Aeschines. All hail to the stout Thyonichus!
Thyonichus. As much to you, Aeschines.
Aeschines. How long it is since we met!
Thyonichus. Is it so long? But why, pray, this melancholy?
Aeschines. I am not in the best of luck, Thyonichus.
Thyonichus. ’Tis for that, then, you are so lean, and hence comes this long moustache, and these love-locks all adust. Just such a figure was a Pythagorean that came here of late, barefoot and wan,—and said he was an Athenian. Marry, he too was in love, methinks, with a plate of pancakes.
Aeschines. Friend, you will always have yourjest,—but beautiful Cynisca,—she flouts me! I shall go mad some day, when no man looks for it; I am but a hair’s-breadth on the hither side, even now.
Thyonichus. You are ever like this, dear Aeschines, now mad, now sad, and crying for all things at your whim. Yet, tell me, what is your new trouble?
Aeschines. The Argive, and I, and the Thessalian rough rider, Apis, and Cleunichus the free lance, were drinking together, at my farm. I had killed two chickens, and a sucking pig, and had opened the Bibline wine for them,—nearly four years old,—but fragrant as when it left the wine-press. Truffles and shellfish had been brought out, it was a jolly drinking match. And when things were now getting forwarder, we determined that each of us should toast whom he pleased, in unmixed wine, only he must name his toast. So we all drank, and called our toasts as had been agreed. Yet She said nothing, though I was there; how think you I liked that? ‘Won’t you call a toast? You have seen the wolf!’ some one said in jest, ‘as the proverb goes,’[72]then she kindled; yes, you could easily havelighted a lamp at her face. There is one Wolf, one Wolf there is, the son of Labes our neighbour,—he is tall, smooth-skinned, many think him handsome. His was that illustrious love in which she was pining, yes, and a breath about the business once came secretly to my ears, but I never looked into it, beshrew my beard!
Already, mark you, we four men were deep in our cups, when the Larissa man out of mere mischief, struck up, ‘My Wolf,’ some Thessalian catch, from the very beginning. Then Cynisca suddenly broke out weeping more bitterly than a six-year-old maid, that longs for her mother’s lap. Then I,—you know me, Thyonichus,—struck her on the cheek with clenched fist,—one two! She caught up her robes, and forth she rushed, quicker than she came. ‘Ah, my undoing’ (cried I), ‘I am not good enough for you, then—you have a dearer playfellow? well, be off and cherish your other lover, ’tis for him your tears run big as apples!’[73]
And as the swallow flies swiftly back to gather a morsel, fresh food, for her young ones under the eaves, still swifter sped she from her soft chair, straight through the vestibule and folding-doors, wherever her feet carried her. So, sure, the old proverb says, ‘the bull has sought the wild wood.’
Since then there are twenty days, and eightto these, and nine again, then ten others, to-day is the eleventh, add two more, and it is two months since we parted, and I have not shaved, not even in Thracian fashion.[74a]
And now Wolf is everything with her. Wolf finds the door open o’ nights, and I am of no account, not in the reckoning, like the wretched men of Megara, in the place dishonourable.[74b]
And if I could cease to love, the world would wag as well as may be. But now,—now,—as they say, Thyonichus, I am like the mouse that has tasted pitch. And what remedy there may be for a bootless love, I know not; except that Simus, he who was in love with the daughter of Epicalchus, went over seas, and came back heart-whole,—a man of my own age. And I too will cross the water, and prove not the first, maybe, nor the last, perhaps, but a fair soldier as times go.
Thyonichus. Would that things had gone to your mind, Aeschines. But if, in good earnest, you are thus set on going into exile,Ptolemyis the free man’s best paymaster!
Aeschines. And in other respects, what kind of man?
Thyonichus. The free man’s best paymaster! Indulgent too, the Muses’ darling, a true lover, the top of good company, knows his friends, and still better knows his enemies. A great giver to many, refuses nothing that he is asked which to give may beseem a king, but, Aeschines, we should not always be asking. Thus, if you are minded to pin up the top corner of your cloak over the right shoulder, and if you have the heart to stand steady on both feet, and bide the brunt of a hardy targeteer, off instantly to Egypt! From the temples downward we all wax grey, and on to the chin creeps the rime of age, men must do somewhat while their knees are yet nimble.
This famous idyl should rather,perhaps,be called a mimus.It describes the visit paid by two Syracusan women residing in Alexandria,to the festival of the resurrection of Adonis.The festival is given by Arsinoë,wife and sister of Ptolemy Philadelphus,and the poem cannot have been written earlier than his marriage,in266B.C.[?]Nothing can be more gay and natural than the chatter of the women,which has changed no more in two thousand years than the song of birds.Theocritus is believed to have had a model for this idyl in the Isthmiazusae of Sophron,an older poet.In the Isthmiazusae two ladies described the spectacle of the Isthmian games.
Gorgo. Is Praxinoë at home?
Praxinoë. Dear Gorgo, how long it is since you have been here! Sheisat home. The wonder is that you have got here at last! Eunoë, see that she has a chair. Throw a cushion on it too.
Gorgo. It does most charmingly as it is.
Praxinoë. Do sit down.
Gorgo. Oh, what a thing spirit is! I have scarcely got to you alive, Praxinoë! What a huge crowd, what hosts of four-in-hands! Everywhere cavalry boots, everywhere men inuniform! And the road is endless: yes, you really livetoofar away!
Praxinoë. It is all the fault of that madman of mine. Here he came to the ends of the earth and took—a hole, not a house, and all that we might not be neighbours. The jealous wretch, always the same, ever for spite!
Gorgo. Don’t talk of your husband, Dinon, like that, my dear girl, before the little boy,—look how he is staring at you! Never mind, Zopyrion, sweet child, she is not speaking about papa.
Praxinoë. Our Lady! the child takes notice.[77]
Gorgo. Nice papa!
Praxinoë. That papa of his the other day—we call every day ‘the other day’—went to get soap and rouge at the shop, and back he came to me with salt—the great big endless fellow!
Gorgo. Mine has the same trick, too, a perfect spendthrift—Diocleides! Yesterday he got what he meant for five fleeces, and paid seven shillings a piece for—what do you suppose?—dogskins, shreds of old leather wallets, mere trash—trouble on trouble. But come, take your cloak and shawl. Let us be off to the palace of rich Ptolemy, the King, to seethe Adonis; I hear the Queen has provided something splendid!
Praxinoë. Fine folks do everything finely.
Gorgo. What a tale you will have to tell about the things you have seen, to any one who has not seen them! It seems nearly time to go.
Praxinoë. Idlers have always holiday. Eunoë, bring the water and put it down in the middle of the room, lazy creature that you are. Cats like always to sleep soft![78a]Come, bustle, bring the water; quicker. I want water first, and how she carries it! give it me all the same; don’t pour out so much, you extravagant thing. Stupid girl! Why are you wetting my dress? There, stop, I have washed my hands, as heaven would have it. Where is the key of the big chest? Bring it here.
Gorgo. Praxinoë, that full body becomes you wonderfully. Tell me how much did the stuff cost you just off the loom?
Praxinoë. Don’t speak of it, Gorgo! More than eight pounds in good silver money,—and the work on it! I nearly slaved my soul out over it!
Gorgo. Well, it ismostsuccessful; all you could wish.[78b]
Praxinoë. Thanks for the pretty speech!Bring my shawl, and set my hat on my head, the fashionable way. No, child, I don’t mean to take you. Boo! Bogies! There’s a horse that bites! Cry as much as you please, but I cannot have you lamed. Let us be moving. Phrygia take the child, and keep him amused, call in the dog, and shut the street door.
[They go into the street.
Ye gods, what a crowd! How on earth are we ever to get through this coil? They are like ants that no one can measure or number. Many a good deed have you done, Ptolemy; since your father joined the immortals, there’s never a malefactor to spoil the passer-by, creeping on him in Egyptian fashion—oh! the tricks those perfect rascals used to play. Birds of a feather, ill jesters, scoundrels all! Dear Gorgo, what will become of us? Here come the King’s war-horses! My dear man, don’t trample on me. Look, the bay’s rearing, see, what temper! Eunoë, you foolhardy girl, will you never keep out of the way? The beast will kill the man that’s leading him. What a good thing it is for me that my brat stays safe at home.
Gorgo. Courage, Praxinoë. We are safe behind them, now, and they have gone to their station.
Praxinoë. There! I begin to be myself again. Ever since I was a child I have feared nothing so much as horses and the chilly snake. Come along, the huge mob is overflowing us.
Gorgo(to an old Woman). Are you from the Court, mother?
Old Woman. I am, my child.
Praxinoë. Is it easy to get there?
Old Woman. The Achaeans got into Troy by trying, my prettiest of ladies. Trying will do everything in the long run.
Gorgo. The old wife has spoken her oracles, and off she goes.
Praxinoë. Women know everything, yes, and how Zeus married Hera!
Gorgo. See Praxinoë, what a crowd there is about the doors.
Praxinoë. Monstrous, Gorgo! Give me your hand, and you, Eunoë, catch hold of Eutychis; never lose hold of her, for fear lest you get lost. Let us all go in together; Eunoë, clutch tight to me. Oh, how tiresome, Gorgo, my muslin veil is torn in two already! For heaven’s sake, sir, if you ever wish to be fortunate, take care of my shawl!
Stranger. I can hardly help myself, but for all that I will be as careful as I can.
Praxinoë. How close-packed the mob is, they hustle like a herd of swine.
Stranger. Courage, lady, all is well with us now.
Praxinoë. Both this year and for ever may all be well with you, my dear sir, for your care of us. A good kind man! We’re letting Eunoë get squeezed—come, wretched girl, push your way through. That is the way. We are all on the right side of the door, quoththe bridegroom, when he had shut himself in with his bride.
Gorgo. Do come here, Praxinoë. Look first at these embroideries. How light and how lovely! You will call them the garments of the gods.
Praxinoë. Lady Athene, what spinning women wrought them, what painters designed these drawings, so true they are? How naturally they stand and move, like living creatures, not patterns woven. What a clever thing is man! Ah, and himself—Adonis—how beautiful to behold he lies on his silver couch, with the first down on his cheeks, the thrice-beloved Adonis,—Adonis beloved even among the dead.
A Stranger. You weariful women, do cease your endless cooing talk! They bore one to death with their eternal broad vowels!
Gorgo. Indeed! And where may this person come from? What is it to you if wearechatterboxes! Give orders to your own servants, sir. Do you pretend to command ladies of Syracuse? If you must know, we are Corinthians by descent, like Bellerophon himself, and we speak Peloponnesian. Dorian women may lawfully speak Doric, I presume?
Praxinoë. Lady Persephone, never may we have more than one master. I am not afraid ofyourputting me on short commons.
Gorgo. Hush, hush, Praxinoë—the Argive woman’s daughter, the great singer, is beginning theAdonis; she that won the prize lastyear for dirge-singing.[82]I am sure she will give us something lovely; see, she is preluding with her airs and graces.
The Psalm of Adonis.
O Queen that lovest Golgi, and Idalium, and the steep of Eryx, O Aphrodite, that playest with gold, lo, from the stream eternal of Acheron they have brought back to thee Adonis—even in the twelfth month they have brought him, the dainty-footed Hours. Tardiest of the Immortals are the beloved Hours, but dear and desired they come, for always, to all mortals, they bring some gift with them. O Cypris, daughter of Diônê, from mortal to immortal, so men tell, thou hast changed Berenice, dropping softly in the woman’s breast the stuff of immortality.
Therefore, for thy delight, O thou of many names and many temples, doth the daughter of Berenice, even Arsinoë, lovely as Helen, cherish Adonis with all things beautiful.
Before him lie all ripe fruits that the tall trees’ branches bear, and the delicate gardens, arrayed in baskets of silver, and the golden vessels are full of incense of Syria. And all the dainty cakes that women fashion in the kneading-tray, mingling blossoms manifold with the white wheaten flour, all that is wrought of honey sweet, and in soft olive oil, all cakes fashioned in the semblance of things that fly,and of things that creep, lo, here they are set before him.
Here are built for him shadowy bowers of green, all laden with tender anise, and children flit overhead—the little Loves—as the young nightingales perched upon the trees fly forth and try their wings from bough to bough.
O the ebony, O the gold, O the twin eagles of white ivory that carry to Zeus the son of Cronos his darling, his cup-bearer! O the purple coverlet strewn above, more soft than sleep! So Miletus will say, and whoso feeds sheep in Samos.
Another bed is strewn for beautiful Adonis, one bed Cypris keeps, and one the rosy-armed Adonis. A bridegroom of eighteen or nineteen years is he, his kisses are not rough, the golden down being yet upon his lips! And now, good-night to Cypris, in the arms of her lover! But lo, in the morning we will all of us gather with the dew, and carry him forth among the waves that break upon the beach, and with locks unloosed, and ungirt raiment falling to the ankles, and bosoms bare will we begin our shrill sweet song.
Thou only, dear Adonis, so men tell, thou only of the demigods dost visit both this world and the stream of Acheron. For Agamemnon had no such lot, nor Aias, that mighty lord of the terrible anger, nor Hector, the eldest born of the twenty sons of Hecabe, nor Patroclus, nor Pyrrhus, that returned out of Troyland, nor the heroes of yet more ancient days, theLapithae and Deucalion’s sons, nor the sons of Pelops, and the chiefs of Pelasgian Argus. Be gracious now, dear Adonis, and propitious even in the coming year. Dear to us has thine advent been, Adonis, and dear shall it be when thou comest again.
Gorgo. Praxinoë, the woman is cleverer than we fancied! Happy woman to know so much, thrice happy to have so sweet a voice. Well, all the same, it is time to be making for home. Diocleides has not had his dinner, and the man is all vinegar,—don’t venture near him when he is kept waiting for dinner. Farewell, beloved Adonis, may you find us glad at your next coming!
In265B.C.Sicily was devastated by the Carthaginians,and by the companies of disciplined free-lances who called themselves Mamertines,or Mars’s men.The hopes of the Greek inhabitants of the island were centred in Hiero,son of Hierocles,who was about to besiege Messana(then held by the Carthaginians)and who had revived the courage of the Syracusans.To him Theocritus addressed this idyl,in which he complains of the sordid indifference of the rich,rehearses the merits of song,dilates on the true nature of wealth,and of the happy lift,and finally expresses his hope that Hiero will rid the isle of the foreign foe,and will restore peace and pastoral joys.The idyl contains some allusions to Simonides,the old lyric poet,and to his relations with the famous Hiero tyrant of Syracuse.
Everis this the care of the maidens of Zeus, ever the care of minstrels, to sing the Immortals, to sing the praises of noble men. The Muses, lo, are Goddesses, of Gods the Goddesses sing, but we on earth are mortal men; let us mortals sing of mortals. Ah, who of all them that dwell beneath the grey morning, will open his door and gladly receive our Graces within his house? who is there that will not send them back again without a gift? Andthey with looks askance, and naked feet come homewards, and sorely they upbraid me when they have gone on a vain journey, and listless again in the bottom of their empty coffer, they dwell with heads bowed over their chilly knees, where is their drear abode, when gainless they return.
Where is there such an one, among men to-day? Where is he that will befriend him that speaks his praises? I know not, for now no longer, as of old, are men eager to win the renown of noble deeds, nay, they are the slaves of gain! Each man clasps his hands below the purse-fold of his gown, and looks about to spy whence he may get him money: the very rust is too precious to be rubbed off for a gift. Nay, each has his ready saw;the shin is further than the knee;first let me get my own!’Tis the Gods’ affair to honour minstrels!Homer is enough for every one,who wants to hear any other?He is the best of bards who takes nothing that is mine.
O foolish men, in the store of gold uncounted, what gain have ye? Not in this do the wise find the true enjoyment of wealth, but in that they can indulge their own desires, and something bestow on one of the minstrels, and do good deeds to many of their kin, and to many another man; and always give altar-rites to the Gods, nor ever play the churlish host, but kindly entreat the guest at table, and speed him when he would be gone. And this, above all, to honour the holy interpreters of theMuses, that so thou mayest have a goodly fame, even when hidden in Hades, nor ever moan without renown by the chill water of Acheron, like one whose palms the spade has hardened, some landless man bewailing the poverty that is all his heritage.
Many were the thralls that in the palace of Antiochus, and of king Aleuas drew out their monthly dole, many the calves that were driven to the penns of the Scopiadae, and lowed with the horned kine: countless on the Crannonian plain did shepherds pasture beneath the sky the choicest sheep of the hospitable Creondae, yet from all this they had no joy, when once into the wide raft of hateful Acheron they had breathed sweet life away! Yea, unremembered (though they had left all that rich store), for ages long would they have lain among the dead forlorn, if a name among later men the skilled Ceian minstrel had spared to bestow, singing his bright songs to a harp of many strings. Honour too was won by the swift steeds that came home to them crowned from the sacred contests.
And who would ever have known the Lycian champions of time past, who Priam’s long-haired sons, and Cycnus, white of skin as a maiden, if minstrels had not chanted of the war cries of the old heroes? Nor would Odysseus have won his lasting glory, for all his ten years wandering among all folks; and despite the visit he paid, he a living man, to inmost Hades, and for all his escape from the murderousCyclops’s cave,—unheard too were the names of the swineherd Eumaeus, and of Philoetius, busy with the kine of the herds; yea, and even of Laertes, high of heart; if the songs of the Ionian man had not kept them in renown.
From the Muses comes a goodly report to men, but the living heirs devour the possessions of the dead. But, lo, it is as light labour to count the waves upon the beach, as many as wind and grey sea-tide roll upon the shore, or in violet-hued water to cleanse away the stain from a potsherd, as to win favour from a man that is smitten with the greed of gain. Good-day to such an one, and countless be his coin, and ever may he be possessed by a longing desire for more! But I for my part would choose honour and the loving-kindness of men, far before wealth in mules and horses.
I am seeking to what mortal I may come, a welcome guest, with the help of the Muses, for hard indeed do minstrels find the ways, who go uncompanioned by the daughters of deep-counselling Zeus. Not yet is the heaven aweary of rolling the months onwards, and the years, and many a horse shall yet whirl the chariot wheels, and the man shall yet be found, who will take me for his minstrel; a man of deeds like those that great Achilles wrought, or puissant Aias, in the plain of Simois, where is the tomb of Phrygian Ilus.
Even now the Phoenicians that dwell beneath the setting sun on the spur of Libya, shudder for dread, even now the Syracusanspoise lances in rest, and their arms are burdened by the linden shields. Among them Hiero, like the mighty men of old, girds himself for fight, and the horse-hair crest is shadowing his helmet. Ah, Zeus, our father renowned, and ah, lady Athene, and O thou Maiden that with the Mother dost possess the great burg of the rich Ephyreans, by the water of Lusimeleia,[89]would that dire necessity may drive our foemen from the isle, along the Sardinian wave, to tell the doom of their friends to children and to wives—messengers easy to number out of so many warriors! But as for our cities may they again be held by their ancient masters,—all the cities that hostile hands have utterly spoiled. May our people till the flowering fields, and may thousands of sheep unnumbered fatten ’mid the herbage, and bleat along the plain, while the kine as they come in droves to the stalls warn the belated traveller to hasten on his way. May the fallows be broken for the seed-time, while the cicala, watching the shepherds as they toil in the sun, in the shade of the trees doth sing on the topmost sprays. May spiders weave their delicate webs over martial gear, may none any more so much as name the cry of onset!
But the fame of Hiero may minstrels bear aloft, across the Scythian sea, and where Semiramis reigned, that built the mighty wall,and made it fast with slime for mortar. I am but one of many that are loved by the daughters of Zeus, and they all are fain to sing of Sicilian Arethusa, with the people of the isle, and the warrior Hiero. O Graces, ye Goddesses, adored of Eteocles, ye that love Orchomenos of the Minyae, the ancient enemy of Thebes, when no man bids me, let me abide at home, but to the houses of such as bid me, boldly let me come with my Muses. Nay, neither the Muses nor you Graces will I leave behind, for without the Graces what have men that is desirable? with the Graces of song may I dwell for ever!
The poet praises Ptolemy Philadelphus in a strain of almost religious adoration.Hauler,in his Life of Theocritus,dates the poem about259B.C.,but it may have been many years earlier.
FromZeus let us begin, and with Zeus make end, ye Muses, whensoever we chant in songs the chiefest of immortals! But of men, again, let Ptolemy be named, among the foremost, and last, and in the midmost place, for of men he hath the pre-eminence. The heroes that in old days were begotten of the demigods, wrought noble deeds, and chanced on minstrels skilled, but I, with what skill I have in song, would fain make my hymn of Ptolemy, and hymns are the glorious meed, yea, of the very immortals.
When the feller hath come up to wooded Ida, he glances around, so many are the trees, to see whence he should begin his labour. Where first shallIbegin the tale, for there are countless things ready for the telling, wherewith the Gods have graced the most excellent of kings?
Even by virtue of his sires, how mighty was he to accomplish some great work,—Ptolemyson of Lagus,—when he had stored in his mind such a design, as no other man was able even to devise! Him hath the Father stablished in the same honour as the blessed immortals, and for him a golden mansion in the house of Zeus is builded; beside him is throned Alexander, that dearly loves him, Alexander, a grievous god to the white-turbaned Persians.
And over against them is set the throne of Heracles, the slayer of the Bull, wrought of stubborn adamant. There holds he festival with the rest of the heavenly host, rejoicing exceedingly in his far-off children’s children, for that the son of Cronos hath taken old age clean away from their limbs, and they are called immortals, being his offspring. For the strong son of Heracles is ancestor of the twain, I and both are reckoned to Heracles, on the utmost of the lineage.
Therefore when he hath now had his fill of fragrant nectar, and is going from the feast to the bower of his bed-fellow dear, to one of his children he gives his bow, and the quiver that swings beneath his elbow, to the other his knotted mace of iron. Then they to the ambrosial bower of white-ankled Hera, convey the weapons and the bearded son of Zeus.
Again, how shone renowned Berenice among the wise of womankind, how great a boon was she to them that begat her! Yea, in her fragrant breast did the Lady of Cyprus, the queenly daughter of Dione, lay her slender hands, wherefore they say that never anywoman brought man such delight as came from the love borne to his wife by Ptolemy. And verily he was loved again with far greater love, and in such a wedlock a man may well trust all his house to his children, whensoever he goes to the bed of one that loves him as he loves her. But the mind of a woman that loves not is set ever on a stranger, and she hath children at her desire, but they are never like the father.
O thou that amongst the Goddesses hast the prize of beauty, O Lady Aphrodite, thy care was she, and by thy favour the lovely Berenice crossed not Acheron, the river of mourning, but thou didst catch her away, ere she came to the dark water, and to the still-detested ferryman of souls outworn, and in thy temple didst thou instal her, and gavest her a share of thy worship. Kindly is she to all mortals, and she breathes into them soft desires, and she lightens the cares of him that is in longing.
O dark-browed lady of Argos,[93]in wedlock with Tydeus didst thou bear slaying Diomede, a hero of Calydon, and, again, deep-bosomed Thetis to Peleus, son of Aeacus, bare the spearman Achilles. But thee, O warrior Ptolemy, to Ptolemy the warrior bare the glorious Berenice! And Cos did foster thee, when thou wert still a child new-born, and received thee at thy mother’s hand, when thou saw’st thy first dawning. For there she called aloud on Eilithyia, loosener of the girdle; she called,the daughter of Antigone, when heavy on her came the pangs of childbirth. And Eilithyia was present to help her, and so poured over all her limbs release from pain. Then the beloved child was born, his father’s very counterpart. And Cos brake forth into a cry, when she beheld it, and touching the child with kind hands, she said:
‘Blessed, O child, mayst thou be, and me mayst thou honour even as Phoebus Apollo honours Delos of the azure crown, yea, stablish in the same renown the Triopean hill, and allot such glory to the Dorians dwelling nigh, as that wherewithal Prince Apollo favours Rhenaea.’
Lo, thus spake the Isle, but far aloft under the clouds a great eagle screamed thrice aloud, the ominous bird of Zeus. This sign, methinks, was of Zeus; Zeus, the son of Cronos, in his care hath awful kings, but he is above all, whom Zeus loved from the first, even from his birth. Great fortune goes with him, and much land he rules, and wide sea.
Countless are the lands, and tribes of men innumerable win increase of the soil that waxeth under the rain of Zeus, but no land brings forth so much as low-lying Egypt, when Nile wells up and breaks the sodden soil. Nor is there any land that hath so many towns of men skilled in handiwork; therein are three centuries of cities builded, and thousands three, and to these three myriads, and cities twice three, and beside these, three times nine, and over them all high-hearted Ptolemy is king.
Yea, and he taketh him a portion of Phoenicia, and of Arabia, and of Syria, and of Libya, and the black Aethiopians. And he is lord of all the Pamphylians, and the Cilician warriors, and the Lycians, and the Carians, that joy in battle, and lord of the isles of the Cyclades,—since his are the best of ships that sail over the deep,—yea, all the sea, and land and the sounding rivers are ruled by Ptolemy. Many are his horsemen, and many his targeteers that go clanging in harness of shining bronze. And in weight of wealth he surpasses all kings; such treasure comes day by day from every side to his rich palace, while the people are busy about their labours in peace. For never hath a foeman marched up the bank of teaming Nile, and raised the cry of war in villages not his own, nor hath any cuirassed enemy leaped ashore from his swift ship, to harry the kine of Egypt. So mighty a hero hath his throne established in the broad plains, even Ptolemy of the fair hair, a spearman skilled, whose care is above all, as a good king’s should be, to keep all the heritage of his fathers, and yet more he himself doth win. Nay, nor useless inhiswealthy house, is the gold, like piled stores of the still toilsome ants, but the glorious temples of the gods have their rich share, for constant first-fruits he renders, with many another due, and much is lavished on mighty kings, much on cities, much on faithful friends. And never to the sacred contests of Dionysus comes any man that is skilled to raise the shrillsweet song, but Ptolemy gives him a guerdon worthy of his art. And the interpreters of the Muses sing of Ptolemy, in return for his favours. Nay, what fairer thing might befall a wealthy man, than to win a goodly renown among mortals?
This abides even by the sons of Atreus, but all those countless treasures that they won, when they took the mighty house of Priam, are hidden away in the mist, whence there is no returning.
Ptolemy alone presses his own feet in the footmarks, yet glowing in the dust, of his fathers that were before him. To his mother dear, and his father he hath stablished fragrant temples; therein has he set their images, splendid with gold and ivory, to succour all earthly men. And many fat thighs of kine doth he burn on the empurpled altars, as the months roll by, he and his stately wife; no nobler lady did ever embrace a bridegroom in the halls, who loves, with her whole heart, her brother, her lord. On this wise was the holy bridal of the Immortals, too, accomplished, even of the pair that great Rhea bore, the rulers of Olympus; and one bed for the slumber of Zeus and of Hera doth Iris strew, with myrrh-anointed hands, the virgin Iris.
Prince Ptolemy, farewell, and of thee will I make mention, even as of the other demigods; and a word methinks I will utter not to be rejected of men yet unborn,—excellence, howbeit, thou shalt gain from Zeus.
This epithalamium may have been written for the wedding of a friend of the poet’s.The idea is said to have been borrowed from an old poem by Stesichorus.The epithalamium was chanted at night by a chorus of girls,outside the bridal chamber.Compare the conclusion of the hymn of Adonis,in the fifteenth Idyl.
InSparta, once, to the house of fair-haired Menelaus, came maidens with the blooming hyacinth in their hair, and before the new painted chamber arrayed their dance,—twelve maidens, the first in the city, the glory of Laconian girls,—what time the younger Atrides had wooed and won Helen, and closed the door of the bridal-bower on the beloved daughter of Tyndarus. Then sang they all in harmony, beating time with woven paces, and the house rang round with the bridal song.
The Chorus.
Thus early art thou sleeping, dear bridegroom, say are thy limbs heavy with slumber, or art thou all too fond of sleep, or hadst thou perchance drunken over well, ere thou didstfling thee to thy rest? Thou shouldst have slept betimes, and alone, if thou wert so fain of sleep; thou shouldst have left the maiden with maidens beside her mother dear, to play till deep in the dawn, for to-morrow, and next day, and for all the years, Menelaus, she is thy bride.
O happy bridegroom, some good spirit sneezed out on thee a blessing, as thou wert approaching Sparta whither went the other princes, that so thou mightst win thy desire! Alone among the demigods shalt thou have Zeus for father! Yea, and the daughter of Zeus has come beneath one coverlet with thee, so fair a lady, peerless among all Achaean women that walk the earth. Surely a wondrous child would she bear thee, if she bore one like the mother!
For lo, we maidens are all of like age with her, and one course we were wont to run, anointed in manly fashion, by the baths of Eurotas. Four times sixty girls were we, the maiden flower of the land,[98]but of us all not one was faultless, when matched with Helen.
As the rising Dawn shows forth her fairer face than thine, O Night, or as the bright Spring, when Winter relaxes his hold, even so amongst us still she shone, the golden Helen. Even as the crops spring up, the glory of the rich plough land; or, as is the cypress in the garden; or, in a chariot, a horse of Thessalianbreed, even so is rose-red Helen the glory of Lacedaemon. No other in her basket of wool winds forth such goodly work, and none cuts out, from between the mighty beams, a closer warp than that her shuttle weaves in the carven loom. Yea, and of a truth none other smites the lyre, hymning Artemis and broad-breasted Athene, with such skill as Helen, within whose eyes dwell all the Loves.
O fair, O gracious damsel, even now art thou a wedded wife; but we will go forth right early to the course we ran, and to the grassy meadows, to gather sweet-breathing coronals of flowers, thinking often upon thee, Helen, even as youngling lambs that miss the teats of the mother-ewe. For thee first will we twine a wreath of lotus flowers that lowly grow, and hang it on a shadowy plane tree, for thee first will we take soft oil from the silver phial, and drop it beneath a shadowy plane tree, and letters will we grave on the bark, in Dorian wise, so that the wayfarer may read:
WORSHIP ME, I AM THE TREE OF HELEN.
WORSHIP ME, I AM THE TREE OF HELEN.
Good night, thou bride, good night, thou groom that hast won a mighty sire! May Leto, Leto, the nurse of noble offspring, give you the blessing of children; and may Cypris, divine Cypris, grant you equal love, to cherish each the other; and may Zeus, even Zeus the son of Cronos, give you wealth imperishable, to be handed down from generation to generation of the princes.
Sleep ye, breathing love and desire each into the other’s breast, but forget not to wake in the dawning, and at dawn we too will come, when the earliest cock shrills from his perch, and raises his feathered neck.
Hymen,O Hymenae,rejoice thou in this bridal.
This little piece is but doubtfully ascribed to Theocritus.The motif is that of a well-known Anacreontic Ode.The idyl has been translated by Ronsard.
Thethievish Love,—a cruel bee once stung him, as he was rifling honey from the hives, and pricked his finger-tips all; then he was in pain, and blew upon his hand, and leaped, and stamped the ground. And then he showed his hurt to Aphrodite, and made much complaint, how that the bee is a tiny creature, and yet what wounds it deals! And his mother laughed out, and said, ‘Art thou not even such a creature as the bees, for tiny art thou, but what wounds thou dealest!’
A herdsman,who had been contemptuously rejected by Eunica,a girl of the town,protests that he is beautiful,and that Eunica is prouder than Cybele,Selene,and Aphrodite,all of whom loved mortal herdsmen.For grammatical and other reasons,some critics consider this idyl apocryphal.
Eunicalaughed out at me when sweetly I would have kissed her, and taunting me, thus she spoke: ‘Get thee gone from me! Wouldst thou kiss me, wretch; thou—a neatherd? I never learned to kiss in country fashion, but to press lips with city gentlefolks. Never hope to kiss my lovely mouth, nay, not even in a dream. How thou dost look, what chatter is thine, how countrified thy tricks are, how delicate thy talk, how easy thy tattle! And then thy beard—so soft! thy elegant hair! Why, thy lips are like some sick man’s, thy hands are black, and thou art of evil savour. Away with thee, lest thy presence soil me!’ These taunts she mouthed, and thrice spat in the breast of her gown, and stared at me all over from head to feet; shooting out her lips, and glancing with half-shut eyes, writhing her beautiful body, and sosneered, and laughed me to scorn. And instantly my blood boiled, and I grew red under the sting, as a rose with dew. And she went off and left me, but I bear angry pride deep in my heart, that I, the handsome shepherd, should have been mocked by a wretched light-o’-love.
Shepherds, tell me the very truth; am I not beautiful? Has some God changed me suddenly to another man? Surely a sweet grace ever blossomed round me, till this hour, like ivy round a tree, and covered my chin, and about my temples fell my locks, like curling parsley-leaves, and white shone my forehead above my dark eyebrows. Mine eyes were brighter far than the glance of the grey-eyed Athene, my mouth than even pressed milk was sweeter, and from my lips my voice flowed sweeter than honey from the honeycomb. Sweet too, is my music, whether I make melody on pipe, or discourse on the flute, or reed, or flageolet. And all the mountain-maidens call me beautiful, and they would kiss me, all of them. But the city girl did not kiss me, but ran past me, because I am a neatherd, and she never heard how fair Dionysus in the dells doth drive the calves, and knows not that Cypris was wild with love for a herdsman, and drove afield in the mountains of Phrygia; ay, and Adonis himself,—in the oakwood she kissed, in the oakwood she bewailed him. And what was Endymion? was he not a neatherd? whom nevertheless as he watched hisherds Selene saw and loved, and from Olympus descending she came to the Latmian glade, and lay in one couch with the boy; and thou, Rhea, dust weep for thy herdsman.
And didst not thou, too, Son of Cronos, take the shape of a wandering bird, and all for a cowherd boy?
But Eunica alone would not kiss the herdsman; Eunica, she that is greater than Cybele, and Cypris, and Selene!
Well, Cypris, never mayst thou, in city or on hillside, kiss thy darling,[104]and lonely all the long night mayst thou sleep!
After some verses addressed to Diophantus,a friend about whom nothing is known,the poet describes the toilsome life of two old fishermen.One of them has dreamed of catching a golden fish,and has sworn,in his dream,never again to tempt the sea.The other reminds him that his oath is as empty as his vision,and that he must angle for common fish,if he would not starve among his golden dreams.The idyl is,unfortunately,corrupt beyond hope of certain correction.