25. I have hitherto spoken only of deities of the winds. We pass now to
a far more important group, the deities of cloud. Both of these are
subordinate to the ruling power of the air, as the demigods of the
fountains and minor seas are to the great deep; but, as the
cloud-firmament detaches itself more from the air, and has a wider range
of ministry than the minor streams and seas, the highest cloud deity,
Hermes, has a rank more equal with Athena than Nereus or Proteus with
Neptune; and there is greater difficulty in tracing his character,
because his physical dominion over the clouds can, of course, be asserted
only where clouds are; and, therefore, scarcely at all in Egypt;* so that
the changes which Hermes undergoes in becoming a Greek from an Egyptian
and Phoenician god, are greater than in any other case of adopted
tradition In Egypt Hermes is a deity of historical record, and a
conductor of the dead to judgment; the Greeks take away much of this
historical function, assigning it to the Muses; but, in investing him
with the physical power over clouds, they give him that which the Muses
disdain,--the power of concealment and of theft.
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