Chapter VII: Myths of the Great Divinities of Heaven (4)

By this time Thisbe, still trembling with fear, yet wishing not to disappoint her lover, stepped cautiously forth, looking anxiously for the youth, eager to tell him the danger she had escaped. When she came to the spot and saw the changed color of the mulberries, she doubted whether it was the same place. While she hesitated, she saw the form of her lover struggling in the agonies of death. She screamed and beat her breast, she embraced the lifeless body, poured tears into its wounds, and imprinted kisses on the cold lips. "O, Pyramus," she cried, "what has done this? It is thine own Thisbe that speaks." At the name of Thisbe Pyramus opened his eyes, then closed them again. She saw her veil stained with blood and the scabbard empty of its sword. "Thine own hand has slain thee, and for my sake," she said. "I, too, can be brave for once, and my love is as strong as thine. But ye, unhappy parents of us both, deny us not our united request. As love and death have joined us, let one tomb contain us. And thou, tree, retain the marks of slaughter. Let thy berries still serve for memorials of our blood." So saying, she plunged the sword into her breast. The two bodies were buried in one sepulcher, and the tree henceforth produced purple berries.

=107. Phaon= ferried a boat between Lesbos and Chios. One day the queen of Paphos and Amathus,[141] in the guise of an ugly crone, begged a passage, which was so good-naturedly granted that in recompense she bestowed on the ferryman a salve possessing magical properties of youth and beauty. As a consequence of the use made of it by Phaon, the women of Lesbos went wild for love of him. None, however, admired him more than the poetess Sappho, who addressed to him some of her warmest and rarest love-songs.

=108. The Vengeance of Venus.= Venus did not fail to follow with her vengeance those who dishonored her rites or defied her power. The youth Hippolytus who, eschewing love, preferred Diana to her, she brought miserably to his ruin. Polyphonte she transformed into an owl, Arsinoë into a stone, and Myrrha into a myrtle tree.[142] Her influence in the main was of mingled bane and blessing, as in the cases of Helen, [OE]none, Pasiphaë, Ariadne, Procris, Eriphyle, Laodamia, and others whose stories are elsewhere told.[143]

=109. Myths of Mercury.= According to Homer,[144] Maia bore Mercury at the peep of day,--a schemer subtle beyond all belief. He began playing on the lyre at noon; for, wandering out of the lofty cavern of Cyllene, he found a tortoise, picked it up, bored the life out of the beast, fitted the shell with bridge and reeds, and accompanied himself therewith as he sang a strain of unpremeditated sweetness. At evening of the same day he stole the oxen of his half brother Apollo from the Pierian mountains, where they were grazing. He covered their hoofs with tamarisk twigs, and, still further to deceive the pursuer, drove them backward into a cave at Pylos. There rubbing laurel branches together, he made fire and sacrificed, as an example for men to follow, two heifers to the twelve gods (himself included). Then home he went and slept, innocent as a new-born child! To his mother's warning that Apollo would catch and punish him, this innocent replied, in effect, "I know a trick better than that!" And when the puzzled Apollo, having traced the knavery to this babe in swaddling clothes, accused him of it, the sweet boy swore a great oath by his father's head that he stole not the cows, nor knew even what cows might be, for he had only that moment heard the name of them. Apollo proceeded to trounce the baby, with scant success, however, for Mercury persisted in his assumption of ignorance. So the twain appeared before their sire, and Apollo entered his complaint: he had not seen nor ever dreamed of so precocious a cattle-stealer, liar, and full-fledged knave as this young rascal. To all of which Mercury responded that he was, on the contrary, a veracious person, but that his brother Apollo was a coward to bully a helpless little new-born thing that slept, nor ever had thought of "lifting" cattle. The wink with which the lad of Cyllene accompanied this asseveration threw Jupiter into uncontrollable roars of laughter. Consequently, the quarrel was patched up: Mercury gave Apollo the new-made lyre; Apollo presented the prodigy with a glittering whiplash and installed him herdsman of his oxen. Nay even, when Mercury had sworn by sacred Styx no more to try his cunning in theft upon Apollo, that god in gratitude invested him with the magic wand of wealth, happiness, and dreams (the _caduceus_), it being understood, however, that Mercury should indicate the future only by signs, not by speech or song as did Apollo. It is said that the god of gain avenged himself for this enforced rectitude upon others: upon Venus, whose girdle he purloined; upon Neptune, whose trident he filched; upon Vulcan, whose tongs he borrowed; and upon Mars, whose sword he stole.

The most famous exploit of the Messenger, the slaughter of Argus, has already been narrated.

FOOTNOTES:

[66] Ovid, Metam. I, 700 _et seq._

[67] Ovid, Metam. 2, 410 _et seq._

[68] Translated by Andrew Lang: Theocritus, Bion, and Moschus, London, 1880.

[69] § 70.

[70] Ovid, Metam. 3, 260 _et seq._

[71] §§ 42, 110-113.

[72] From E. R. Sill's Semele.

[73] Commentary, §§ 118, 255.

[74] Ovid, Metam. 7, 172 _et seq._

[75] Roscher, Ausf. Lex. Lfg. 3, 379 [Schirmer]. Originals in Pausanias, Apollodorus, and Hyginus.

[76] From Tennyson's Amphion. See Horace, Ars Poet. 394.

[77] Ovid, Metam. 8, 620-724.

[78] From The Sons of Cydippe, by Edmund Gosse in his On Viol and Flute.

[79] § 27, and Commentary.

[80] From Ovid.

[81] From Spenser's Muiopotmos.

[82] Ovid, Metam. 6, 1-145.

[83] § 200.

[84] Iliad, 5, 850 _et seq._ (Lang, Leaf, and Myers' translation). In accordance with the system of nomenclature adopted in this work, Latin equivalents are given, wherever possible, for Greek names.

[85] Iliad, 21, 390 (Lang, Leaf, and Myers' translation).

[86] Ovid, Metam. 3, 1-137; 4, 563-614.

[87] Iliad, 2, 1335.

[88] Ovid, Metam. 6, 313-381.

[89] § 30.

[90] Roscher, Ausf. Lex. Lfg. 2, 254, Article _Aloadæ_ [Schultz].

[91] Ovid, Metam. 10, 162-219.

[92] Ovid, Metam. 2, 1-400.

[93] § 44.

[94] _Medio tutissimus ibis._--OVID.

[95]

_Hic situs est Phaëthon, currus auriga paterni,_
_Quem si non tenuit, magnis tamen excidit ausis._--OVID.

[96] Iliad, 1, 43-52 (Lang, Leaf, and Myers' translation).

[97] Ovid, Metam. 6, 165-312.

[98] From W. S. Landor's Niobe.

[99] See Commentary, §§ 64, 80.

[100] Iliad, 18, 564 (Lang, Leaf, and Myers' translation).

[101] Cicero, Natura Deorum, 3, 22.

[102] See Commentary.

[103] From Browning's Balaustion's Adventure. The Greek form of the proper names has been retained.

[104] Proserpine.

[105] For the originals, see Iliad, 2, 715, and the Alcestis of Euripides.

[106] Ovid, Metam. 11, 146-193.

[107] § 118.

[108] § 145.

[109] Ovid, Metam. 1, 452-567.

[110] From the Fable for Critics.

[111] Iliad, 9, 561; Apollodorus, 1, 7, § 8.

[112] Stephen Phillips, Marpessa.

[113] Ovid, Metam. 4, 256-270.

[114] § 196.

[115] § 168.

[116] Ovid, Metam. 5, 585-641.

[117] Ovid, Metam. 3, 138-252.

[118] Apollodorus, 1, 4, § 3.

[119] Ovid, Fasti, 5, 537; Iliad, 18, 486, and 22, 29; Odyssey, 5, 121, 274.

[120] The story is told by Hyginus in his Fables, and in his Poetical Astronomy.

[121] Authorities are Pausanias, 5, 1, §§ 2-4; Ovid, Ars. Am. 3, 83; Tristia, 2, 299; Apollonius, and Apollodorus.

[122] From the Endymion, Bk. 3.

[123] § 194.

[124] Ovid, Metam. 10, 503-559, 708-739.

[125] From an elegy intended to be sung at one of the spring celebrations in memory of Adonis. Translated from Bion by Andrew Lang. _Cypris_, _Cytherea_, and the _Paphian_ refer to Venus. See Commentary. This elegy is also translated by Mrs. Browning and by Sir Edwin Arnold.

[126] Apuleius, Metam. Golden Ass, 4, 28, etc.

[127] William Morris, The Story of Cupid and Psyche, in The Earthly Paradise.

[128] Robert Bridges, Eros and Psyche.

[129] The last three paragraphs are from Pater's version in Marius the Epicurean.

[130] William Morris, The Earthly Paradise.

[131] By T. K. Hervey.

[132] Ovid, Metam. 10, 560-680.

[133] From W. S. Landor's Hippomenes and Atalanta.

[134] The poetical passages are from Marlowe's Hero and Leander, First Sestiad. Marlowe's narrative was completed by Chapman. See Musæus of Alexandria, De Amore Herois et Leandri; Virg. Georg. 3, 258; Ovid, Her. 18, 19; Stat. Theb. 6, 770.

[135] Sonnet, On a Picture of Leander.

[136] Ovid, Metam. 10, 243-297.

[137] Andrew Lang, The New Pygmalion.

[138] From William Morris, Pygmalion and the Image, in The Earthly Paradise.

[139] Andrew Lang, The New Pygmalion, or The Statue's Choice. A witty and not unpoetic bit of burlesque.

[140] Ovid, Metam. 4, 55-166.

[141] § 100, and Commentary.

[142] Murray, Manual of Mythology, p. 87; Ovid, Metam. 10, 298-502.

[143] See Index for sections.

[144] Hymn to Mercury (Hermes).