"Libation" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... of it, Whence, all the tumult of the building hushed, Thou first of men mightst look out to the East. 35 The vulgar saw thy tower, thou sawest the sun. For this, I promise on thy festival To pour libation, looking o'er the sea, Making this slave narrate thy fortunes, speak Thy great words, and describe thy royal face— 40 Wishing thee wholly where Zeus lives the most, Within the eventual ...
— Selections from the Poems and Plays of Robert Browning • Robert Browning
... virtue of giving a "fillip" to the lagging appetite, and attuning it to the healthiest possible breakfast pitch. Nicholas, although not addicted to early potations, was prevailed upon to join the party. During, the friendly conversation which accompanied this faithless libation to the Goddess of Health, Greaves observed that while he did not feel himself at liberty to speak freely in the mixed company of the preceding evening, notwithstanding what might have been termed his unfriendly insinuations ...
— Ridgeway - An Historical Romance of the Fenian Invasion of Canada • Scian Dubh
... and woes of the world made His path through it like that of bare feet on sharp flints. If He had never died it would still have been true that 'He was wounded for our transgressions and bruised for our iniquities.' On the Cross He completed the libation which had continued throughout His life and 'poured out His soul unto death' as He had been pouring it out all through His life. We have no measure by which we can estimate the inevitable sufferings in such a world ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... With savage war demands your happy land. Beneath the dark immeasurable host, Descending, swarming, how the crags are lost! Already now their ravening eyes behold Your star-bright temples and your gates of gold; And to their gods in fancied goblets pour The warm libation of your children's gore. Move then to vengeance, meet the sons of blood, Led by this arm and lighted by that God; The strife is fierce, your fanes and fields the prize, The warrior conquers ...
— The Columbiad • Joel Barlow
... as each portion of each life must conform to this type; otherwise public security is compromised: any falling off in gymnastic education weakens the army; passing the images of the gods and neglecting the usual libation draws down celestial vengeance on the city. Consequently, to prevent all deviations, the State, absolute master, exercises unlimited jurisdiction; no freedom whatever is left to the individual, no portion of himself is reserved to himself, no sheltered corner against the ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 4 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 3 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... the heads of all pointing the same way; and the monarch, attended by several of his principal officers, as the Vizier, the Chief Eunuch, the fan-bearers, the bow and mace bearers, and also by a number of musicians, came to the place, and solemnly poured a libation over the prostrate forms, first how-ever (as it would seem) raising the cup to his own lips. It is probable that this ceremony had to some extent a religious character. The Assyrian monarchs commonly ascribe the success ...
— The Seven Great Monarchies Of The Ancient Eastern World, Vol 2. (of 7): Assyria • George Rawlinson
... arose to her feet the priest tendered her some mhowa spirit in a cocoanut shell, but the girl, disdaining its stimulation, poured it in a libation upon the Linga. ...
— Caste • W. A. Fraser
... poison by which the great philosopher of Athens had been put to death. But his limbs were already cold, and the draught proved fruitless. He then entered a bath of hot water, sprinkling the slaves who stood nearest to him, with the words that he was pouring a libation to Jupiter the Liberator.[36] Even the warm water failed to make the blood flow more speedily, and he was finally carried into one of those vapour baths which the Romans called sudatoria, and stifled with its steam. His body was burned privately, ...
— Seekers after God • Frederic William Farrar
... he, "I'm goin' to pull out for home to day, an' I don't want to go without a farewell libation to the good ...
— Happy Hawkins • Robert Alexander Wason
... come and speak. Messages from the spirit world he will get, but he must pass through the Ocean stream, to the groves of Proserpine. From that point, after mooring his ship, he is to go to the houses of Hades, where is a rock at the meeting of two loud-roaring rivers; "pour there a libation to the dead" with due ceremony. In all of which is the method of the later necromancy, or consultation of the departed for prophetic purposes. Very old is the faith that the souls of deceased persons can be made to appear and to foretell the ...
— Homer's Odyssey - A Commentary • Denton J. Snider
... added some infernal drug to the refreshment? I wonder; for there is something besides guanabana in the libation! ...
— The Pearl of the Antilles, or An Artist in Cuba • Walter Goodman
... me the bowl, and the she-goat, that I may milk her and poor forth a libation to the Muses. Farewell, oh, farewells manifold, ye Muses, and I, some future day, will sing you yet a ...
— Theocritus, Bion and Moschus rendered into English Prose • Andrew Lang
... world are cut out, and the match-makers repair to the grave of the lad, there to set out wine and fruit for the consummation of the marriage. Two seats are placed side by side, and a small streamer is set up near each seat. If these streamers move a little after the libation has been performed, the souls are believed to approach each other; but if one of them does not move, the party represented thereby is considered to disapprove of the marriage. Each family has to reward its match-maker with a present of woven stuffs. Such go-betweens ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo Volume 1 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa
... fresh myrtle my blade I'll entwine, Like Harmodius, the gallant and good, When he made at the tutelar shrine A libation of Tyranny's blood. ...
— Edgar Allan Poe's Complete Poetical Works • Edgar Allan Poe
... one of these streams, fills the hollow of his hand with water, and tastes it, as a libation, and as a toast to the generous land which has just received him; the water is excellent; he plucks a flower, and continues ...
— The Solitary of Juan Fernandez, or The Real Robinson Crusoe • Joseph Xavier Saintine
... bird-headed, animal-headed, and the like. Their reign, it is true, may be over in the Valley of the Nile, but in me they still have a fervent adorer. Were I inclined to worship them with due antique ceremonial, there are two libation tables in one of the attics ready to my hand, carved with semblances of sacrificial meats and drinks; or here, in a tin box behind the "Retrospective Review," are specimens of actual food offerings deposited three thousand years ago in various tombs at Thebes—shrivelled ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 21, August, 1891 • Various
... last of the Agnikula or fire-born clans, According to the legend: "Again Vasishtha seated on the lotus prepared incantations; again he called the gods to aid; and as he poured forth the libation a figure arose, lofty in stature, of elevated front, hair like jet, eyes rolling, breast expanded, fierce, terrific, clad in armour with quiver filled, a bow in one hand and a brand in the other, ...
— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India - Volume IV of IV - Kumhar-Yemkala • R.V. Russell
... very weary. Thinking of you, I wished to arrange with you a merry feast after the ancient method, when the Greeks and Romans said their Pater noster to Master Priapus, and the learned god called in all countries Bacchus. The feast will be proper and a right hearty one, since at our libation there will be present some pretty crows with three beaks, of which I know from great experience the ...
— Droll Stories, Volume 2 • Honore de Balzac
... our better fortunes, then!" said the old soldier, filling a glass for Tappingham; and, "Here's to our better fortunes!" echoed the young men, pouring off the gentle liquor heartily. Having thus made libation to their particular god, the trio separated. But Jefferson did not encounter the alacrity of acceptance he expected from Crailey, when he found him, half an hour later, at the hotel bar. Indeed, at first, Mr. Gray not only refused outright to go, but seriously ...
— The Two Vanrevels • Booth Tarkington
... believed, as full of joy for the tidings that he brought, and eager to welcome him and crown him with garlands for his good news, which he indeed accepted of, but hung them upon his herald's staff; and thus returning to the seaside before Theseus had finished his libation to the gods, he stayed apart for fear of disturbing the holy rites, but, as soon as the libation was ended, went up and related the king's death, upon the hearing of which, with great lamentations and a confused tumult of grief, they ran with all haste to the city. And from hence, ...
— The Boys' and Girls' Plutarch - Being Parts of The "Lives" of Plutarch • Plutarch
... of stars! Light, the revealer of dread beauty's face! Weaving whereof the hills are lambent clad! Mighty libation to the Unknown God! Cup whereat pine-trees slake their giant thirst And little leaves drink sweet delirium! Being and breath and potion! Living soul And all-informing heart of all that lives! How can we magnify thine ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 3 (of 4) • Various
... of the event. All that piety can do for them is beside the mark. Their wilful spirit is fled before the last stone of the mausoleum can be got in place, and as it flies it jogs the elbow of the cup-bearer and his libation is spilt idly upon the ground. Although it would be too much and too ungrateful to say that the monumental piety of Mr Festing Jones has been similarly turned to derision—after all, Butler was not a great man—we feel that something analogous has happened. This laborious ...
— Aspects of Literature • J. Middleton Murry
... the order of the day. Some hearts were wild with enthusiasm, others dark with despair. Already the tide of brothers' blood had crimsoned the sod of more than one State. Blood, blood, was flowing-crimson blood, that might have been a libation ...
— Leah Mordecai • Mrs. Belle Kendrick Abbott
... heat of the battle, when it was customary to vow temples to the immortal gods, he vowed to Jupiter the victorious, that if he should defeat the legions of the enemy, he would, before he tasted of any generous liquor, make a libation to him of a cup of wine and honey. This kind of vow proved acceptable to the gods, and they conducted the auspices to a ...
— The History of Rome; Books Nine to Twenty-Six • Titus Livius
... in all. But I would not seek him out, nor compel him to come to me, since he would not of his own accord. So he went his way, I mine, and I have seen him no more. Yet ever on my birthday I drain a cup to him, and none knows to whom the King drinks a full glass silently. It is my libation on a friendship's grave. Perhaps it would support an interpretation more subtle. For when I stood between Owen and Hammerfeldt, torn this way and that, uncertain whom I should follow through life, was not I the humble transitory theatre of a great ...
— The King's Mirror • Anthony Hope
... and above all the rose, said to convey a delicious coolness to the temples on which it bloomed. And now for the first time wine came to heighten the spirits and test the charm of the garlands. Each, as the large goblet passed to him, poured from the brim, before it touched his lips, his libation to the good spirit. And as Antagoras, rising first, set this pious example, out from the further ends of the hall, behind the fountains, burst a concert of flutes, and the great ...
— Pausanias, the Spartan - The Haunted and the Haunters, An Unfinished Historical Romance • Lord Lytton
... gong, the Captain took up the cups one by one, in order that, like the Greeks of old, he might "perform the rites and pour the ruddy wine," which he did by throwing their contents over the bow of the vessel into the river. The libation performed, a quantity of crackers and squibs and gilt tin foil were burnt, with uplifted hands, whilst the deep-sounding gong was incessantly struck with increasing violence as the vessels were swept along with the current. The victim and the other ...
— Travels in China, Containing Descriptions, Observations, and Comparisons, Made and Collected in the Course of a Short Residence at the Imperial Palace of Yuen-Min-Yuen, and on a Subsequent Journey thr • John Barrow
... revelation from God, Jacob set up a pillar of stone, and he poured out a drink offering thereon, as in a later day the priests were to offer libations in the Temple on the Feast of Tabernacles,[305] and the libation brought by Jacob at Beth-el was as much as all the waters in ...
— The Legends of the Jews Volume 1 • Louis Ginzberg
... musical merit which his artist soul craved was his ambition. He knew pleasure as he approximated to that goal, and vexation almost to despair when he fell far short. He knew it was not before God but at another shrine he poured out his soul's libation. ...
— The First Soprano • Mary Hitchcock
... rarely took any other potation when quite alone with his family; but at the Sunday board he circulated the champagne briskly during dinner, and considered a pint of claret each man's fair share afterwards. I should not omit, however, that his Bordeaux was uniformly preceded by a small libation of the genuine mountain dew, which he poured with his own hand, more majorum, for each guest—making use for the purpose of such a multifarious collection of ancient Highland quaighs (little cups of curiously dovetailed wood, inlaid with ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott, Volume V (of 10) • John Gibson Lockhart
... his stove in the morning, he makes two cups of coffee of the best and nicely sugared, and pours them out all over the stove, saying, 'God bless or favour Sheykh Shadhilee and his descendants.' The blessing on the saint who invented coffee of course I knew, and often utter, but the libation is new to me. You see the ancient religion crops up even through the severe faith of Islam. If I could describe all the details of an Arab, and still more of a Coptic, wedding, you would think I was relating ...
— Letters from Egypt • Lucie Duff Gordon
... least slay me with my daughter, and there will be twice the libation of blood for the earth, and the dead ...
— The Tragedies of Euripides, Volume I. • Euripides
... old Chu, and soon returned with the august effigy (which wore "a green face, a red beard, and a hideous expression") in his arms. The other men were frightened, and begged Chu to restore his worship to his place on the infernal bench. Before carrying back the worthy magistrate, Chu poured a libation on the ground and said, "Whenever your excellency feels so disposed, I shall be glad to take a cup of wine with you in a friendly way." That very night, as Chu was taking a stirrup cup before going to bed, the ...
— Books and Bookmen • Andrew Lang
... replied. "It would be a sin and a shame to have it otherwise. No house ought to be fitted up for a future home without a strong and a leading reference to beauty in all its arrangements. If I were a Greek, I should say that the first household libation should be made to beauty; but, being an old-fashioned Christian, I would say that he who prepares a home with no eye to beauty neglects the example of the great Father who has filled our earth home with ...
— Household Papers and Stories • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... resting-place, and it returned. I sent forth a raven, and it left, The raven went, the rushing of the waters it saw, It ate, it waded, it croaked, it did not return. I sent forth (the animals) to the four winds, I poured out a libation, I made an offering on the peak of the mountain, Seven and seven I set incense-vases there, In their depths I poured cane, cedar, and rosewood (?). The gods smelled a savour; The gods smelled a sweet savour. ...
— The Astronomy of the Bible - An Elementary Commentary on the Astronomical References - of Holy Scripture • E. Walter Maunder
... proportion of Malvoisie and Champagne, were spread upon the grass, which was literally flowery turf, being covered with violets, iris, and anemones of every dye. Instead of changing our plates, we washed them in a beautiful fountain which murmured near us, having first, by a libation, propitiated the presiding nymph for this pollution of her limpid waters. For my own peculiar taste there were too many servants (who on these occasions are always de trop), too many luxuries, too much fuss; but considering ...
— The Diary of an Ennuyee • Anna Brownell Jameson
... young fellow eagerly, "we ought to have ALL been there! We ought to have made a solemn rite of it, you know,—a kind of sacrifice. We ought to have poured a kind of libation on ...
— The Three Partners • Bret Harte
... uncertain gait, the oars making all this resemblance. Indeed, it was so diminutive, that it often kept up the two boys that belonged to it from the fresh as well as the salt water, they clapping it over their heads, by way of an umbrella, whenever the clouds poured down a libation too liberal. To those curious in philology I convey the information, that in the word dinghy, the g was pronounced hard. This explanation is also necessary to do justice to the pigmy floater, as it was always painted in the gayest colours possible. It was quite a pet of the first-lieutenant's. ...
— Rattlin the Reefer • Edward Howard
... the slops of what he called his "crowning dish of tea" into the sugar-dish instead of the slop-basin, and concluded with spilling the scalding liquor upon old Plato, the Colonel's favourite spaniel, who received the libation with a howl that did little honour ...
— Guy Mannering • Sir Walter Scott
... matters had reached a sad and significant crisis, that the peculiar institutions left as a legacy by their forefathers were threatened by the Northern fanatics, and that in the near future the blood of patriots might be poured forth as a libation upon the soil they loved; to eloquent denunciations of the hirelings and would-be violators of our rights under the constitution. To all these they listened, evidently devoting all their slow energies to the comprehension of it, but they were less moved than might have been expected ...
— In Connection with the De Willoughby Claim • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... that the New China, as we know it in the more forward spheres of activity, will only take her proper place in the family of nations after fresh upheavals. Rivers of blood may yet have to flow as a sickening libation to the gods who have guided the nation for forty centuries before she will be able to attain her ambition of standing line to line with the other powers of the eastern and western worlds. But it ...
— Across China on Foot • Edwin Dingle
... his nose—"Oh! Oh! The filthy fellow! Kondo[u] Uji! Deign to wash your hands. Indeed hot water is always carried on one's person. But...." All grasped their nasal members and protested. Noborinosuke laughed outright, and submitted to the ablution. Abe in malice gave the hands a copious libation. For the nonce his fingers had been saved and Kondo[u] was ...
— Bakemono Yashiki (The Haunted House) - Tales of the Tokugawa, Volume 2 (of 2) • James S. De Benneville
... who here make prayers for thee, sit together near the libation, like flies round the honey. The worshippers, anxious for wealth, have placed their desire upon Indra, as we put our ...
— Ten Great Religions - An Essay in Comparative Theology • James Freeman Clarke
... figure almost filled the capacious sanctuary, which was enriched with gold and gems, and adorned by the skill of the Grecian artists. The deity was represented in a bending attitude, with a golden cup in his hand, pouring out a libation on the earth; as if he supplicated the venerable mother to give to his arms the cold and beauteous Daphne: for the spot was ennobled by fiction; and the fancy of the Syrian poets had transported the amorous tale from the banks of the Peneus to those of the Orontes. The ancient ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon
... solemn nothings that fill our everyday life blossom suddenly into bright possibilities. In a word, while such friends are near us we feel that all is well. Perhaps we never saw them before, and they may never cross our life's path again; but the influence of their calm, mellow natures is a libation poured upon our discontent, and we feel its healing touch, as the ocean feels the mountain ...
— Story of My Life • Helen Keller
... hungry community, and expectation was on tiptoe all the morning. On tiptoe it was destined to remain, however, until afternoon; when Squeers, having refreshed himself with his dinner, and further strengthened himself by an extra libation or so, made his appearance (accompanied by his amiable partner) with a countenance of portentous import, and a fearful instrument of flagellation, strong, supple, wax-ended, and new,—in short, purchased that morning, ...
— The Life And Adventures Of Nicholas Nickleby • Charles Dickens
... song and wanton dance; it presides over our convivial banquets with brow crowned with ivy and faded roses; whilst all the unholy delights of earth sacrifice to it, in return it scatters amongst its adorers all the ills and sorrows that flow from the curse of Eden, making a libation to the infernal gods of the honor, the fortune, and the lives of men. The ghoul or fiend of modern society ...
— Alvira: the Heroine of Vesuvius • A. J. O'Reilly
... heroes weep, it is from excess of strength, and not from weakness, a sacrifice or libation of fertile natures, like the perspiration of stone in summer's heat. We hardly know that tears have been shed, and it seems as if weeping were proper only for babes and heroes. Their joy and their sorrow ...
— A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers • Henry David Thoreau
... depicted his hero in the guise of Bacchus; the King immediately took up a bottle of clear water and drank a big glass. I gave a great peal of laughter, and said to M. le Brun, "You see, monsieur, his Majesty's decision in that libation of ...
— The Memoirs of Madame de Montespan, Complete • Madame La Marquise De Montespan
... portion of the inner parts He gave, then fill'd a golden cup with wine, Which, tasted first, he to the daughter bore Of Jove the Thund'rer, and her thus bespake. Oh guest! the King of Ocean now adore! For ye have chanced on Neptune's festival; And, when thou hast, thyself, libation made Duly, and pray'r, deliver to thy friend The gen'rous juice, that he may also make Libation; for he, doubtless, seeks, in prayer 60 The Immortals, of whose favour all have need. But, since he younger is, and with myself Coeval, first I give the cup to thee. He ceas'd, and to her hand consign'd ...
— The Odyssey of Homer • Homer
... sorrows bleed afresh in the view of so tragical a scene, prevent my adoring the gracious appointment of the great Lord of all events, that when the day in which he must have expired without an enemy appeared so very near, the last ebb of his generous blood should be poured out, as a kind of sacred libation, to the liberties of his country, and the honour of his God! that all the other virtues of his character, embalmed as it were by that precious stream, might diffuse around a more extensive fragrance, and be transmitted to the most remote posterity ...
— The Life of Col. James Gardiner - Who Was Slain at the Battle of Prestonpans, September 21, 1745 • P. Doddridge
... been ruined by the salt-water that we had shipped, our bread especially being almost reduced to pulp. We picked out the least damaged portions, however, and ate them, with some chunks of raw salt beef, washing down the whole with a sparing libation of weak grog, after which we ...
— The Log of a Privateersman • Harry Collingwood
... They personified it as a man with regular features, and a vigorous but portly body, such as befits the rich of high lineage. Sometimes water springs from his breast; sometimes he presents a frog, or libation of vases, or bears a tray full of offerings of flowers, corn, fish, or geese. The inscriptions call him "Hapi, father of the gods, lord of sustenance, who maketh food to be, and covereth the two lands of Egypt with ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol XI. • Edited by Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton
... Three days were occupied in the celebration. Three times were the pig, the sheep, and the bull carried around the great multitude, and then, amid the flaunting of banners, the burning of incense, and the sounding of trumpets, the libation was poured forth, and the inoffensive beasts were sacrificed for the purification of the people. Once every five years the inhabitants were thus counted, and once in five years were they also purified, and in this way ...
— The Story of Rome From the Earliest Times to the End of the Republic • Arthur Gilman
... slew a bull and a kid as sacrifices, and he then entered the temple of Ningirsu, where he prostrated himself. And he took the sacred mould and the fair cushion on which it rested in the temple, and he poured a libation into the mould. Afterwards, having made offerings of honey and butter, and having burnt incense, he placed the cushion and the mould upon his head and carried it to the appointed place. There he placed clay in the mould, shaping it into ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, And Assyria In The Light Of Recent Discovery • L.W. King and H.R. Hall
... with wine or oil nor any less libation [Ant. 3. Hallowed, nor made sweet with humbler perfume's breath; Not with only these redeemed from desecration, But with blood and spirit of life poured forth to death; Blood unspotted, spirit unsullied, life devoted, Sister too supreme to make the bride's hope good, Daughter ...
— Studies in Song, A Century of Roundels, Sonnets on English Dramatic Poets, The Heptalogia, Etc - From Swinburne's Poems Volume V. • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... concluded with the Athenians and their allies on the twelfth day of the Spartan month Gerastius; the allies also taking the oaths. Those who concluded and poured the libation were Taurus, son of Echetimides, Athenaeus, son of Pericleidas, and Philocharidas, son of Eryxidaidas, Lacedaemonians; Aeneas, son of Ocytus, and Euphamidas, son of Aristonymus, Corinthians; Damotimus, son of Naucrates, and Onasimus, son of Megacles, Sicyonians; ...
— The History of the Peloponnesian War • Thucydides
... loudest chorus had died away, and the Islanders were pouring forth their libation to their great enemy the Sun, when suddenly a vast obscurity spread over the glowing West. They looked at each other, and turned pale, and the wine from their trembling goblets fell useless on the shore. The women were too frightened to scream, and, for the first time in the ...
— The Voyage of Captain Popanilla • Benjamin Disraeli
... sensible and sturdy at board meetings and executive councils; logical and convincing at political gatherings; decorous and grave in the kirk; and humorous and jovial at festivities, where perhaps later in the evening, in company with others, hands were clasped over a libation lyrically defined as a "right guid williewaught." On one of these occasions they had walked home together, not without some ostentation of steadiness; yet when MacFen's eminently respectable front door had closed upon him, the consul was ...
— A Protegee of Jack Hamlin's and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... goes to the burying-ground of the bridegroom, and, offering wine and fruits, requests the pair to marry. There two seats are prepared on adjoining positions, either of which having behind it a small banner more than a foot long. Before the ceremony is consecrated by libation, the two banners remain hanging perpendicularly and still; but when the libation is sprinkled and the deceased couple are requested to marry, the banners commence to gradually approach till they touch one another, which shows ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo, Volume 2 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa
... he always did, and involuntarily poured out a libation on the hearth, as he almost always did. Good-natured, ungainly, long-suffering men seldom achieve the art ...
— The Grim Smile of the Five Towns • Arnold Bennett
... presiding over germination; that is the deity that might, perhaps, withdraw his favour with disastrous results. He commonly proves, however, a kindly and responsive being, and in offering to him a few sheaves of corn, some barley-cakes, or a libation from the vintage, the public is grateful rather than calculating; the sacrifice has become an act of thanksgiving. So in Christian devotion (which often follows primitive impulses and repeats the dialectic of paganism in a more speculative region) the redemption did not remain merely expiatory. ...
— The Life of Reason • George Santayana
... translates the M.H.G. "minne trinken" 'to drink to the memory of a person', an old custom originating with the idea of pouring out a libation to the gods. Later it assumed the form of drinking to the honor of God, of a saint, or of an absent friend. See Grimm, "Mythologie", p. 48. (2) "Amelungs", see Adventure XXVIII, note 3. (3) "Wolfhart", see Adventure XXVIII, ...
— The Nibelungenlied • Unknown
... pact of Theseus and Peirithous. Betwixt that rift and the Thorician rock, The hollow pear-tree and the marble tomb, Midway he sat and loosed his beggar's weeds; Then calling to his daughters bade them fetch Of running water, both to wash withal And make libation; so they clomb the steep; And in brief space brought what their father bade, Then laved and dressed him with observance due. But when he had his will in everything, And no desire was left unsatisfied, It thundered from the netherworld; the maids ...
— The Oedipus Trilogy • Sophocles
... words which they both used in the quarrel, as brought tears into the eyes of Ulysses at the remembrance of past passages of his life, and he held his large purple weed before his face to conceal it. Then craving a cup of wine, he poured it out in secret libation to the gods, who had put into the mind of Demodocus unknowingly to do him so much honour. But when the moving poet began to tell of other occurrences where Ulysses had been present, the memory of his brave ...
— THE ADVENTURES OF ULYSSES • CHARLES LAMB
... creep no more behind a bush; Here unobserved she boldly goes, As who should say, to pluck a rose,[16] Ye, who frequent this hallow'd scene, Be not ungrateful to the Dean; But duly, ere you leave your station, Offer to him a pure libation, Or of his own or Smedley's lay, Or billet-doux, or lock of hay: And, O! may all who hither come, Return with unpolluted thumb! Yet, when your lofty domes I praise I sigh to think of ancient days. Permit me then to raise my style, And sweetly moralize a-while. ...
— Poems (Volume II.) • Jonathan Swift
... which bespeaks The pondered action passed into the blood; So swift to harden purpose into deed That, with the wind of ruin in his hair, Soul sprang full-statured from the broken flesh, And at one stroke he lived the whole of life, Poured all in one libation to the truth, A brimming flood whose drops shall overflow On deserts of the soul long beaten down By the brute hoof of habit, till they spring In ...
— Artemis to Actaeon and Other Worlds • Edith Wharton
... these columns two rings give an opportunity for a knotted ornament that could also be very quickly arranged, and the brilliant colours of the knots would add notably to the gay appearance of the tabernacle. Under the canopy the king himself is shown standing in an attitude of worship and pouring a libation on the portable altar. The latter is a tripod, probably of bronze, and upon it appears a dish with something in it which is too roughly drawn to be identified. On the right stands a second and smaller tripod with a vessel containing the ...
— A History of Art in Chaldaea & Assyria, v. 1 • Georges Perrot
... man who said that "his boastful answer to the tyrant and the despot was that his bright home was the land of the settin' sun." Mr. Scadder and Mr. Jefferson Brick were to him the men who said (in cooperation) that "the libation of freedom must sometimes be quaffed in blood." And in these chapters more than anywhere else he falls into the extreme habit of satire, that of treating people as if there were nothing about them except their opinions. It is therefore ...
— Appreciations and Criticisms of the Works of Charles Dickens • G. K. Chesterton
... because the child had been united by Jara, he should be called (Jarasandha i.e., united by Jara). And the son of the king of Magadha endued with great energy, began to grow up in bulk and strength like a fire into which hath been poured libation of clarified butter. And increasing day by day like the moon in the bright fortnight, the child began to enhance the joy of ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Part 2 • Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa
... are rinsing—so. Useful commodity, a cup of this kind." here our friend dashed in a large qualifier of cognac, "it not only conceals the quality of the water, for you can sometimes perceive the animalculae hereabouts without a microscope, but also the strength of the libation. So—a piece of biscuit now, and the smallest morsel of that cold tongue—your health, Thomas"—a long pull—"speedy promotion to you, Thomas." Here our friend rested the jug on his knee. "Were you ever at a Gaudeamus of Presbyterian clergymen on the ...
— Tom Cringle's Log • Michael Scott
... remind us of those represented on the garments of figures in vase pictures, such as the embattled border, the wave pattern, and certain patterns in rectangular compartments. A group of Dionysos pouring out a libation while a female serves him with wine, and a row of animals, are ...
— Needlework As Art • Marian Alford
... his pupils how their master willingly submitted to the mandate of the state—which he knew was morally mistaken—in spite of the possibilities of escape, and how he took up the cup of hemlock in his own hand, even offering libation from its deadly contents, do we not discern in his whole proceeding and demeanor, an act of self-immolation? No physical compulsion here, as in ordinary cases of execution. True the verdict of the judges was compulsory: it said, "Thou shalt die,—and that ...
— Bushido, the Soul of Japan • Inazo Nitobe
... we took her photo she was returning from her morning worship at the shrine. She had poured her libation over the idol, walked round and round it, prostrated herself before it, gone through the prayers she had learned off by heart, and now ...
— Things as They Are - Mission Work in Southern India • Amy Wilson-Carmichael
... poured out her soul on paper—a libation intended for Brandon. I made a dozen attempts, in as many different ways, to deliver her letters, but every effort was a failure, and this missive met the fate of the others. De Longueville kept close ...
— When Knighthood Was in Flower • Charles Major
... Christ, had even made certain steam toys, which we find described in a manuscript written about 120 B. C., at Alexandria, by a learned compiler and inventor named Hero. One of these was in the form of a man pouring from a cup a libation to the gods. The figure stood upon an altar, and it was connected by a pipe with a kettle of water underneath. On lighting a fire under the kettle, the water was forced up through the figure, and flowed out of the cup upon the altar. Another toy was a revolving ...
— Captains of Industry - or, Men of Business Who Did Something Besides Making Money • James Parton
... tenderly recorded in the poems She Came and Went and the First Snow-Fall. The volume of poems published in 1848 was "reverently dedicated" to the memory of "our little Blanche," and in the introductory poem addressed "To M.W.L." he poured forth his sorrow like a libation of tears: ...
— The Vision of Sir Launfal - And Other Poems • James Russell Lowell
... the sea; and whose fountain was only thirty-five degrees of heat on the 17th of July, or three degrees above the freezing point. We mixed some good whisky with this water, and recruited our strength [a very judicious proceeding.] Then we poured as a libation into the fountain a little of the excellent whisky which our landlord had brought along with him [a very foolish proceeding.] After resting half an hour, we ascended to the top of Brae Riach at five P.M., and found it to be four thousand two hundred and ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, No. 382, October 1847 • Various
... wiped the perspiration from his brow, and took up his altar again reverently. Then he drew from his pocket a small flask, poured a few drops into the tiny focus on the top as a libation to Bacchus, and himself toasted 'the spade.' Carefully handling his precious possession he returned home with it in his arms and placed it on the drawing-room mantelpiece, to the dismay of his wife, who misdoubted the religion of the Romans. 'That's a settler for Telfer,' he ...
— Border Ghost Stories • Howard Pease
... pardoned. Perhaps I have made one or two omissions in the course of the evening for which I trust you will grant me your pardon and indulgence. One thing in particular I have omitted, and I would now wish to make amends for it by a libation of reverence and respect to the memory of SHAKESPEARE. He was a man of universal genius, and from a period soon after his own era to the present day he has been universally idolized. When I come to his honoured name, I am like the sick man who hung up his ...
— Chronicles of the Canongate • Sir Walter Scott
... he thus embrace me during our journey from Philadelphia to New York, and four times did I pour down my libation of love's dew. We parted the best of friends, and from that day to this I have never seen him but the pleasure I enjoyed with him will never be ...
— The Life and Amours of the Beautiful, Gay and Dashing Kate Percival - The Belle of the Delaware • Kate Percival
... demijohn of whiskey, slung it dexterously and gracefully over her arm, so that it rested on her elbow like a cradle, and, going to each one in succession, filled their glasses. It obliged each one to rise to accept the libation, and as Hale did so in his turn he met the dark eyes of the girl full on his own. There was a pleased curiosity in her glance that made this married man of thirty-five color as awkwardly as ...
— Snow-Bound at Eagle's • Bret Harte
... always a gay festival. It may be a memorial ceremony in honour of some great man lately dead. Then speeches are made in his praise, solemn and sacred music is sung, and the Salamander, an impressive libation to the dead man's Manes, ...
— Home Life in Germany • Mrs. Alfred Sidgwick
... exaltation took possession of the young girl, an exaltation such as might have possessed itself of a priestess of old, pouring a libation to the gods in behalf of some devout suppliant. He had known her, this mysterious, homeless being that had come floating across the waters to hear the song of his exile. A deep, thrilling emotion ...
— A Venetian June • Anna Fuller
... they trust to their factors; they never scheme to build up chartered companies for gain, by preying upon the public; never seek to overreach a neighbor or a stranger, that they may increase their means by decreasing his; would scorn the libation of generous wine, if they felt the tear of the widow or the orphan mingled with it, and a thousand times would prefer to be cheated than to cheat; despising the vicious, and cultivating only the nobler ...
— The Memories of Fifty Years • William H. Sparks
... assembled multitude, accompanied by songs of triumph, and the wild melody of barbaric instruments, that swelled louder and louder as his bright orb, rising above the mountain range towards the east, shone in full splendor on his votaries. After the usual ceremonies of adoration, a libation was offered to the great deity by the Inca, from a huge golden vase, filled with the fermented liquor of maize or of maguey, which, after the monarch had tasted it himself, he dispensed among his royal kindred. These ceremonies completed, ...
— The History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William H. Prescott
... feeling of jealousy and ill-humour to take possession of his mind. The other, on the contrary, before he satisfied his thirst, raised in the hollow of his hand a portion of the water, and, lifting it toward the sun, reversed his hand, and allowed it to fall upon the ground, as a libation to the Great Spirit, who had vouch-safed him a successful hunt and the blessing of the refreshing water with which he was about to quench ...
— The Old Santa Fe Trail - The Story of a Great Highway • Henry Inman
... found at Macon on the Saone, in the year 1764, and published by Caylus. It represents Cybele, the universal mother, with the mural crown on her head, and the wings of pervasion growing from her shoulders, mixing the productive elements of heat and moisture by making a libation upon the flames of an altar. On each side of her head is one of the Discouri, signifying the alternate influence of the diurnal and nocturnal Sun; and, upon a crescent supported by the tips of her wings, are the seven planets, ...
— The God-Idea of the Ancients - or Sex in Religion • Eliza Burt Gamble
... the various requirements of drinking largely and drinking delicately; of pouring easily out, or of keeping for years the perfume in; of storing in cellars, or bearing from fountains; of sacrificial libation, of Panathenaic treasure of oil, and sepulchral treasure of ashes,—and you have a resultant series of beautiful form and decoration, from the rude amphora of red earth up to Cellini's vases of gems and crystal, in which series, but especially in the more simple conditions of it, are ...
— Lectures on Art - Delivered before the University of Oxford in Hilary term, 1870 • John Ruskin
... are lights in the windows; a blue spire of smoke Climbs from the grange grove of elm and oak. The smell of the Earth, where the night pours to her Its dewy libation, is sweeter than myrrh, And an incense to Toil is the smell of the loam On the last ...
— Songs, Merry and Sad • John Charles McNeill
... seemed nothing incongruous in her being there. No, I can't tell you what she was like to look at, except that she was like a great sacred, sacrificial figure; she might have come there to pray, or to offer something, or to pour out a libation. She was tall and grave, and gave the effect of something white and golden. In her black gown and against the yew ...
— The Return of the Prodigal • May Sinclair
... and children. When they finally surged past the pier-head on the crest of a tremendous billow, and swept into the harbour under a vast shower of spray that burst over the pier and rose above the mast-heads of the shipping within—as if to pour a libation on the gallant crews— then a succession of cheers, that cannot be described, welcomed the victors and re-echoed from the chalk-cliffs, to be caught up and sent out again and again in thrilling cadence on the mad sea, which ...
— The Floating Light of the Goodwin Sands • R.M. Ballantyne
... three or four times. On the following morning, however, as we had but just left the depot, the camels would not drink, and as all our vessels were full, the water in the trough had to be poured out upon the ground as a libation to the Fates. In consequence of having to dry a number of things, we did not get away until past midday, and at eleven miles upon our course, after passing two small salt lagoons, we came upon a much larger one, where there was good herbage. This we took advantage of, and encamped there. ...
— Australia Twice Traversed, The Romance of Exploration • Ernest Giles
... the squire and the parson a most excellent political discourse, framed out of newspapers and political pamphlets; in which they made a libation of four bottles of wine to the good of their country: and then, the squire being fast asleep, the parson lighted his pipe, mounted his horse, and ...
— The History of Tom Jones, a foundling • Henry Fielding
... they were as a natural consequence all decapitated as they passed through the door. Only one escaped, who had bribed a Chamar to go instead of him. He and his village fled from Agra and came to Chhattisgarh, where they founded the Agharia caste. And, in memory of this, when an Agharia makes a libation to his ancestors, he first pours a little water on the ground in honour of the dead Chamar. Such stories may be purely imaginary, or may contain some substratum of truth, as that the ancestors of the caste were Rajputs, who took wives from Chamars and other low castes. ...
— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India—Volume I (of IV) • R.V. Russell
... beloved, not long! Tarry yet a little while, O outraged soul, in the shape that once was thine, and thou shalt see thyself avenged. Lo, I hear the wings of Kefa, Goddess of the Flood-time, rustling in the silence of the midnight skies. She herself shall pour out a libation to thine injured shade! "Nay, nay, my lords, and you good friends of those who did my own true lord to death, sit still, and drain a farewell cup with me, your Queen. It is too late to fly, for every way is closed. ...
— The Mummy and Miss Nitocris - A Phantasy of the Fourth Dimension • George Griffith
... begins at one end of State street and drinks, or pretends to drink, at every bar between Lake and Fortieth streets. This libation poured on the altar of liberty, he is popularly declared to be in the race. The newspapers announce that he is the people's idol, and the boss of the machine sends word to the newspapers that it is all well enough, but ...
— David Lockwin—The People's Idol • John McGovern
... right, for Oro accepted the homage by a little motion of the head. After this, at a sign from him she drank the water. Then the glass was refilled and handed to Oro who also held it towards the sky. He, however, made no libation but drank at once, two tumblers ...
— When the World Shook - Being an Account of the Great Adventure of Bastin, Bickley and Arbuthnot • H. Rider Haggard
... in a room of the College of Physicians for relief of the sick poor, houses the God of Sloth within the College, and outside, among other allegories, personifies Disease as a Fury to whom the enemies of the Dispensary offer libation. Boileau in his Lutrin a mock-heroic poem written in 1673 on a dispute between two chief personages of the chapter of a church in Paris, la Sainte Chapelle, as to the position of a pulpit, had with some minor allegory, chiefly personified Discord, and made her enter into ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... his hand towards the encircling moors. "We have feasted more Homerico, and in Homer, you remember the host allowed his guest fourteen days before asking that question. Permit me to delay the answer only till I have poured libation on the turf here. Ah! I perceive the whisky is exhausted: but water shall suffice. May I trouble you—my joints are stiff—to fill your drinking-cup from the brook ...
— Noughts and Crosses • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... crown, and now is this second unto the lord[2] of Isthmos and unto the fifty daughters of Nereus, for that Phylakidas the youngest son is winner in the games. And be it ours to make ready yet a third for the Saviour[3], the Olympian one, and in honour of Aigina make libation of our honey-speaking song. ...
— The Extant Odes of Pindar • Pindar
... libation? A. To the memory of Simon of Cyrene, the early friend and disciple of our Saviour, who was compelled to bear his cross, and fell a ...
— The Mysteries of Free Masonry - Containing All the Degrees of the Order Conferred in a Master's Lodge • William Morgan
... you please, to the turbid libation which some rose-lipped Paris, some silk-locked Sybarite poured out last night, after leaving the theatre. Under the pretence of adding a leaf to the chaplets, won by what he is pleased to tern 'diving dramatic genius,' this 'Jules Duval'—let me see, I would not libel an honourable ...
— Infelice • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson
... death of his father by killing his mother. The Furies chased him for many years through the world until at last he found pardon and peace. The story is told in several Greek plays, but perhaps best in AEschylus' "Libation ...
— Selections From American Poetry • Various
... every bit of crockery there is in the 'Femme-sans-Tete' with blows from my whip. What can I do to kill time?" He raised his head quickly, as he felt himself suddenly almost smothered under a shower of dust. This was a fatal movement for him, for his eyes received part of the libation destined for his hair. He closed them with a disagreeable sensation, after seeing Mademoiselle Reine Gobillot's fresh, chubby face, her figure prim beyond measure in a lilac-and-green plaid gingham dress, and carrying a basket on her arm, a necessary ...
— Gerfaut, Complete • Charles de Bernard
... also, in such station As when the pyre was charr'd, and piled the sods. And offering to the dead made, and their gods, The old mourners had, standing to make libation, I stand, and to the Gods and to the dead Do reverence without prayer or praise, and shed Offering to these unknown, the gods of gloom, And what of honey and spice my seed-lands bear, And what I may of fruits in this chill'd air, And lay, Orestes-like, across ...
— Book of English Verse • Bulchevy
... Wilding, you ought to speak with respect of English sauces. I think I have heard how a libation of one of them, which was poured over a certain cathedral, has made it look as good as new," said Miss Macdonnell, "and we have lately learned that one of the most distinguished of our party is ambitious ...
— The Cook's Decameron: A Study in Taste: - Containing Over Two Hundred Recipes For Italian Dishes • Mrs. W. G. Waters
... it was ended, I sent you back to your native place. So I shall be truly grateful if henceforth you will offer rice-beer to me, set up the divine symbols in my honour, and worship me with the words 'I make a libation to the chief of the salmon, the divine fish.' If you do not worship me, you will become a poor man. Remember this well!" Such were the words which the divine old man spoke to him in his dream.—(Translated literally. Told ...
— Aino Folk-Tales • Basil Hall Chamberlain
... a double goblet crown'd, And cast a large libation on the ground; Then to their vessels, through the gloomy shades, The chiefs return; divine Ulysses leads. Meantime Achilles' slaves prepared a bed, With fleeces, carpets, and soft linen spread: There, till the sacred morn restored the day, In slumber sweet the ...
— The Iliad of Homer • Homer
... her every evening, sitting in the stifling, ugly house, and poured out his soul as if it were a libation to a goddess. She sometimes answered by telegraph, sometimes by a perfumed note. He schooled himself not to feel hurt. Why should Babette write? Does a goldfinch indict epistles; or a humming-bird study composition; or a glancing, red-scaled fish in summer shallows ...
— The Shape of Fear • Elia W. Peattie
... were accompanied by a whimper, so Polybius, who could not bear to see any but cheerful faces, raised his cup and drank her health with kindly words. Then refilling the tankard, he poured a libation, and was about to empty it to Melissa's health, but Praxilla's lean frame was standing by his side as quickly as though a serpent had stung her. She was drawing a stick of asparagus between her teeth, but she hastily ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... a man commits his spirit to God in life may be his when he comes to die, and that death may become a voluntary act, and the spirit may not be dragged out of us, reluctant, and as far as we can, resisting, but that we may offer it up as a libation, to use one metaphor of St. Paul's, or may surrender it willingly as an act of faith? It is wonderful to think that life and death, so unlike each other, may be made absolutely identical in the spirit in which ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... aware of, and accordingly proceed to untie your pack, and exposing its contents to view, solicit him to give, at least, the preference in trade. Your opponent, on the other side of the fire-place, having also poured out his libation, imitates your example in every respect; and most probably he may secure the wife, while you engage the ...
— Service in the Hudson's Bay Territory • John M'lean
... yet, at the last races of the county town of——, upon her health being proposed among a round of beauties, the Laird of Bumperquaigh, permanent toast-master and croupier of the Bautherwhillery Club, not only said MORE to the pledge in a pint bumper of Bourdeaux, but, ere pouring forth the libation, denominated the divinity to whom it was dedicated, 'the Rose of Tully-Veolan'; upon which festive occasion three cheers were given by all the sitting members of that respectable society, whose throats the wine had left capable of such exertion. Nay, I am well ...
— Waverley, Or 'Tis Sixty Years Hence, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... they all placed, and the due libation made of wine, with an offering of salt, to the domestic Gods—a silver group of statues occupying the centre of the board, where we should now place the plateau and epergne, than a louder burst ...
— The Roman Traitor (Vol. 1 of 2) • Henry William Herbert
... glory of sky and river and temples. I had room in my mind only for the dream-beauty of that astounding picture, into the foreground of which I seemed to have been thrust, so close upon my eyes loomed the line of lotus columns. It was as if the ancient gods had poured a libation of ruby wine from their zenith-dwelling into the translucent depths of the Nile. Even the long colonnade of broken pillars was deep rose-red against a pale rose sky, repeated again in deeper rose down in a magic world beneath the pink crystal roof of shining water. Then, suddenly, bright windows ...
— It Happened in Egypt • C. N. Williamson & A. M. Williamson
... along the streets and laughed loudly and talked with an audacious freedom that was often the cause of his expulsion from respectable company. A glass or two of wine seemed quite to turn his brain; he was alert then for any frivolity, and he was not always content with so restricted a libation, when the consequences were even more to ...
— Art in England - Notes and Studies • Dutton Cook
... hymeneal sacrifice. I had this from his own declaration. He did not name the positive day, but it is certainly to be soon. You will undoubtedly, however, have timely notice, as a guest. We must pour a liberal libation upon the mystic altar, Alonzo, and twine the nuptial garland with wreaths of joy. Beauman ought to devote a rich offering to so valuable a prize. He has been here for a week, and departed for New-London yesterday, ...
— Alonzo and Melissa - The Unfeeling Father • Daniel Jackson, Jr.
... joyful day to the Tyrians and the voyagers from Troy, a day to live in our children's memory. [734-756]Bacchus, the giver of gladness, be with us, and Juno the bountiful; and you, O Tyrians, be favourable to our assembly.' She spoke, and poured liquid libation on the board, which done, she first herself touched it lightly with her lips, then handed it to Bitias and bade him speed; he valiantly drained the foaming cup, and flooded him with the brimming gold. The other princes followed. Long-haired Iopas on his gilded lyre ...
— The Aeneid of Virgil • Virgil
... profligacy of this man indeed manifested itself in a strange manner: a short time after he had thus buried his wife, he was seen sitting at his door, with a bottle of rum in his hand, and actually drinking one glass and pouring another on her grave until it was emptied, prefacing every libation by declaring how well she had loved it during her life. He appeared to be in a state not far from insanity, as this anecdote certainly testifies; but the melancholy event had not had any other effect ...
— An Account of the English Colony in New South Wales, Vol. 1 • David Collins
... warned the people in order that they might protect their crops. The peasants, to propitiate the planets, offered in sacrifice fat cocks and white lambs; and the poor, who had neither fowls nor four-footed beasts to offer, cut their thumbs, in the full expectation that this insignificant libation of a few drops of human blood would secure the favour of the heavenly bodies, and avert ...
— The Mysteries of All Nations • James Grant
... intoxicating juice of a plant offered in libation to a Hindu god, especially to INDRA (q. v.), to strengthen him in his war with the demons, and identified with the invigorating and inspiring principle in nature which manifests itself at once in the valour of the soldier and the inspiration of the poet; as a god Soma is ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood
... still Can touch our hearts and captivate our will; For laureled genius has the power to brave Death's fell advance, and lives beyond the grave: Bear witness, this grand audience clustered here. Your plaudits cannot reach dead Lytton's ear, But no more sweet libation can you pour To Lytton's memory, on this distant shore, Than your prolonged applause, which now proclaims, Though the great author's gone, ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 11, No. 24, March, 1873 • Various
... no witnesses of what he had said, the Senate decided to send for the boy, and when they saw how he blushed and wept with a modesty mingled with unquenchable rage, they, without requiring any other proof, found Capitolinus guilty, and condemned him to pay a fine, with which Marcellus had silver libation vessels made, and consecrated them to ...
— Plutarch's Lives, Volume II • Aubrey Stewart & George Long
... sounds of preparation. Some Brought driftwood for the fires, some gathered flowers To deck themselves, and all the fruitful earth Was robbed of its delights for beauty's sake. Before the feasting Chief Akau rose, Grave and majestic, for the evening prayer; Pouring libation from the kava bowl In a deep silence, to the gods ...
— The Rose of Dawn - A Tale of the South Sea • Helen Hay
... wine like a libation; and as his voice ceased to echo, and he sank into his seat, an uncontrollable wave of emotion ran over the assembly. Many of the women wept, and the men conversed in whispers. After a considerable interval, during which ...
— The Second Deluge • Garrett P. Serviss
... complete, and the banquet prepared for the people, And they were banqueted all, nor had one to complain of his portion. But when of meat and of drink the desire from them all had departed, Duly the goblets were mantled with wine by the youths of the temple, Handed in order to all, and the round of libation accomplish'd. Then through the livelong day the Achaians, in melody gracious, Chanted the paean divine to the glory of Phoebus Apollo, Hymning the might of the King; and the voice of the harmony pleased him. Then, when the sun went down, and the darkness around them was gather'd, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 367, May 1846 • Various
... uninterested head. In short, these dignitaries, without moving a muscle of the face, or a joint of the body, after a few seconds, and with great solemnity, ejected what had been swallowed upon the ground. It seemed as if given forth in the spirit of a libation among the ancients. The chiefs having afterwards tasted, each replacing the gourd, and returning to his stand before the next came forward, they all went to their seats, and two old men approached and handed round gourds full to the other parties present who had remained stationary. The ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol I, Issue I, January 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... freely. God is honored with a banquet of eggs at the cross roads, the god of the world. God, with benignant spirit, desired in sacrifice a goat, a bull to be carried within the precincts of the holy place. God, twice propitiated, blesses the pit of the sacred libation." ...
— A Budget of Paradoxes, Volume II (of II) • Augustus de Morgan
... returned thanks, and imprinted kisses upon the stranger land, and saluted the unknown mountains and fields. He was {now} going to offer sacrifice to Jupiter, and commanded his servants to go and fetch some water for the libation from the running springs. An ancient grove was standing {there, as yet} profaned by no axe. There was a cavern in the middle {of it}, thick covered with twigs and osiers, forming a low arch by the junction ...
— The Metamorphoses of Ovid - Vol. I, Books I-VII • Publius Ovidius Naso
... have been admirably rendered in English verse by Mr. E. D. A. Morshead. Of the first, 'The House of Atreus' (being the 'Agamemnon,' 'Libation-Bearers,' and 'Furies') was first published by him in 1881, an octavo volume which was reprinted in 1890 and 1901. 'The Suppliant Maidens,' 'The Persians,' 'The Seven against Thebes,' and 'Prometheus Bound' were collected in one octavo volume in 1908. His version ...
— The Book-Hunter at Home • P. B. M. Allan
... Glaucus, inclining reverentially to a beautiful image of the god placed in the centre of the table, at the corners of which stood the Lares and the salt-holders. The guests followed the prayer, and then, sprinkling the wine on the table, they performed the wonted libation. ...
— The Last Days of Pompeii • Edward George Bulwer-Lytton
... dignity and delicacy, that it ought to be given back to the French, a vicious race abandoned to the culture of the vine. I proposed that the last liquors on board should be poured out in a pagan libation before it. And then I suddenly remembered that this Liberty was still in some sense enlightening the world, or one part of the world; was a lamp for one sort of wanderer, a star of one sort of seafarer. To one persecuted people at least this land had really been an asylum; even if recent legislation ...
— What I Saw in America • G. K. Chesterton
... as the court was entered, a raised road was reached, paved with white marble, on both sides of which were planted deep green fir trees, and kingfisher-green cypress trees. On the moon-shaped platform were laid out antiquities, tripods, libation-vases, and other similar articles. In front of the antechamber was hung a gold-coloured flat tablet, with ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin
... strain: There aged Zorai, his Alzira prest With love parental, to his anxious breast: Priest of the sun, within the sacred shrine His fervent spirit breath'd the strain divine; 120 With glowing hand, the guiltless off'ring spread, With pious zeal the pure libation shed; Nor vain the incense of erroneous praise When meek devotion's soul the tribute pays; On wings of purity behold it rise, 125 While bending mercy wafts it ...
— Poems (1786), Volume I. • Helen Maria Williams
... man."[245] With these Australian practices we may compare a custom observed by the civilised Greeks of antiquity. Every year the Peloponnesian lads lashed themselves on the grave of Pelops at Olympia, till the blood ran down their backs as a libation in honour ...
— The Belief in Immortality and the Worship of the Dead, Volume I (of 3) • Sir James George Frazer
... known (or won) by persons blessed even with the intelligence of Vrihaspati. A thing is lost if cast into the sea; words are lost if addressed to one that listens not; the scriptures are lost on one that hath not his soul under control; and a libation of clarified butter is lost if poured over the ashes left by a fire that is extinguished. He that is endued with the intelligence maketh friendships with those that are wise, having first examined by the aid of his intelligence, repeatedly searching by his understanding, ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 2 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... without ceremony or delay. Her father and Bradley ate as Kate had never seen men eat; only her amazement could keep pace with their quiet but unremitting efforts to clean up everything in sight. There was little mastication but much knife and fork work, with free libation of coffee; and Belle, Kate noticed, while somewhat left behind by the men, paid strict attention to ...
— Laramie Holds the Range • Frank H. Spearman
... reflected as in the convex mirror of a dewdrop, where it swelled so that he could not hold it, but let it out again through his throat, metamorphosed into music, which he poured forth over all as the libation on ...
— The Seaboard Parish Vol. 2 • George MacDonald
... his righteous hand, In vain the splendid blow had given, The tyrant, only chang'd, disdain'd The light of unregarded Heaven. And Cato—thou, who tyranny All earth besides enslaved, withstood; And failing to high liberty, Pour'd fierce libation of thy blood. ...
— A Sketch of the Life of the late Henry Cooper - Barrister-at-Law, of the Norfolk Circuit; as also, of his Father • William Cooper
... named by Richard Wren Street. Why is the song sparrow calling "Dick, Dick!" so lustily and scratching so testily in the leaves that have drifted under an old rose shrub? The birds' bath and drinking basin is still empty; I pour out the libation to the day by ...
— The Garden, You, and I • Mabel Osgood Wright
... fifty, joined Jason in his enterprise. The Argo, the ship which bore them, had fifty oars, and in the keel was a piece of wood from the great oak of Dodona, which could speak for the oracles. When all was ready, Jason stood on the poop, and poured forth a libation from a golden cup, praying aloud to Jupiter, to the Winds, the Days, the Nights, and to Fate to grant them a favourable voyage. Old Chiron came down from his hills to cheer them, and pray for their return; and as the oars kept measured time, Orpheus struck his lyre in tune with ...
— Aunt Charlotte's Stories of Greek History • Charlotte M. Yonge
... cult of the dead among the Greeks are scanty. There was the usual kindly provision of food, arms, and other necessaries for them.[693] Odysseus in Hades pours out a libation (honey, wine, water, to which meal is added) to all the dead, addresses vows and prayers to them, and promises to offer to them a barren heifer on his return to Ithaca, and a black sheep separately to Teiresias.[694] From the sixth ...
— Introduction to the History of Religions - Handbooks on the History of Religions, Volume IV • Crawford Howell Toy
... of a coming event, and you have had it at last in the whole length and breadth of it. But it is not my fault if the wind began to blow so that I could not go out—as I intended—as I shall do to-morrow; and that you have received my dulness in a full libation of it, in consequence. My sisters said of the roses you blasphemed, yesterday, that they 'never saw such flowers anywhere—anywhere here in London—' and therefore if I had thought so myself before, it was not ...
— The Letters of Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett, Vol. 1 (of 2) 1845-1846 • Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett
... sprinkled the barley meal, first they drew back the victims' heads and slaughtered them and flayed them, and cut slices from the thighs and wrapped them in fat, making a double fold, and laid raw collops thereon, and the old man burnt them on cleft wood and made libation over them of gleaming wine; and at his side the young men in their hands held five-pronged forks. Now when the thighs were burnt and they had tasted the vitals, then sliced they all the rest and ...
— The Iliad of Homer • Homer (Lang, Leaf, Myers trans.)
... Mercury, and with an invocation to his father, in which he promises to avenge him, and to whom he consecrates a lock of his hair. He sees a female train in mourning weeds issuing from the palace, to bring a libation to the grave; and, as he thinks he recognises his sister among them, he steps aside with Pylades in order to observe them unperceived. The chorus, which consists of captive Trojan virgins, in a speech, accompanied with mournful gestures, reveals the ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel
... stage we have proceeded with him through the MYSTERIES OF LIFE. The Eleusinia are closed, and the crowning libation poured. ...
— Alice, or The Mysteries, Book XI • Edward Bulwer Lytton |
