Chapter XXI: The Anthology (1)

The History of its Compilation.--Collections of Meleager,
Philippus, Agathias, Cephalas, Planudes.--The Palatine
MS.--The Sections of the Anthology.--Dedicatory
Epigrams.--Simonides.--Epitaphs: Real and
Literary.--Callimachus.--Epigrams on Poets.--Antipater
of Sidon.--Hortatory Epigrams.--Palladas.--Satiric
Epigrams.--Lucillius.--Amatory Epigrams.--Meleager,
Straton, Philodemus, Antipater, Rufinus, Paulus
Silentiarius, Agathias, Plato.--Descriptive Epigrams.

The Anthology may from some points of view be regarded as the most valuable relic of antique literature which we possess. Composed of several thousand short poems, written for the most part in the elegiac metre, at different times and by a multitude of authors, it is coextensive with the whole current of Greek history, from the splendid period of the Persian war to the decadence of Christianized Byzantium. Many subjects of interest in Greek life, which would otherwise have had to be laboriously illustrated from the historians or the comic poets, are here fully and melodiously set forth. If we might compare the study of Greek literature to a journey in some splendid mountain region, then we might say with propriety that from the sparkling summits where Æschylus and Sophocles and Pindar sit enthroned we turn in our less strenuous moods to gather the meadow flowers of Meleager, Palladas, Callimachus. Placing them between the leaves of the book of our memory, we possess an everlasting treasure of sweet thoughts, which will serve in after-days to remind us of those scenes of Olympian majesty through which we travelled. The slight effusions of these minor poets are even nearer to our hearts than the masterpieces of the noblest Greek literature. They treat with a touching limpidity and sweetness of the joys and fears and hopes and sorrows that are common to all humanity. They introduce us to the actual life of a bygone civilization, stripped of its political or religious accidents, and tell us that the Greeks of Athens or of Sidon thought and felt exactly as we feel. Even the _Graffiti_ of Pompeii have scarcely more power to reconstruct the past and summon as in dreams the voices and the forms of long-since-buried men. There is yet another way in which the Anthology brings us closer to the Greeks than any other portion of their literature. The lyrists express an intense and exalted mood of the race in its divine adolescence. The tragedians exhibit the genius of Athens in its maturity. The idyllists utter a rich nightingale note from the woods and fields of Sicily. But the Anthology carries us through all the phases of Hellenic civilization upon its uninterrupted undercurrent of elegiac melody. The clear fresh light of the morning, the splendor of noonday, the mellow tints of sunset, and the sad gray hues of evening are all there. It is a tree which bears the leaves and buds and blossoms and fruitage of the Greek spirit on its boughs at once. Many intervals in the life of the nation which are represented by no other portion of its literature--the ending, for example, of the first century before Christ--here receive a brilliant illustration. Again, there is no more signal proof of the cosmopolitan nature of the later Greek culture than is afforded by the Anthology. From Rome, Alexandria, Palestine, Byzantium, no less than from the isles and continent of Greece, are recruited the poets, whose works are enshrined in this precious golden treasury of fugitive pieces.

The history of the Anthology is not without interest. By a gradual process of compilation and accretion it grew into its present form from very slight beginnings. The first impulse to collect epigrams seems to have originated in connection with archæology. From the very earliest the Greeks were in the habit of engraving sentences, for the most part in verse, upon their temples, statues, trophies, tombs, and public monuments of all kinds. Many of these inscriptions were used by Herodotus and Thucydides as authorities for facts and dates. But about 200 B.C. one Polemon made a general collection of the authentic epigrams to be found upon the public buildings of the Greek cities. After him Alcetas copied the dedicatory verses at Delphi. Similar collections are ascribed to Mnestor and Apellas Ponticus. Aristodemus is mentioned as the compiler of the epigrams of Thebes. Philochorus performed the same service for Athens. Neoptolemus of Paros and the philosopher Euhemerus are also credited with similar antiquarian labors. So far, the collectors of epigrams had devoted themselves to historical monuments; and of their work, in any separate form at least, no trace exists. But Meleager of Gadara (B.C. 60) conceived the notion of arranging in alphabetical order a selection of lyric and erotic poetry, which he dedicated to his friend Diocles. He called this compilation by the name of #stephanos#, or wreath, each of the forty-six poets whom he admitted into his book being represented by a flower. Philip of Thessalonica, in the time of Trajan, following his example, incorporated into the garland of Meleager those epigrams which had acquired celebrity in the interval. About the same time or a little later, Straton of Sardis made a special anthology of poems on one class of subjects, which is known as the #mousa paidikê#, and into which, besides ninety-eight of his own epigrams, he admitted many of the compositions of Meleager, Philip, and other predecessors. These collections belong to the classical period of Greek literature. But the Anthology, as we possess it, had not yet come into existence. It remained for Agathias, a Byzantine Greek of the age of Justinian, to undertake a comprehensive compilation from all the previous collections. After adding numerous poems of a date posterior to Straton, especially those of Paulus Silentiarius, Macedonius, Rufinus, and himself, he edited his #kyklos epigrammatôn#, divided into seven books. The first book contained dedicatory epigrams, the second descriptive poems, the third epitaphs, the fourth reflections on the various events of life, the fifth satires, the sixth erotic verses, the seventh exhortations to enjoyment. Upon the general outline of the Anthology as arranged by Agathias two subsequent collections were founded. Constantinus Cephalas, in the tenth century, at Byzantium, and in the reign of Constantinus Porphyrogenitus, undertook a complete revision and recombination of all pre-existing anthologies. With the patience of a literary bookworm, to whom the splendid libraries of the metropolis were accessible, he set about his work, and gave to the Greek anthology that form which it now bears. But the vicissitudes of the Anthology did not terminate with the labors of Cephalas. Early in the fourteenth century a monk, Planudes, set to work upon a new edition. It appears that he contented himself with compiling and abridging from the collection of Cephalas. His principal object was to expurgate it from impurities and to supersede it by what he considered a more edifying text. Accordingly he emended, castrated, omitted, interpolated, altered, and remodelled at his own sweet will: "non magis disposuit quam mutilavit et ut ita dicam castravit hunc librum, detractis lascivioribus epigrammatis, ut ipse gloriatur," says Lascaris in the preface to his edition of the Planudean Anthology.[163] He succeeded, however, to the height of his desire; for copies ceased to be made of the Anthology of Cephalas; and when Europe in the fifteenth century awoke to the study of Greek literature, no other collection but that of Planudes was known. Fortunately for this most precious relic of antiquity, there did exist one exemplar of the Anthology of Cephalas. Having escaped the search of Poggio, Aurispa, Filelfo, Poliziano, and of all the emissaries whom the Medici employed in ransacking the treasure-houses of Europe, this unique manuscript was at last discovered in 1606 by Claude de Saumaise, better known as Milton's antagonist Salmasius, in the Palatine Library at Heidelberg. A glance at this treasure assured the young scholar--for Saumaise was then aged only twenty-two--that he had made one of the most important discoveries which remained within the reach of modern students. He spent years in preparing a critical edition of its text; but all his work was thrown away, for the Leyden publishers to whom he applied refused to publish the Greek without a Latin version, and death overtook him before he had completed the requisite labor. Meanwhile the famous Palatine MS. had been transferred, after the sack of Heidelberg in 1623, to the Vatican, as a present to Pope Gregory XV. Isaac Voss, the rival of Saumaise, induced one Lucas Langermann to undertake a journey to Rome, in order that he might make a faithful transcript of the MS. and publish it, to the annoyance of the great French scholar. But Saumaise dying in 1653, the work, undertaken from motives of jealousy, was suspended. The MS. reposed still upon the shelves of the Vatican Library; and in 1776 the Abbé Giuseppe Spalletti completed a trustworthy copy of its pages, which was bought by Ernest, Duke of Gotha and Altenburg, for his library. In the year 1797 the MS. itself was transferred to Paris after the treaty of Tolentino; and in 1815 it was restored to Heidelberg, where it now reposes. Meanwhile Brunck had published, from copies of this MS., the greater portion of the Anthology in his _Analecta Veterum Poetarum Græcorum_; and Jacobs, between 1794 and 1814, had edited the whole collection with minutest accuracy upon the faith of the Abbé Spalletti's exemplar. The edition of Didot, to which I shall refer in my examination of the Anthology,[164] is based not only on the labors of Brunck and Jacobs, but also upon the MSS. of the unfortunate Chardon de la Rochette, who, after spending many years of his life in the illustration of the Anthology of Cephalas, was forced in old age to sell his collections for a small sum. They passed in 1836 into the possession of the (then) Imperial Library.

The Palatine MS., which is our sole authority for the Anthology as arranged by Cephalas, is a 4to parchment of 710 pages. It has been written by different hands, at different times, and on different plans of arrangement. The index does not always agree with the contents, but seems to be that of an older collection, of which the one we possess is an imperfect copy. Yet Cephalas is often mentioned, and always with affectionate reverence, by the transcribers of the MS. In one place he is called #ho makarios kai aeimnêstos kai tripothêtos anthrôpos#, "the blessed man, who is ever to be held in thrice affectionate and longing recollection," the sentiment of which words we in the middle of this nineteenth century may most cordially echo.

The first section of the Anthology is devoted to Christian epigrams upon the chief religious monuments and statues of Byzantium. However these may interest the ecclesiastical student, they have no value for a critic of Greek poetry. The second section consists of a poem in hexameters upon the statues which adorned the gymnasium of Zeuxippus. Some conception may be formed, after the perusal of this very pedestrian composition, of the art treasures which Byzantium contained in the fifth century. Authentic portraits of the great poets and philosophers of Greece, as well as works of imagination illustrative of the _Iliad_ and the Attic tragedies, might then be studied in one place of public resort. Byzantium had become a vast museum for the ancient world. The third section is devoted to mural inscriptions from the temple of Apollonis in Cyzicus. The fourth contains the prefaces of Meleager, Philip, and Agathias, to their several collections. The fifth, which includes 309 epigrams, is consecrated to erotic poetry. The sixth, which numbers 358, consists of a collection of inscriptions from temples and public monuments recording the illustrious actions of the Greeks or votive offerings of private persons. In the seventh we read 748 epitaphs of various sorts. The eighth carries us again into the dismal region of post-pagan literature: it contains nothing but 254 poems from the pen of Saint Gregory the Theologian. The 827 epigrams of the ninth section are called by their collector #epideiktika#; that is to say, they are composed in illustration of a variety of subjects, anecdotical, rhetorical, and of general interest. Perhaps this part of the whole Anthology has been the favorite of modern imitators and translators. Passing to the tenth section, we find 126 semi-philosophical poems, most of which record the vanity of human life and advise mortals to make the best of their brief existence by enjoyment. The eleventh is devoted to satire. It is here that the reflex influence of Latin on Greek literature is most perceptible. The twelfth section bears the name of Straton, and exhibits in its 258 epigrams the morality of ancient Hellas under the aspect which has least attraction for modern readers. The thirteenth embraces a few epigrams in irregular metres. The fourteenth is made up of riddles and oracles. The fifteenth, again, has half a century of poems which could not well be catalogued elsewhere. The sixteenth contains that part of the Planudean collection which does not occur in our copy of the Anthology of Cephalas. It may be mentioned in conclusion that, with one or two very inconsiderable exceptions, none of the poems of the early Greek lyrists and Gnomic writers are received into the so-called Anthology.

To the student of Greek history and Greek customs no section of the Anthology is more interesting than that which includes the #epigrammata anathêmatika#, the record of the public and the private votive offerings in Hellas. Here, as in a scroll spread out before us, in the silver language of the great Simonides,[165] may be read the history of the achievements of the Greeks against Xerxes and his hosts. The heroes of Marathon, the heroes of Thermopylæ, Megistias the soothsayer, Leonidas the king, Pausanias the general, the seamen of Salamis, the Athenian cavalry, the Spartans of Platæa--all receive their special tribute of august celebration at the hands of the poet who best knew how to suit simple words to splendid actions. Again, the #stêlê# which commemorated in Athens the patriotic tyrannicide of Aristogeiton, the statue of Pan which Miltiades after Marathon consecrated in honor of his victory, the trophies erected by Pausanias at Delphi to Phoebus, the altar to Zeus Eleutherios dedicated in common by all the Greeks, the tripod sent to Delphi by Gelon and the other tyrants of Sicily after their victory over the Carthaginians, for each and all of these Simonides was called on to compose imperishable verse. Our heart trembles even now when we read such lines as these:

#ô xein' angellein Lakedaimoniois hoti têide
keimetha tois keinôn rhêmasi peithomenoi.#[166]

And who does not feel that the grandeur of the occasion exalts above all suspicion of prosiness the frigid simplicity of the following?

#tonde poth' Hellênes rhômêi cheros, ergôi Arêos,
eutolmôi psychês lêmati peithomenoi,
Persas exelasantes, eleutheron Helladi kosmon
hidrysanto Dios bômon Eleutheriou.#[167]

But it is not merely within the sphere of world-famous history that the dedicatory epigrams are interesting. Multitudes of them introduce us to the minutest facts of private life in Greece. We see the statues of gods hung round with flowers and scrolls, the shrines filled with waxen tablets, wayside chapels erected to Priapus or to Pan, the gods of the shore honored with dripping clothes of mariners, the Paphian home of Aphrodite rich with jewels and with mirrors and with silks suspended by devout adorers of both sexes. A fashionable church in modern Italy--the Annunziata at Florence, for example, or St. Anthony at Padua--is not more crowded with pictures of people saved from accidents, with silver hearts and waxen limbs, with ribbons and artificial flowers, with rosaries and precious stones, and with innumerable objects that only tell their tale of bygone vows to the votary who hung them there, than were the temples of our Lady of Love in Cneidos or in Corinth. In the epigrams before us we read how hunters hung their nets to Pan, and fishermen their gear to Poseidon; gardeners their figs and pomegranates to Priapus; blacksmiths their hammers and tongs to Hephæstus. Stags are dedicated to Artemis and Phoebus, and corn-sheaves to Demeter, who also receives the plough, the sickle, and the oxen of farmers. A poor man offers the produce of his field to Pan; the first-fruits of the vine are set aside for Bacchus and his crew of satyrs; Pallas obtains the shuttle of a widow who resolves to quit her life of care and turn to Aphrodite; the eunuch Alexis offers his cymbals, drums, flutes, knife, and golden curls to Cybele. Phoebus is presented with a golden cicada, Zeus with an old ash spear that has seen service, Ares with a shield and cuirass. A poet dedicates roses to the maids of Helicon and laurel-wreaths to Apollo. Scribes offer their pens and ink and pumice-stone to Hermes; cooks hang up their pots and pans and spits to the Mercury of the kitchen. Withered crowns and revel-cups are laid upon the shrine of Lais; Anchises suspends his white hair to Aphrodite, Endymion his bed and coverlet to Artemis, Daphnis his club to Pan. Agathias inscribes his _Daphniaca_ to the Paphian queen. Prexidike has an embroidered dress to dedicate. Alkibie offers her hair to Here, Lais her mirror to Aphrodite, Krobylus his boy's curls to Apollo, Charixeinos his long tresses to the nymphs. Meleager yields the lamp of his love-hours to Venus; Lucillius vows his hair after shipwreck to the sea-gods; Evanthe gives her thyrsus and stag's hide to Bacchus. Women erect altars to Eleithuia and Asclepius after childbirth. Sophocles dedicates a thanksgiving shrine for poetic victories. Simonides and Bacchylides record their triumphs upon votive tablets. Gallus, saved from a lion, consecrates his hair and vestments to the queen of Dindymus. Prostitutes abandon their ornaments to Kupris on their marriage. The effeminate Statullion bequeaths his false curls and flutes and silken wardrobe to Priapus. Sailors offer a huge cuttlefish to the sea-deities. An Isthmian victor suspends his bit, bridle, spurs, and whip to Poseidon. A boy emerging into manhood leaves his petasos and strigil and chlamys to Hermes, the god of games. Phryne dedicates winged Eros as the first-fruits of her earnings. Hadrian celebrates the trophies erected by Trajan to Zeus. Theocritus writes inscriptions for Uranian Aphrodite in the house of his friend Amphicles, for the Bacchic tripod of Damomenes, and for the marble muse of Xenocles. Erinna dedicates the picture of Agatharkis. Melinna, Sabæthis, and Mikythus are distinguished by poems placed beneath their portraits. There is even a poem on the picture of a hernia dedicated apparently in some Asclepian shrine; and a traveller erects the brazen image of a frog in thanksgiving for a draught of wayside water. Cleonymus consecrates the statues of the nymphs:

#hai tade benthê
ambrosiai rhodeois steibete possin aei.#

Ambrosial nymphs, who always tread these watery deeps with
roseate feet.

It will be seen by this rapid enumeration that a good many of the dedicatory epigrams are really epideictic or rhetorical; that is to say, they are written on imaginary subjects. But the large majority undoubtedly record such votive offerings as were common enough in Greece with or without epigrams to grace them.

What I have just said about the distinction between real and literary epigrams composed for dedications applies still more to the epitaphs. These divide themselves into two well-marked classes: 1. Actual sepulchral inscriptions or poems written immediately upon the death of persons contemporary with the author; and, 2. Literary exercises in the composition of verses appropriate to the tombs of celebrated historical or mythical characters. To the first class belong the beautiful epitaphs of Meleager upon Clearista (i. 307), upon Heliodora (i. 365), upon Charixeinos, a boy twelve years old (i. 363), upon Antipater of Sidon (i. 355), and the three which he designed for his own grave (i. 352). Callimachus has left some perfect models in this species of composition. The epitaph on Heracleitus, a poet of Halicarnassus, which has been exquisitely translated by the author of _Ionica_, has a grace of movement and a tenderness of pathos that are unsurpassed:

#eipe tis, Hêrakleite, teon moron, es de me dakry
êgagen, emnêsthên d' hossakis amphoteroi
hêlion en leschêi katedysamen; alla sy men pou,
xein' Halikarnêseu, tetrapalai spodiê;
hai de teai zôousin aêdones, hêisin ho pantôn
harpaktês Aïdês ouk epi cheira balei.#[168]

His epitaph on the sea-wrecked Sopolis (i. 325), though less touching, opens with a splendid note of sorrow:

#ôphele mêd' egenonto thoai nees; ou gar an hêmeis
paida Diokleidou Sôpolin estenomen;
nyn d' ho men ein hali pou pheretai nekys; anti d' ekeinou
ounoma kai keneon sêma parerchometha.#[169]

The following couplet upon Saon (i. 360) is marked by its perfection of brevity:

#tâide Saôn ho Dikônos Akanthios hieron hypnon
koimatai; thnaskein mê lege tous agathous.#[170]

Among the genuine epitaphs by the greatest of Greek authors, none is more splendid than Plato's upon Aster (i. 402):

#Astêr prin men elampes eni zôoisin Heôios;
nyn de thanôn lampeis Hesperos en phthimenois.#[171]

To Plato is also ascribed a fine monumental epigram upon the Eretrian soldiers who died at Ecbatana (i. 322):

#hoide pot' Aigaioio barybromon oidma lipontes
Ekbatanôn pediôi keimeth' eni mesatôi.
chaire klytê pote patris Eretria; chairet' Athênai
geitones Euboiês; chaire thalassa philê.#[172]

Erinna's epitaph on Baucis (i. 409) deserves quotation, because it is one of the few pieces accepted by the later Greeks, but probably without due cause, as belonging to a girl whose elegiacs were rated by the ancients above Sappho's:

#stalai kai Seirênes emai kai penthime krôsse
hostis echeis Aïda tan oligan spodian,
tois emon erchomenoisi par' êrion eipate chairein,
ait' astoi telethônt' aith' heteras polios;
chôti me nymphan eusan echei taphos eipate kai to;
chôti patêr m' ekalei Baukida chôti genos
Tênia, hôs eidônti; kai hotti moi ha synetairis
Êrinn' en tymbôi gramm' echaraxe tode.#[173]

Sappho herself has left the following lament for the maiden Timas (i. 367):

#Timados hade konis, tan dê pro gamoio thanousan
dexato Phersephonas kyaneos thalamos,
has kai apophthimenas pasai neothagi sidarôi
halikes himertan kratos ethento koman.#[174]

In each of these epitaphs the untimely fading of a flower-like maiden in her prime has roused the deepest feeling of the poetess. This, indeed, is the chord which rings most truly in the sepulchral lyre of the Greeks. Their most genuine sorrow is for youth cut off before the joys of life were tasted. This sentiment receives, perhaps, its most pathetic though least artistic expression in the following anonymous epitaph on a young man. The mother's love and anguish are set forth with a vividness which we should scarcely have expected from a Greek (i. 336):

#nêlees ô daimon, ti de moi kai phengos edeixas
eis oligôn eteôn metra minynthadia?
ê hina lypêsêis di' emên biotoio teleutên
mêtera deilaiên dakrysi kai stonachais,
hê m' etech' hê m' atitêle kai hê poly meizona patros
phrontida paideiês ênysen hêmeterês?
hos men gar tytthon te kai orphanon en megaroisi
kallipen; hê d' ep' emoi pantas etlê kamatous.
ê men emoi philon êen eph' hagnôn hêgemonêôn
emprepemen mythois amphi dikaspolias;
alla moi ou genyôn epedexato kourimon anthos
hêlikiês eratês, ou gamon, ou daïdas;
ouch hymenaion aeise periklyton, ou tekos eide,
dyspotmos, ek geneês leipsanon hêmeterês,
tês polythrênêtou; lypei de me kai tethneôta
mêtros Pôlittês penthos aexomenon,
Phrontônos goerais epi phrontisin, hê teke paida
ôkymoron, keneon charma philês patridos.#$1

The common topic of consolation in these cases of untimely death is the one which Shakespeare has expressed in the dirge for Fidele, and D'Urfey in his dirge for Chrysostom by these four lines:

Whilst we that pine in life's disease,
Uncertain-blessed, less happy are.

Lucian, speaking of a little boy who died at five years of age (i. 332), makes him cry:

#alla me mê klaiois; kai gar biotoio meteschon
paurou kai paurôn tôn biotoio kakôn.#

A little girl in another epitaph (i. 366) says to her father:

#ischeo lypas,
Theiodote; thnatoi pollaki dystychees.#

A young man, dying in the prime of life, is even envied by Agathias (i. 384):

#empês olbios houtos, hos en neotêti marantheis
ekphyge tên biotou thasson alitrosynên.#

But it is not often that we hear in the Greek Anthology a strain of such pure and Christian music as this apocryphal epitaph on Prote:

#ouk ethanes, Prôtê, metebês d' es ameinona chôron,
kai naieis makarôn nêsous thaliêi eni pollêi,
entha kat' Êlysiôn pediôn skirtôsa gegêthas
anthesin en malakoisi, kakôn ektosthen hapantôn;
ou cheimôn lypei s', ou kaum', ou nousos enochlei,
ou peinêis, ou dipsos echei s'; all' oude potheinos
anthrôpôn eti soi biotos; zôeis gar amemptôs
augais en katharaisin Olympou plêsion ontos.#[176]

Death at sea touched the Greek imagination with peculiar vividness. That a human body should toss, unburied, unhonored, on the waves, seemed to them the last indignity. Therefore the epitaphs on Satyrus (i. 348), who exclaims,

#keinôi dinêenti kai atrygetôi eti keimai
hydati mainomenôi memphomenos Boreêi,#

and on Lysidike (i. 328), of whom Zenocritus writes,

#chaitai sou stazousin eth' halmyra dysmore kourê
nauêge phthimenês ein hali Lysidikê,#

and on the three athletes who perished by shipwreck (i. 342), have a mournful wail of their own. Not very different, too, is the pathos of Therimachus struck by lightning (i. 306):

#automatai deilêi poti taulion hai boes êlthon
ex oreos pollêi niphomenai chioni;
aiai, Thêrimachos de para dryï ton makron heudei
hypnon; ekoimêthê d' ek pyros ouraniou.#[177]

It is pleasant to turn from these to epitaphs which dwell more upon the qualities of the dead than the circumstances of their death. Here is the epitaph of a slave (i. 379):

#Zôsimê hê prin eousa monôi tôi sômati doulê
kai tôi sômati nyn heuren eleutheriên.#[178]

Here is a buffoon (i. 380):

#Nêleiês Aïdês; epi soi d' egelasse thanonti,
Tityre, kai nekyôn thêke se mimologon.#[179]

Perhaps the most beautiful of all the sepulchral epigrams is one by an unknown writer, of which I here give a free paraphrase (_Anth. Pal._ vii. 346):

Of our great love, Parthenophil,
This little stone abideth still
Sole sign and token:
I seek thee yet, and yet shall seek,
Though faint mine eyes, my spirit weak
With prayers unspoken.

Meanwhile, best friend of friends, do thou,
If this the cruel fates allow
By death's dark river,
Among those shadowy people, drink
No drop for me on Lethe's brink:
Forget me never!

Of all the literary epitaphs, by far the most interesting are those written for the poets, historians, and philosophers of Greece. Reserving these for separate consideration, I pass now to mention a few which belong as much to the pure epigram as to the epitaph. When, for example, we read two very clever poems on the daughters of Lycambes (i. 339), two again on a comically drunken old woman (i. 340, 360), and five on a man who has been first murdered and then buried by his murderer (i. 340), we see that, though the form of the epitaph has been adopted, clever rhetoricians, anxious only to display their skill, have been at work in rivalry. Sardanapalus, the eponym of Oriental luxury, furnishes a good subject for this style of composition. His epitaph runs thus in the Appendix Planudea (ii. 532):

#eu eidôs hoti thnêtos ephys, ton thymon aexe
terpomenos thaliêisi; thanonti soi outis onêsis;
kai gar egô spodos eimi, Ninou megalês basileusas.
toss' echô hoss' ephagon kai ephybrisa, kai met' erôtos
terpn' edaên; ta de polla kai olbia keina leleiptai.
hêde sophê biotoio parainesis anthrôpoisin.#[180]

We find only the fourth and fifth lines among the sepulchral epigrams of the Anthology of Cephalas (i. 334), followed by a clever parody composed by the Theban Crates. Demetrius, the Spartan coward, is another instance of this rhetorical exercise. Among the two or three which treat of him I quote the following (i. 317):

#hanik' apo ptolemou tressanta se dexato matêr,
panta ton hoplistan kosmon olôlekota,
auta toi phonian, Damatrie, autika lonchan
eipe dia plateôn ôsamena lagonôn;
katthane, mêd' echetô Sparta psogon; ou gar ekeina
êmplaken, ei deilous toumon ethrepse gala.#[181]

Agathias writes a very characteristic elegy on Lais (i. 315):

#herpôn eis Ephyrên taphon edrakon amphi keleuthon
Laïdos archaiês, hôs to charagma legei;
dakry d' epispeisas, chairois gynai, ek gar akouês;
oikteirô se g', ephên, hên paros ouk idomên;
a poson êïtheôn noon êkaches; all' ide Lêthên
naieis, aglaïên en chthoni katthemenê.#[182]

An epitaph on the inutility of epitaphs is an excellent novelty, especially when the witty poet (Paulus Silentiarius) has the humor to make the ghost eager to speak while the wayfarer is inattentive (i. 332):

#ounoma moi. ti de touto? patris de moi. es ti de touto?
kleinou d' eimi genous. ei gar aphaurotatou?
zêsas d' endoxôs elipon bion. ei gar adoxôs?
keimai d' enthade nyn. tis tini tauta legeis?#[183]

The value of the epitaphs on poets and great men of Greece is this--that, besides being in many cases of almost perfect beauty, they contain the quintessence of ancient criticism. Every epithet is carefully so chosen as to express what the Greeks thought peculiar and appropriate to the spirit and the works of their heroes.

Orpheus is the subject of the following exquisite elegy by Antipater of Sidon (i. 274):

#ouketi thelgomenas, Orpheu, dryas, ouketi petras
axeis, ou thêrôn autonomous agelas;
ouketi koimaseis anemôn bromon, ouchi chalazan,
ou niphetôn syrmous ou patageusan hala.
ôleo gar; se de polla katôdyranto thygatres
Mnamosynas, matêr d' exocha Kalliopa;
ti phthimenois stonacheumen eph' hyiasin, hanik' alalkein
tôn paidôn Aïdên oude theois dynamis?#[184]

Sophocles receives a gift of flowers and ivy, and quiet sleep from Simmias the Theban (i. 277):

#êrem' hyper tymboio Sophokleos, êrema, kisse,
herpyzois, chloerous ekprocheôn plokamous,
kai petalon pantê thalloi rhodon, hê te philorrhôx
ampelos, hygra perix klêmata cheuamenê,
heineken euepiês pinytophronos, hên ho melichros
êskêsen Mouseôn ammiga kak Charitôn.#[185]

Among the nine epitaphs on Euripides none is more delicate than the following by Ion (i. 282):

#chaire melampetalois, Euripidê, en gyaloisi;
Pierias ton aei nyktos echôn thalamon;
isthi d' hypo chthonos ôn, hoti soi kleos aphthiton estai
ison Homêreiais aenaois charisin.#[186]

Where could a poet be better lulled to rest than among the black-leaved hollows of Pieria? But the most touching tribute to Euripides is from the pen of a brother dramatist, the comic poet Philemon (ii. 94):

#ei tais alêtheiaisin hoi tethnêkotes
aisthêsin eichon, andres hôs phasin tines,
apênxamên an hôst' idein Euripidên.#[187]

Aristophanes is praised by Antipater of Thessalonica (ii. 37) as the poet who laughed and hated rightly:

#kômike kai styxas axia kai gelasas.#

His plays are characterized as full of fearful graces, #phoberôn plêthomenoi charitôn#. Over the grave of Anacreon, who receives more tributes of this kind than any other poet, roses are to bloom, and wine is to be poured, and the thoughts of Smerdies, Bathyllus, and Megistias are to linger. Antipater of Sidon in particular paid honor to his grave (i. 278):

#thalloi tetrakorymbos, Anakreon, amphi se kissos
habra te leimônôn porphyreôn petala;
pêgai d' arginoentos anathlibointo galaktos,
euôdes d' apo gês hêdy cheoito methy,
ophra ke toi spodiê te kai ostea terpsin arêtai,
ei dê tis phthimenois chrimptetai euphrosyna,
ô to philon sterxas, phile, barbiton, ô syn aoidâi
panta diaplôsas kai syn erôti bion.#[188]

The same poet begins another epitaph thus:

#tymbos Anakreiontos; ho Têïos enthade kyknos
heudei chê paidôn zôrotatê maniê.#

Less cheerful are the sepulchres of the satirists. We are bidden not to wake the sleeping wasp upon the grave of Hipponax (i. 350):

#ô xeine, pheuge ton chalazepê taphon
ton phrikton Hippônaktos, houte cha tephra
iambiazei Boupaleion es stygos,
mê pôs egeirêis sphêka ton koimômenon,
hos oud' en hâidêi nyn kekoimiken cholon,
skazousi metrois ortha toxeusas epê.#[189]

The same thought is repeated with even more of descriptive energy in an epitaph on Archilochus (i. 287):

#sêma tod' Archilochou parapontion, hos pote pikrên
mousan echidnaiôi prôtos ebapse cholôi,
haimaxas Helikôna ton hêmeron; oide Lykambês
myromenos trissôn hammata thygaterôn;
êrema dê parameipson, hodoipore, mê pote toude
kinêsêis tymbôi sphêkas ephezomenous.#[190]

Diogenes offers similar opportunities for clever writing. The best of his epitaphs is this well-known but anonymous dialogue (i. 285):

#eipe, kyon, tinos andros ephestôs sêma phylasseis?
tou kynos. alla tis ên houtos anêr ho Kyôn?
Diogenês. genos eipe. Sinôpeus. hos pithon ôikei?
kai mala; nyn de thanôn asteras oikon echei.#[191]

The epitaphs on Erinna, who died when she was only nineteen, are charged with the thought which so often recurs when we reflect on poets, like Chatterton, untimely slain--what would not they have done, if they had lived? (i. 275):

#ho glykys Êrinnês houtos ponos, ouchi polys men
hôs an parthenikas enneakaideketeus,
all' heterôn pollôn dynatôteros; ei d' Aïdas hoi
mê tachys êlthe, tis an talikon esch' onoma?#[192]

Sappho rouses a louder strain of celebration (i. 276):

#Sapphô toi keutheis chthôn Aioli tan meta Mousais
athanatais thnatan Mousan aeidomenan,
han Kypris kai Erôs syn ham' etraphon, has meta Peithô
eplek' aeizôon Pieridôn stephanon,
Helladi men terpsin, soi de kleos; ô trielikton
Moirai dineusai nêma kat' êlakatas,
pôs ouk eklôsasthe panaphthiton êmar aoidôi
aphthita mêsamena dôr' Helikôniadôn?#[193]

This is the composition of Antipater of Sidon, who excels in this special style. Without losing either the movement or the passion of poetry, he is always delicate and subtle in his judgments. His epigrams on Pindar are full of fire (i. 280):

#Pierikan salpinga, ton euageôn baryn hymnôn
chalkeutan, katechei Pindaron hade konis,
hou melos eisaïôn phthenxaio ken, hôs pote Mousôn
en Kadmou thalamois smênos aneplasato.#[194]

The very quintessence of criticism is contained in the phrases #salpinx#, #chalkeutas#. The Appendix Planudea (ii. 590) contains another epitaph on Pindar by Antipater, which for its beautiful presentation of two legends connected with his life deserves to be quoted:

#nebreiôn hoposon salpinx hyperiachen aulôn,
tosson hyper pasas ekrage seio chelys;
oude matên hapalois peri cheilesin esmos ekeinos
eplase kêrodeton, Pindare, seio meli.
martys ho Mainalios keroeis theos hymnon aeisas
ton seo kai nomiôn lêsamenos donakôn.#[195]

It is impossible to do justice to all these utterances on the early poets. Æschylus (i. 281):

#ho tragikon phônêma kai ophryoessan aoidên
pyrgôsas stibarêi prôtos en euepiêi.#

Alcman (i. 277):

#ton charient' Alkmana, ton hymnêtêr' hymenaiôn
kyknon, ton Mousôn axia melpsamenon.#

Stesichorus (ii. 36):

#Homêrikon hos t' apo rheuma
espasas oikeiois, Stêsichor', en kamatois.#

Ibycus (ii. 36):

#hêdy te Peithous,
Ibyke, kai paidôn anthos amêsamene.#

Enough has been quoted to show the delicate and appreciative criticism of the later and lighter Greek poets for the earlier and grander. It is also consolatory to find that almost no unknown great ones are praised in these epigrams; whence we may conclude that the masterpieces of Greek literature are almost as numerous now as they were in the age of Nero. The philosophers receive their due meed of celebration. Plato can boast of two splendid anonymous epitaphs (i. 285):

#gaia men en kolpois kryptei tode sôma Platônos,
psychê d' athanaton taxin echei makarôn.#

And--

#aiete, tipte bebêkas hyper taphon? ê tinos, eipe,
asteroenta theôn oikon aposkopeeis?
psychês eimi Platônos apoptamenês es Olympon
eikôn; sôma de gê gêgenes Atthis echei.#[196]

It is curious to find both Thucydides (ii. 119) and Lycophron (ii. 38) characterized by their difficulty.

Closely allied in point of subject to many of the epitaphs are the so-called hortatory epigrams, #epigrammata protreptika#. These consist partly of advice to young men and girls to take while they may the pleasures of the moment, partly of wise saws and maxims borrowed from the Stoics and the Cynics, from Euripides and the comic poets. Lucian and Palladas are the two most successful poets in this style. Palladas, whose life falls in the first half of the fifth century, a pagan, who regarded with disgust the establishment of Christianity, attained by a style of "elegant mediocrity" to the perfection of proverbial philosophy in verse. When we remember that the works of Euripides, Menander, Philemon, Theophrastus, and the Stoics were mines from which to quarry sentiments about the conduct of life, we understand the general average of excellence below which he rarely falls and above which he never rises. Yet in this section, as in the others of the Anthology, some of the anonymous epigrams are the best. Here is one (ii. 251):

#eis aïdên itheia katêlysis, eit' ap' Athênôn
steichois, eite nekys, niseai ek Meroês;
mê se g' aniatô patrês apotêle thanonta;
pantothen heis ho pherôn eis aïdên anemos.#[197]

Here is another, which repeats the old proverb of the cup and the lip (ii. 257):

#polla metaxy pelei kylikos kai cheileos akrou.#

And another, on the difference between the leaders and the followers in the pomp of life (ii. 270):

#polloi toi narthêkophoroi pauroi de te bakchoi.#

Equally without author's name is the following excellent prayer (ii. 271):

#Zeu basileu ta men esthla kai euchomenois kai aneuktois
ammi didou; ta de lygra kai euchomenôn aperykois.#[198]

Lucian gives the following good advice on the use of wealth (ii. 256):

#hôs tethnêxomenos tôn sôn agathôn apolaue,
hôs de biôsomenos pheideo sôn kteanôn;
esti d' anêr sophos houtos hos amphô tauta noêsas
pheidoi kai dapanêi metron ephêrmosato.#[199]

Agathias asks why we need fear death (ii. 264):

#ton thanaton ti phobeisthe, ton hêsychiês genetêra,
ton pauonta nosous kai peniês odynas?
mounon hapax thnêtois paraginetai, oude pot' auton
eiden tis thnêtôn deuteron erchomenon;
hai de nosoi pollai kai poikilai, allot' ep' allon
erchomenai thnêtôn kai metaballomenai.#[200]

The remainder of my quotations from this section will all be taken from Palladas. Here is his version of the proverb attributed to Democritus that life's a stage (ii. 265):

#skênê pas ho bios kai paignion; ê mathe paizein
tên spoudên metatheis ê phere tas odynas.#[201]

Here, again, is the old complaint that man is Fortune's plaything (ii. 266):

#paignion esti tychês meropôn bios, oiktros, alêtês,
ploutou kai peniês messothi rhembomenos.
kai tous men katagousa palin sphairêdon aeirei,
tous d' apo tôn nephelôn eis aïdên katagei.#[202]

Here again, but cadenced in iambics, is the Flight of Time (ii. 266):

#ô tês bracheias hêdonês tês tou biou;
tên oxytêta tou chronou penthêsate;
hêmeis kathezomestha kai koimômetha,
mochthountes ê tryphôntes; ho de chronos trechei,
trechei kath' hêmôn tôn talaipôrôn brotôn,
pherôn hekastou tôi biôi katastrophên.#[203]

The next epigram is literally bathed in tears (ii. 267):

#dakrycheôn genomên kai dakrysas apothnêskô;
dakrysi d' en pollois ton bion heuron holon.
ô genos anthrôpôn polydakryton, asthenes, oiktron,
phainomenon kata gês kai dialyomenon.#[204]

When he chooses to be cynical, Palladas can present the physical conditions of human life with a crude brutality which is worthy of a monk composing a chapter _De contemptu humanæ miseriæ_. It is enough to allude to the epigrams upon the birth (ii. 259) and the breath (ii. 265) of man. To this had philosophy fallen in the death of Greece. One more quotation from Palladas has a touch of pathos. The old order has yielded to the new: Theodosius has closed the temples: the Greeks are in ashes: their very hopes remain among the dead (ii. 268):

#Hellênes esmen andres espodômenoi,
nekrôn echontes elpidas tethammenas;
anestraphê gar panta nyn ta pragmata.#

With this wail the thin, lamentable voice of the desiccated rhetorician ceases.

Akin to these hortatory epigrams, in their tone of settled melancholy, are some of the satiric and convivial. It is necessary, when we think of the Greeks as the brightest and sunniest of all races, to remember what songs they sang at their banquets, and to comfort ourselves with the reflection that between their rose-wreaths and the bright Hellenic sky above them hung for them, no less than for ourselves, the cloud of death.

What more dismal drinking-song can be conceived than this? (i. 337):

#ouden hamartêsas genomên para tôn me tekontôn;
gennêtheis d' ho talas erchomai eis Aïdên;
ô mixis goneôn thanatêphoros; ômoi anankês
hê me prospelasei tôi stygerôi thanatôi;
ouden eôn genomên; palin essomai hôs paros ouden;
ouden kai mêden tôn meropôn to genos;
leipon moi to kypellon apostilbôson, hetaire,
kai lypês akonên ton Bromion pareche.#[205]

The good sense of Cephalas placed it among the epitaphs; for, in truth, it is the quintessence of the despair of the grave. Yet its last couplet forces us to drag it from the place of tombs, and put it into the mouth of some late reveller of the decadence of Hellas. It has to my ear the ring of a drinking-song sung in a room with closed shutters, after the guests have departed, by some sad companion who does not know that the dawn has gone forth and the birds are aloft in the air. The shadow of night is upon him. Though Christ be risen and the sun of hope is in the sky, he is still as cheerless as Mimnermus. If space sufficed, it would be both interesting and profitable to compare this mood of the epigrammatists with that expressed by Omar Khayyám, the Persian poet of Khorassan, in whose quatrains philosophy, melancholy, and the sense of beauty are so wonderfully mingled that to surpass their pathos is impossible in verse.[206] Here is another of the same tone (ii. 287):

#êôs ex êous parapempetai, eit' amelountôn
hêmôn exaiphnês hêxei ho porphyreos,
kai tous men têxas, tous d' optêsas, enious de
physêsas axei pantas es hen barathron.#[207]

And another with a more delicate ring of melancholy in the last couplet (ii. 289):

#hypnôeis ô 'taire; to de skyphos auto boâi se;
egreo, mê terpou moiridiêi meletêi;
mê pheisêi Diodôre; labros d' eis Bakchon olisthôn
achris epi sphalerou zôropotei gonatos;
esseth' hot' ou piomestha, polys polys; all' ag' epeigou.
hê synetê krotaphôn haptetai hêmeterôn.#[208]

And yet another (ii. 294), which sounds like the Florentine Carnival Song composed by Lorenzo de' Medici--

Chi vuol esser lieto sia;
Di doman non è certezza--

#pine kai euphrainou; ti gar aurion ê ti to mellon
oudeis ginôskei; mê treche, mê kopia;
hôs dynasai, charisai, metados, phage, thnêta logizou;
to zên tou mê zên ouden holôs apechei;
pas ho bios toiosde rhopê monon; an prolabêis sou
an de thanêis heterou panta; sy d' ouden echeis.#[209]

But the majority of the #epigrammata skôptika#, or jesting epigrams, are not of this kind. They are written for the most part, in Roman style, on ugly old women, misers, stupid actors, doctors to dream of whom is death, bad painters, poets who kill you with their elegies, men so light that the wind carries them about like stubble, or so thin that a gossamer is strong enough to strangle them; vices, meannesses, deformities of all kinds. Lucillius, a Greek Martial of the age of Nero, is both best and most prolific in this kind of composition. But of all the sections of the Anthology this is certainly the least valuable. The true superiority of Greek to Latin literature in all its species is that it is far more a work of pure beauty, of unmixed poetry. In Lucillius the Hellenic muse has deigned for once to assume the Roman toga, and to show that if she chose she could rival the hoarse-throated satirists of the empire on their own ground. But she has abandoned her lofty eminence, and descended to a lower level. The same may be said in brief about the versified problems and riddles (ii. pp. 467-490), which are not much better than elegant acrostics of this or the last century. It must, however, be remarked that the last-mentioned section contains a valuable collection of Greek oracles.

Of all the amatory poets of the Anthology, by far the noblest is Meleager. He was a native of Gadara in Palestine, as he tells us in an epitaph composed in his old age:

#patra de me teknoi
Atthis en Assyriois naiomena, Gadara.#[210]

It is curious to think of this town, which from our childhood we have connected with the miracle of the demoniac and the swine, as a Syrian Athens, the birthplace of the most mellifluous of all erotic songsters. Meleager's date is half a century or thereabouts before the Christian era. He therefore was ignorant of the work and the words of One who made the insignificant place of his origin world-famous. Of his history we know really nothing more than his own epigrams convey; the two following couplets from one of his epitaphs record his sojourn during different periods of his life at Tyre and at Ceos:

#hon theopais êndrôse Tyros Gadarôn th' hiera chthôn;
Kôs d' eratê Meropôn presbyn egêrotrophei.
All' ei men Syros essi, Salam; ei d' oun syge Phoinix,
Naidios; ei d' Hellên, chaire; to d' auto phrason.#[211]

This triple salutation, coming from the son of Gadara and Tyre and Ceos, brings us close to the pure humanity which distinguished Meleager. Modern men, judging him by the standard of Christian morality, may feel justified in flinging a stone at the poet who celebrated his Muiscos and his Diocles, his Heliodora and his Zenophila, in too voluptuous verse. But those who are content to criticise a pagan by his own rule of right and wrong will admit that Meleager had a spirit of the subtlest and the sweetest, a heart of the tenderest, and a genius of the purest that has been ever granted to an elegist of earthly love. While reading his verse, it is impossible to avoid laying down the book and pausing to exclaim: How modern is the phrase, how true the passion, how unique the style! Though Meleager's voice has been mute a score of centuries, it yet rings clear and vivid in our ears; because the man was a real poet, feeling intensely, expressing forcibly and beautifully, steeping his style in the fountain of tender sentiment which is eternal. We find in him none of the cynicism which defiles Straton, or of the voluptuary's despair which gives to Agathias the morbid splendor of decay, the colors of corruption. All is simple, lively, fresh with joyous experience in his verse.

The first great merit of Meleager as a poet is limpidity. A crystal is not more transparent than his style; but the crystal to which we compare it must be colored with the softest flush of beryl or of amethyst. Here is a little poem in praise of Heliodora (i. 85):

#plexô leukoïon, plexô d' hapalên hama myrtois
narkisson, plexô kai ta gelônta krina,
plexô kai krokon hêdyn; epiplexô d' hyakinthon
porphyreên, plexô kai philerasta rhoda,
hôs an epi krotaphois myrobostrychou Hêliodôras
euplokamon chaitên anthobolêi stephanos.#[212]

Nothing can be more simple than the expression, more exquisite than the cadence of these lines. The same may be said about the elegy on Cleariste (i. 307):

#ou gamon all' Aïdan epinymphidion Klearista
dexato, parthenias hammata lyomena;
arti gar hesperioi nymphas epi diklisin acheun
lôtoi kai thalamôn eplatageunto thyrai;
êôioi d' ololygmon anekragon, ek d' Hymenaios
sigatheis goeron phthegma metharmosato;
hai d' autai kai phengos edâidouchoun para pastôi
peukai, kai phthimenâi nerthen ephainon hodon.#[213]

The thought of this next epigram recalls the song to Ageanax in Theocritus's seventh idyl (ii. 402):

#ourios empneusas nautais Notos, ô dyserôtes,
hêmisy meu psychas harpasen Andragathon;
tris makares naes, tris d' olbia kymata pontou,
tetraki d' eudaimôn paidophorôn anemos;
eith' eiên delphis hin' emois bastaktos ep' ômois
porthmeutheis esidêi tan glykypaida Rhodon.#[214]

These quotations are sufficient to set forth the purity of Meleager's style, though many more examples might have been borrowed from his epigrams on the cicada, on the mosquitoes who tormented Zenophila, on Antiochus, who would have been Eros if Eros had worn the boy's petasos and chlamys. The next point to notice about him is the suggestiveness of his language, his faculty of creating the right epithets and turning the perfect phrase that suits his meaning. The fragrance of the second line in this couplet is undefinable but potent:

#ô dyserôs psychê pausai pote kai di' oneirôn
eidôlois kalleus kôpha chliainomenê.#[215]

It is what all day-dreamers and castle-builders, not to speak of the dreamers of the night, must fain cry out in their despair. The common motive of a lover pledging his absent mistress is elevated to a region of novel beauty by the passionate repetition of words in this first line:

#enchei kai palin eipe palin palin Hêliodôras.#[216]

In the same way a very old thought receives new exquisiteness the last couplet of the epitaph on Heliodora:

#alla se gounoumai Ga pantrophe tan panodyrton
êrema sois kolpois mater enankalisai.#[217]

The invocation to Night, which I will next quote, has its own beauty derived from the variety of images which are subtly and capriciously accumulated:

#hen tode pammêteira theôn litomai se philê Nyx
nai litomai kômôn symplane potnia Nyx.#[218]

But Meleager's epithets for Love are, perhaps, the triumphs of his verbal coinage:

#esti d' ho pais glykydakrys aeilalos ôkys atarbês
sima gelôn pteroeis nôta pharetrophoros.#[219]

Again he calls him #habropedilos erôs# (delicate-sandalled Love) and fashions words like #psychapatês#, #hypnapatês# (soul-cheating and sleep-cheating), to express the qualities of the treacherous god. In some of his metaphorical descriptions of passion he displays a really fervid imagination. To this class of creation belong the poem on the Soul's thirst (ii. 414), on the memory of beauty that lives like a fiery image in the heart (ii. 413), and the following splendid picture of the tyranny of Love. He is addressing his Soul, who has once again incautiously been trapped by Eros:

#ti matên eni desmois
spaireis? autos erôs ta ptera sou dedeken,
kai s' epi pyr estêse, myrois d' errane lipopnoun,
dôke de dipsôsêi dakrya therma piein.#[220]

Surely a more successful marriage of romantic fancy to classic form was never effected even by a modern poet. This line again contains a bold and splendid metaphor:

#kômazô d' ouk oinon hypo phrena pyr de gemistheis.#[221]

Meleager had a soul that inclined to all beautiful and tender things. Having described the return of spring in a prolonged chant of joy, he winds up with words worthy of a troubadour on Minnesinger in the April of a new age:

#pôs ou chrê kai aoidon en eiari kalon aeisai?#[222]

The cicada, #droserais stagonessi methystheis# (drunken with honey-drops of dew), the #autophyes mimêma lyras# (nature's own mimic of the lyre)--a conceit, by the way, in the style of Marini or of Calderon--the bee whom he addresses as #anthodiaite melissa# (flower-pasturing bee), and all the flowers for which he has found exquisite epithets, the #philombros narkissos# (narcissus that loves the rain of heaven), the #philerasta rhoda# (roses to lovers dear), the #ouresiphoita krina# (lilies that roam the mountain-sides), and again #ta gelônta krina# (laughing lilies), testify to the passionate love and to the purity of heart with which he greeted and studied the simplest beauties of the world.[223] In dealing with flowers he is particularly felicitous. Most exquisite are the lines in which he describes his garland of the Greek poets and assigns to each some favorite of the garden or the field, and again those other couplets which compare the boys of Tyre to a bouquet culled by love for Aphrodite. #Baia men alla rhoda# (slight things perhaps, but roses): these are the words in which Meleager describes the too few but precious verses of Sappho, and for his own poetry they have a peculiar propriety. #Teai zôousin aêdones#, (thy nightingales still live) we may say, quoting Callimachus, when we take leave of him. His poetry has the sweetness and the splendor of the rose, the rapture and full-throated melody of the nightingale.

Next in artistic excellence to Meleager among the amatory poets is Straton, a Greek of Sardis, who lived in the second century. But there are few readers who, even for the sake of his pure and perfect language, will be prepared to put up with the immodesty of his subject-matter. Straton is not so delicate and subtle in style as Meleager; but he has a masculine vigor and _netteté_ of phrase peculiar to himself. It is not possible to quote many of his epigrams. He suffers the neglect which necessarily obscures those men of genius who misuse their powers. Yet the story of the garland-weaver (ii. 396), and the address to schoolmasters (ii. 219), are too clever to be passed by without notice. The following epigram on a picture of Ganymede gives a very fair notion of Straton's style (ii. 425):

#steiche pros aithera dion, apercheo paida komizôn
aiete, tas diphyeis ekpetasas pterygas,
steiche ton habron echôn Ganymêdea, mêde metheiês
ton Dios hêdistôn oinochoon kylikôn;
pheideo d' haimaxai kouron gampsônychi tarsôi
mê Zeus algêsêi touto barynomenos.#[224]

To this may be added an exhortation to pleasure in despite of death (ii. 288).[225]

Callimachus deserves mention as a third with Meleager and Straton. His style, drier than that of Meleager, more elevated than Straton's, is marked by a frigidity of good scholarship which only at intervals warms into the fire of passionate poetry. In writing epigrams Callimachus was careful to preserve the pointed character of the composition. He did not merely, as is the frequent wont of Meleager, indite a short poem in elegiacs. This being the case, his love poems, though they are many, are not equal to his epitaphs.

To mention all the poets of the amatory chapters would be impossible. Their name is legion. Even Plato the divine, by right of this epigram to Aster:

#asteras eisathreis astêr emos; eithe genoimên
ouranos hôs pollois ommasin eis se blepô--#[226]

and of this to Agathon:

#tên psychên Agathôna philôn epi cheilesin eschon;
êlthe gar hê tlêmôn hôs diabêsomenê--#[227]

takes rank in the erotic cycle. Yet we may touch in passing on the names of Philodemus and Antipater, the former a native of Gadara, the latter a Sidonian, whose epitaph was composed by Meleager. Their poems help to complete the picture of Syrian luxury and culture in the cities of North Palestine, which we gain when reading Meleager. Of Philodemus the liveliest epigram is a dialogue, which seems to have come straight from the pages of some comedy (i. 68); but the majority of his verses belong to that class of literature which finds its illustration in the Gabinetto Segreto of the Neapolitan Museum. Occasionally he strikes a true note of poetry, as in this invocation to the moon:

#nykterinê dikerôs philopannyche phaine selênê,
phaine di' eutrêtôn ballomenê thyridôn;
augaze chryseên Kallistion; es ta phileuntôn
erga katopteuein ou phthonos athanatêi.
olbizeis kai tênde kai hêmeas oida selênê;
kai gar sên psychên ephlegen Endymiôn.#[228]