HERMETIC. medicine meant the most mysterious and power- ful medicine, and the expression "hermetic seal- ing,' for the most complete, air-tight closure, has survived to our own day. Consult Dufresnoy, Bistoire de la philosophie hermctique (Paris, 1742) ; Baumgarten-Crusius, De Librorum Her- meticorum Origine atque Indole (Jena, 1827); Hilger, De Uermetis Trismegisti Poemandro (Leipzig, 1855) ; Menard, Hermes Trismegiste (Paris, 18G6) ; Pietschmann, Hermes Trisme- gisiiis (Leipzig, 1875). HEE.MIA, her'mi-4. An Athenian lady in Shake^peare's Midsummer Xight's Dream. She is the daughter of Egeus, and is enamored of Lysander. HERMI'AS (Lat., from Gk. 'Ep/uas, Her- mias, or 'Ep/«ias, Hcrmeias). A slave of Eubu- lus, tyrant of Atarneus, in Mysia, Asia Minor, whom he subsequently succeeded on the throne (B.C. 347). At Athens he made the acquaintance of Plato and Aristotle. The latter spent some years at the Court of Hermias, but fled when .rtaxerxes IIL captured the tyrant and put him to death. The philosopher, who was married to one of the relatives of Hermias, erected a statue in his honor. HERMINJAED, ar'm^'nyar', Aiiit Louis (1817 — ). A .Swiss author, bom at Vevey. Vaud. He was a teacher, and practiced his pro- fession in Russia, Germany, and France, before going to Geneva, where he became a friend of Amiel. His great work, the Correspondence des reformateurs dans les pays de langue fran^aise. began to appear in 1866 (vol. ix., covering the period 1.543-44. in 1807). HERMIONE, her-ml'.Vne. (1) The beautiful daughter of Menelaus and Helen, married against her will to Xeoptolemus (Pyrrhus), the son of Achilles, in performance of a promise made by her father. According to late tradition, she was carried off by Neoptolemus, who was killed by Orestes, to whom she had already been prom- ised. (2) The much-injured wife of Leontes, the madly jealous King of Sicily, in Shakespeare's Winter's Tale. The character is taken from Bellaria, in Greene's Pandosto. (3) The scorn- ful love of Pyrrhus and loving mother of As- tyana^. in Racine's .indromaque. After Andro- mache has persuaded Orestes to murder Pvrrhus, in the act of ascending the altar with Hermione, the latter becomes Regent of Epirus. HERMI'ONES. or HERMIN'ONES. One of the three great divisions of the German peoples, so named from their mythical progenitor Irmi- nus. They were the oldest, best, and most-power- ful of the West-Germanic stock, and their eastern boundary was the Vistula and the Carp.ithians. Among the nations to whom the name Hermiones applied were the Suevi. the Herniunduri. the Lombard!, the Vandali. the Heruli. and the Quadi. Their earlv home was about the basin of the Elbe and the Main. Consult Stubbs. Con- stituiional Histoni of England, ch. 1. 6th ed. (Oxford. 1807). HERMrPTTJS OF SMYRNA (Gk.'EpM/irjros, Hcrmippusi. A Greek pliilnsupher who lived about B.C. 200. . disciple nf rallimachus of .Alex- andria, he was called o K<i//(;"i Vf"'f. the Calli- machean. He was the author of B(o/. a work containing the biographies of all the Greek phi- losophers, historians, and poets. Though it is r HERMIT CRAB. repeatedly referred to by later writers, only frag- ments have been preserved. Consult MuUer, Historicorum Grwcorum Fragmenta (Paris, 1808-83). HERMIT (from OF. hermite, ermite, from Lat. ertniita. from Gk. 4piifurris, eremites, her- mit, from ipTifUa, eremia, desert, from ipij/ws, erimos, quiet; connected with Gk. iip^pa, irema, quietly, Goth, rimis, quiet, Skt. ram, to rest). One of the names given in the early ages, and still more in the later Church, to a class of soli- tary ascetics, who, with a view to more complete freedom from the cares, temptations, and business of the world, withdrew from the ordinary inter- course of life and took up their abode in natural caverns or rudely formed huts in deserts, forests, mountains, and other solitary places. The her- mits of the Middle Ages, like the primitive anchorites, often lived in complete solitude; but a much more cominon, and, in its influence on the Church, more important form of the institute was that of a conununity of hermits, each pos- sessing his separate hermitage, but all meeting at stated times for mass, prayer, religious in- struction, and other common exercises. The various hermits of this class are regarded as constituting religious orders, and although never attaining to the popularity which distinguished the Franciscans, Dominicans, and other active orders, thej' have formed, nevertheless, a nu- merous and not uninfluential element in the spiritual life of the Roman Catholic Church. It would be impossible to enumerate the many small associations of this kind. For some of the more important, see Augustlniass; Celestines: HIERO^"Y^[ITES; P-WLITES. HERMITAGE, The. ( 1 ) A celebrated palace and museum at Saint Petersburg (q.v. ). (2) A garden on the side of a hill overlooking Mos- cow. Russia, which has become a noted fashion- able resort. (3) The name given to Rousseau's retreat in the valley of Montmorency, Frame. It was built for the philosopher by Madame d'Epi- nay, and was occupied by him from 1751 to 1757. La nouielle Hcloise, Le discours siir I'inegaliti des conditions, and a part of the Dictionary of Music were written here. In 1813 Gn'try died in this place. (4) An old house near Xashville, Tenn., where Andrew .Jackson resided for a great part of his life, and near which he was buried. The mansion is now owned by the State. HERMIT CRAB. One of a large group of small crabs (q.v.) of the family Paguridop. hav- ing the abdominal or tail segments much more largely developed than in true crabs, but un- defended by hard plates, and not forming an organ for swimming. The soft and tender tail re- quires a protective covering, which the instinct of the hermit crabs leads them to find in some coiled shell of a suitable size. On the slightest alarm the hermit crab retires backward into the shell, guarding the aperture of it with one claw, which is much larger than the other, the hard points of the feet also projecting a little. The whole struc- ture of the animal is adapted to such a habita- tion. The part which in the lobster becomes a finlike expansion at the end of the abdomen, be- comes in the hermit crab an appendage for firm- ly holding in the shell : and so well does the liermit crab hold that it may be pulled to pieces, but cannot be pulled out. Some species have suckers to render the hold more perfect. They
