern the bottom of it. Her fingers hereupon plucked a rose to pieces, and threw the white leaves into the hurrying flood, which carried them away ”

“ Anansi is the culture hero of the Gold Coast,—a kind of god—, just as Turtle is of the Slave coast and Hare (our own Brer Rabbit) of the Bantu people "Anansi stories" regularly form the entertainment during wake-nights, and it is difficult not to believe that the vividness with which these animal actors take part in the story springs from the idea that they really represent the dead in the underworld whose spirits have the power, according to the native belief, of taking animal form. ”

“ Then said Aeneas:
‘Talk not thus, but mount in my chariot and take the reins and whip, and I myself will stand upon the car and fight with Diomedes.’
‘Nay,’ said Pandarus, ‘take thou thyself the reins. Should thy horses be driven by one they know not, and hear a strange voice from him who drives them, mad might they go with fear. So drive thine own horses, Aeneas, and with my spear will I go against Diomedes.’
In the chariot then mounted Aeneas and Pandarus, and swiftly galloped the horses against Diomedes. ”

“ He talked of the pestilence by day, and dreamed of it at night; and more than once alarmed the house by roaring for assistance, under the idea that he was suddenly attacked. By his mother's advice, he steeped rue, wormwood, and sage in his drink, till it was so abominably nauseous that he could scarcely swallow it, and carried a small ball in the hollow of his hand, compounded of wax, angelica, camphor, and other drugs. ”

“ The tempest sinks one, and scatters the rest. Neptune drives off the winds, and calms the sea. Aeneas, with his own ship and six more, arrives safe at an African port. Venus complains to Jupiter of her son’s misfortunes. Jupiter comforts her, and sends Mercury to procure him a kind reception among the Carthaginians. Aeneas, going out to discover the country, meets his mother in the shape of a huntress, who conveys him in a cloud to Carthage, where he sees his friends whom he thought lost, and receives a kind entertainment from the queen. ”

“ The putridity of the atmosphere may be occasioned either by a multitude of dead bodies which have not been burnt, as is apt to happen in wars, or it may arise from the exhalations of certain marshes or lakes in the summer season, or sometimes the inordinate heat of the atmosphere may give rise to them, as happened in the case of the Athenian plague, according to the testimony of Thucydides. ”

“ At the mouth of the gloomy cavern by the side of Lake Avernus, which was the opening to the road that led to Hades—the kingdom of the dead—they offered sacrifices to the gods. Then they plunged into the cave, the Sibyl going first, and AEneas following with sword drawn, as his guide had directed. ”

“ Deh was an Ol' Witch call Brar Dead, never talk to nobody; if him talk to anybody, him be dead. But him only making some bow all day an' set it to catch all wil' animal, an' when he catch dem, he put dem over fire an' dry dem, but him no eat dem. So Mr. Anansi go deh one day an' say, "Brar Dead, gi' me some of you meat now." But he never 'peak to Mr. Anansi, for him can't talk to nobody. So Anansi goin' in an' tak a whole bagful of de dry meat an start to eat it. ”

“ Aunis, one of the ancient provinces of France, glows languidly beneath the caresses of a humid sun, enveloped in a thin veil of ocean mists, and at times she seems to float in the midst of her waves and her sands, beneath a sky bounded by remote and indeterminate horizons, vague and immense, like some vast wreckage overgrown with gardens and oases. ”

“ Anansi couldn't get anyt'ing to eat, so he take up his hand-basket an' a big pot an' went down to the sea-side to catch fish. When he reach there, he make up a large fire and put the pot on the fire, an' say, "Come, big fish!" He catch some big fish put them aside. He said, "Big fish go, make little fish come!" He then catch the little fish. He say, "Little fish go, make big fish come!" an' say, "Big fish go, make little fish come!" ”

“ One night, as Solomon Eagle, who had likewise been miraculously preserved, pursued his course through the streets, he paused before Mr. Roundel's house, and looking up at the window, at which the latter had chanced to be stationed, cried in a loud voice, "Be of good cheer. You have served God faithfully, and there shall no evil befall you, neither shall the plague come nigh your dwelling." ”

“ There were some sharp stones lying at the bottom of the brook, and when Annie was about half-way over, she trod upon one of them, and hurt her foot. Poor Annie stood still, and began to cry, for she was afraid to go on, and afraid to turn back, and the sharp stone had hurt her foot very much. ”

“ The King had a fine cock, which always crowed at daybreak to waken the King if he wished to get up early. Anansi begged that the King would command the cock to crow next morning, that Anansi might be sure of getting off in time. This the King readily promised.
As soon as night fell Anansi went by a back way to the cock’s sleeping-place, seized the bird quickly, and killed it. He then carried it to Lizard’s house, where all were in bed. There he quietly cooked [48] the cock, placed the feathers under Lizard’s bed, and put some of the flesh on a dish close to Lizard’s hand. ”

“ The Sense whereof is this in English; that when the Empire of the Priamidae should be destroy'd, the Line of Anchises should succeed. Venus therefore, says the Historian, was desirous to have a Son by Anchises, tho' he was then in his decrepid Age: Accordingly she had Aeneas. ”

“ As Boissier has pointed out,890 the death of Anchises is postponed in the story as long as possible, and it is only after his death that Aeneas is exposed to a really dangerous temptation; it is immediately after this event that, as we saw, he loses heart at the first storm, and then, on landing in Africa, falls a victim for the moment to the queenly charms of Dido. ”