Chapter Huniades to Hythloday of H by Brewer's Readers Handbook

Hymen, god of marriage; the personification of the bridal song; marriage.

Till Hymen brought his love-delighted hour,
There dwelt no joy in Eden’s rosy bower…
The world was sad, the garden was a wild,
And man, the hermit, sighed—till woman smiled.
   —Campbell: Pleasures of Hope, ii. (1799).

Hymettus, a mountain in Attica, noted for honey.

And the brown bees of Hymettus
Make their honey not so sweet.
   —Mrs. Browning: Wine of Cyprus, 7.

Hymn Tunes. (See Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, p. 641, col. 1.)

Hyndman (Master), usher to the council-chamber at Holyrood.—Sir W. Scott: The Abbot (time, Elizabeth).

Hypatia, a novel by Charles Kingsley (1853). Hypatia was born in Alexandria, A.D. 370. She attracted vast crowds by her lectures on philosophy and neo-Platonism. She was a most modest, graceful, and beautiful young woman, but the Christian clergy, headed by archbishop Cyril, stirred up the rabble against her. They seized her, dragged her into one of the churches of Alexandria, and literally tore her to pieces (A.D. 415). It is one of the saddest tales in history.

Hyperion, the sun. His parents were Cælum and Tellus (heaven and earth). Strictly speaking, he was the father of the sun, but Homer uses the word for the sun itself.

When the might Of Hyperion from his noon-tide throne Unbends their languid pinions [i.e. of the winds].
   —Akenside: Hymn to the Naiads (1767).

Shakespeare incorrectly throws the accent on the second syllable: “Hyperion to a satyr” (Hamlet, act i. sc. 2). In this almost all English poets have erred with Shakespeare; but Akenside accents the word correctly, and in Fuimus Troes we have—

Blow, gentle Africus,
Play on our poops, when Hyperion’s son
Shall couch in west. (1633.)
Placat equo Persis radiis Hyperione cinctum.
   —Ovid: Fasti, i. 385.

Keats has left the fragment of a poem entitled Hyperion, of which Byron says, “It seems inspired by the Titans, and is as sublime as Æschylus.”

Hyperion, a romance by Longfellow, The hero, Paul Flemming, was heart-broken at the loss of a dear friend. He travelled abroad, to try and assuage his grief, and spent a winter in Heidelberg, where he buried himself in “old dusty books,” and held long discussions with his friend the baron of Hohenfels. He met an English lady, Mary Ashburton, and loved her, but pride parted them, and they separated never to meet again. Paul Flemming wandered through many lands, and in a little chapel, on a marble tablet, found the words of consolation which no friend had yet spoken. He determined to face life again, and “be strong.” The story is interwoven with charming translations from German poety; most of which are collected in the volume of Longfellow’s Poems.

Hypnos, god of sleep, brother of Oneiros (dreams) and Thanatos (death).

In every creature that breathes, from the conqueror resting on a field of blood, to the nest-bird cradled in its bed of leaves, Hypnos holds a sovereignty which nothing mortal can long resist.—Ouida: Folle-Farine, iii. 11.

Hypochondira, personified by Thomson—

And moping here, did Hypochondria sit,
Mother of spleen, in robes of various dye…
And some her frantic deemed, and some her deemed a wit.
   —Castle of Indolence, i. 75 (1748).