BOOK XIX

In the nineteenth, Bacchos sets up a delightful contest over the fragrant bow] about the tomb of Staphylos. He spoke; and the lad sealed his lips with unvoiced silence, his mind heavy with the pangs of new mourning, and gave way to a helpless flow of tears. At last Methe his mother spoke a piteous word of greeting to Lyaios : watcher of your dances, has sunk in the brazen sleep : Staphylos your friend, Dionysos, Charon’s winds have carried away. A double burden of sorrow fell on me: Bacchos of the vine deserted me, my husband fell into sickness, and I cherished one common pain for both, Staphylos dying and Lyaios far away. But give me, dear Bacchos, give me your cup full of your bubbling vintage ; that I may drink, and lull my heavy sorrow with your sorrowconsoling wine! O Dionysos, my only hope, with your jubilant cry! Let me only see the vintage, let me see the bowl, and I shed tears no more ! ”’ in a cup gave the young man and the downcast from fetters, the sleep which will not let go.

mother that winejuice which resolves all cares and drives away alltrouble. Both drank the honey-flowing stuff of the vintage with its mindsolacing drops. Methe and Botrys quieted their groaning pain; and then the woman spoke to Bacchos the heartlight! Grief holds me no more, pain no more, now Dionysos has appeared! You have come to me, dear Bacchos, as a great light ; for by your potion of healing wine I have quieted my tears. I mourn no more for husband, no more for a father’s death, even Botrys I will give up if it be your pleasure ; for I have Bacchos as father and son both, aye and husband. I will go with you even to your house, if it be your pleasure. I would join the company of Bassarids. If it be your will, I will lift your sacred gear and your lovely fruit, I will press my lips to the hoboy of the winepress. Leave me not a widow, that I may not cherish a double grief, my husband perished and Dionysos gone! You have Botrys for a servant. Let him learn the dances, the sacred rites and sacred things, and if you please, the Indian War ; let me see him laughing in the inebriated winepress treading hard on the offspring of your vintage ! Remember old Pithos, and leave him not untaught of your rites or without a share of your delicious wine.”’ with laughing face, and thus he said to the wineloving golden Aphrodite, bestower of hearty good cheer, the feast beside Lyaios as he touches the feast!

Be garlandbearer for Dionysos, even as Aphrodite, girdled with flowers and luxuriant clusters. The chaplets upon your hair shall make Victory jealous ! I will make you pourer of wine, next after Hebe? goldenthrone. You shall rise a satellite star for Lyaios of the vine, ever by his side to serve the Bacchanal cups, and man’s joy, the surfeit of wine, shall bear your name, Methe. I will give the name of Botrys to the careconsoling fruit of my vintage, and I will call after Staphylos the carryberry bunch of grapes, which is the offspring of the gardenvines full of juicy liquor. Without Methe I shall never be able to feast, without Methe I will never rouse the merry revels.”’ reeling Staphylos, Dionysos the foe of mourning held a contest where no mourning was. He brought out a bearded goat and a vigorous bull and set them both as prizes, calling to the contest combatants well able to touch the harp in Pierian music ; he set them both as prizes, and stirred up these athletes well acquainted with the melodious lute by making a the glossy bull to the man who wins the victory, and the shaggy goat I will give to the loser.”’ Oiagros, a man of the cold Bistonian land,° with the quill hanging to his harp. Hard upon him leapt up Erechtheus, a citizen of Attica the friend of music.

Both moved into the midst of the assembly, comtional prize for the best dithyrambic chorus, the goat for the peting as drivers of the harp. They had entwined leaves of laurel in their hair, and girt up their robes. away, running their fingers over the tensed strings and plucking each in turn, then tightening the pegs at the end, to make sure that the pitch was not too high, and yet that it should not go flat and turn womanish the manly tune. he twangled his harp, with a master’s touch, for a song of his own country, and this is what he sang : the mother of all life, with Triptolemos his son and ancient Metaneira. Then how Deo gave them the corn, when Triptolemos found out how to scatter showers of seed from his chariot laden with ears all over the furrowed soil. And when Celeos died, how harvesthome Deo lamented beside the newbuilt sepulchre with unweeping eyes, and consoling them again with heartenchanting words, quenched the heavy grief of Triptolemos and Metaneira. Even so the sceptred king of Assyria had entertained Dionysos in his palace, and the Lord had requited the table with his Euian gifts and the fruitage of the vine ; then after Staphylos died, that tippling king, he took away the gloomy care of Botrys his son and soothed the sorrow of Methe his mourning wife.

alike enchanted with the music ; they and the god with the thyrsus admired the Attic song with the lovely tones of the fit setting. as the father of Orpheus who has the Muse his booncompanion. Only a couple of verses he sang, a ditty of Phoibos, clearspoken in few words after some Apollo brought to life again his longhair’d Hyacinthos : Staphylos will be made to live for aye by Dionysos. broke out into loud acclamations of propitious words with one voice and one tongue, and all the Satyrs roared. Bacchos leapt from his seat in haste, waving his right hand up and down ; Botrys ran up, crying Euoi and applauding the musical harmonies of the harper. The Lord crowned Oiagros’s head with ivy, and the father of Orpheus stamped his foot on the ground, as he accepted with joy the untamed bull, the prize of the singing, while his companions danced round him in a row. The man of Athens carried off the bearded goat with shamed hands, full of sorrow worthy prizes in his generous hand, offered for victory in the woven dance: a mixer teeming with old fragrant wine, a golden bowl which held infinite measures, spilling on the thirsty earth Lyaios’s juice of four years old. This was an Olympian work of Hephaistos the great master, which Cypris once gave to her brother Dionysos of the vine. A lesser bowl also he set before the assembly, solid silver, shining and round, which Bacchos had once received as a guestgift from the king of Alybe ὃ ; who lived in the rich country where the black hole of the mines in the earth was whitened with silver nooks. Round the mean the top of the brim it may stand, but the is edge of the lip, on the bossy brim, was ivy twining over bunches of grapes in fine patterns of gold all round.? This he brought and laid before them with deep belly still breathing the winepress, stuff of a younger vintage, must, a draught of unmated potation®; for who would grudge a defeated man to drink of dew that cannot inebriate ?

company, he called out the masters of the dance with and win the match of nimble steps, let him take both the golden bowl and the delicious wine that fills it ; but whoso staggers and totters on moving feet, and falls, and proves the worse dancer, let him accept the worse prize. For I am not like every one else. To the prizewinner who conquers in the dainty beating of the dance, I will give no shining tripod and no swift horse, no spear and corselet stained with blood of Indians ; I make no summons to marksmen for straight throwing with the quoit ; this is no race for speed of foot, no sharp spear cast at a distance. In honour of Staphylos, the dead king, a man who loved the dance, I celebrate the sportive steps he loved. I offer no prizes for wrestlers with straining muscles ; this is no race for horsemanship, no games of Elis,° this is no course of Oinomaos with death for his goodsons.¢ My turning-point is the dance, my starting-point the skipping feet, the beckoning hand, the pirouette, the nods and becks and glances obviously careless justhere. (There is no place for a “‘ knob” on a mixer, and no mention of one either.) The bunches of grapes stand out in bosses, ὀμφαλοί, all around the rim.

of the expressive face, speaking silence, which twirls the signalling fingers, and the dancer’s whole Seilenos, and antediluvian Maron got up on heavy foot, with his eyes on the great mixer of shining gold : not because the golden was the better, but because this alone contained the oldest wine and the finest stuff, filling it to the brim. His passion for this lovely wine made him young again, and the Bacchic aroma was too much for his gray hair. He twirled his feet round testing his strength, to see if heavy old age had made his limbs forget how to dance. The old man tried to appease the soul of Staphylos by the words that poured sober enough out of his not mourn. I know not how to shed tears; what have tears to do with Dionysos? Reels and jigs are the gifts I offer at your tomb. Accept me smiling : Maron knows no cares, Maron knows not groans, nor the burden of melancholy sorrow. He is the lovely lackey of Dionysos who cannot mourn. Be gracious to your Maron, even if you have drunk the water of Lethe! Grant me this boon, that I may drink that store of old wine, and let Seilenos drink the new stuff of a new vintage !

were living, for I rate the dance above the steamloving table. For you I dance, Staphylos, both living and not breathing, and strike up a funeral revel. I ama servant of Bacchos, not of Phoibos, and I never learnt to sing dirges, such as Lord Apollo sang in Crete shedding tears for Atymnios?® the beloved. I ama stranger to the Heliads. I am alien to Eridanos,® not connected with Phaéthon the charioteer who the mourning flowers or shake the dainty petals of the lamenting iris.° equal judge, or if you possess the flowery court of Rhadamanthys, and pick your dainty way in the groves and meadows of Elysium, listen to your Maron: instead of cups, without libation, I mouth out for you a drinkoffering fullofsense. Be gracious to your Maron, and grant me a victory of wine, the victory to be famous among all! Then I will pour over your tomb the first spoils of my golden cups, the first lovely drops from the bowl after I win my prize passing the changes right over left, and figuring a silent eloquence of hand inaudible. He moved his eyes about as a picture of the story, he wove a rhythm full of meaning with gestures full of art.

He shook his head and would have tossed his hair, but hair he had none ; both head and face were bare. He did not what an old man of Titan blood might have done, show the Titan race in his speaking picture, not Cronos or Phanes ὦ more primeval still, nor the breed of Titan Helios as old as the universe itself: no, he left all the confusion of that ancient stuff—he depicted with wordless art the cupbearer of Cronides offering the goblet to Zeus, or pouring the dew divine to fill up the bowl, and the other immortals in company ever enjoying cup after cup. His poet’s theme was the sweet potion. Aye, he danced also the maiden Hebe herself drawing the nectar ; when he looked at the Satyrs, with voiceless hands he acted Ganymedes, or when he saw the Bacchant women, he showed them goldenshoe Hebe in a picture having sense without words. gestures, lifting rhythmic feet with the motions of an artist, as he trod the winding measures of his unresting dance. Then he stood still trembling, and watched with shifty eye who should beat whom, who would go home with the larger bowl full of wine.

traced the cues of his art in all their intricate mazes. This is what he acted with gesturing hands: how once a great quarrel arose between Cyrene’s son? and Dionysos over their cups, and the Blessed gathered together. There was no boxing, no running, no quoit in that contest: cups were the well-used tools ready for Phoibos’s son and Dionysos, and a couple of mixingbowls, one containing old wine, one with the gift of the sprigloving bee all fresh. Cronides sat in the seat of judgement. The competitors had before them a luscious match for a honeydrop victory ; cups were the tools; and like another Hermes? with golden wings, lovely Eros himself came forward to preside in the ring, holding in one hand both ivy and an olive-branch. He offered to Bacchos the flowering ivy, to Aristaios the olive-branch like the garlands of Pisa,° the holy ornament of Pallas. was familiar as an offering to the underworld deities, and travail of the bee, and offered the immortals his mingled honey in the cup, a potion cleverly compounded ; he passed the goblet to each in turn one after another, and made their hearts glad. But after a first taste of the bubbling liquid, surfeit came at once: a third cup was filled and declined, and they would not touch a fourth. They found fault with the honey for this quick surfeit. Then richly-clad Dionysos drew from his mixer, full of sweet drink, lifted two cups and offered one with each hand, the first to Cronides, the second to Hera, then a third goblet to Earthshaker his father’s brother. Then he mixed for the gods one and all with Father Zeus; they were all delighted, except disconsolate Phoibos alone, who was jealous, and the god smiled as he handed him the goblet. They enchanted their minds with cups in great abundance ; drinking made them thirstier than before, they asked again for more, and could not get enough. Then the immortals loudly cheered, and gave Bacchos the chief prize for his delicious potion of wine. And Eros the ever-out-of-reach, the conductor of the game, drunken himself, crowned the hair of Lyaios with a vine-and-ivy garland.

handed skill, and his right hand ceased to move. Then fixing his gaze on the sky, he leapt into the air with bounding shoe. Now he clapt both feet together, then parted them, and went hopping from foot to foot ; now over the floor he twirled dancing round and round upright upon his heels and spun ina known that some kind of drink could be made of honey, but sucréé, and seems never to have heard of mead. circling sweep. He stood steady on his right foot holding a toe of the other foot, or bent his knee and caught it in his clasped hands, or held an outstretched thigh with the other leg upright, the heavyknee Seilenos! He lifted the left foot coiling up to the side, to the shoulder, twining it behind him and holding it up until he brought the sole round his neck. Then with a quick turn of the backswerving dance, he artfully bent himself over, face up, in a hoop, showing his belly spread out and curved up towards the sky, while he spun round and round on one unchanging spot. His head hung down as he moved, as if it were always touching the ground and yet not grazing the dust. So Seilenos went scratching the ground with hairy foot, restlessly moving round and round in his wild caperings.

he slipt to the ground and rolled over on his back. At once he became a river: his body was flowing water with natural ripples all over, his forehead changed to a winding current with the horns for waves, the turbulent swell came to a crest on his head, his belly sank into the sand, a deep place for fishes. As Seilenos lay spread, his hair changed into natural rushes, and over the river his pipes made a shrill tune of themselves as the breezes touched victory, and held in his arms the mixer stuffed with delicious wine ; he took the silver bowl, the prize of Seilenos now a flood, and threw it into the river as a libation, where it intoxicated the currents of the dancing river. And so the place was named from the Mixer, and men still speak of the Euian water ve name some mountain tarn, com the of murmuring Seilenos full of sweet drink. Then Maron addressed these words to the running stream : cast the ruddy wine into you and call you the Cellarer. Accept your drink, tippler never satisfied, accept the silver bowl of Bacchos, and you shall have silvery eddies. Seilenos Twirlthefoot, you dance even in your current, you keep the spinning of your feet even in your waves, you revel still in your watery shape. Then be gracious to Bacchants and Satyrs and winegiving vintage, and guard the Seilenoi of your own race. Be generous to Maron who drinks no heeltaps, and let me never see that you still keep a secret grudge among the rivers. Rather let your waters increase the wine of Maron’s vintage, and be of one mind with Dionysos even among the rivers.

your betters? Another Seilenos there was,? fingering a proud pipe, who lifted a haughty neck and challenged a match with Phoibos ; but Phoibos tied him to a tree and stript off his hairy skin, and made it awindbag. There it hung high on a tree, and the breeze often entered, swelling it out into a shape like his, as if the shepherd could not keep silence but made his tune again. Then Delphic Apollo changed his form in pity, and made him the river which bears his name. Men still speak of the winding water of that hairy Seilenos, which lets out a sound wandering on the wind, as if he were still playing on the reeds of his Phrygian pipe in rivalry. challenging one better than you, just like the earlier Seilenos. You must no longer seek a barefoot Bacchant for your bride as before, that Bacchant of the mountains with flowing locks ; you have now for your pleasure the innumerable tribe of Naiads with flowing hair. Seek no longer the snaky wreaths of Lyaios ; eels are what you have to do with, the wriggling travail of the streams, and instead of serpents there are fishes with closefitted speckled scales crawling in your streams. And if you have parted from Dionysos and his grapes, I hold you the happier; for you really make the grapes to grow! What more could you want, when you have after Bacchos now Zeus to feed your streams, the Father of all creation?

Instead of your Satyrs you have your regiments of rivers ; instead of the winepress you dance on the back of murmuring Ocean. Even in the waters you are like what you were: it is proper that Seilenos, once proud of his horned forehead, as a river should have the horned shape of a bull.” ὃ winding waters of Seilenos the tumbling flood, the ever-turning river which was his very likeness.