BOOK XXV

In the twenty-fifth you have the struggle of Perseus and the comparison of Heracles with the valour of Dionysos. O Musz, once more fight the poet’s war with your thyrsus-wand of the mind: for not yet has Eastern Ares bent a servile knee and calmed the sevenyear conflict. The nestlings of the Indian planetree are shrinking again in horror at the dragon’s jaw-point, and thus they foretell war with Bacchos.? I will not sing the first six lichtgangs,® while the Indian army remained behind walls; I will make my pattern like Homer’s and sing the last year of warfare, I will describe that which has the number of my seventh sparrow. For sevengate Thebes I will brew my bowl of poesy, for she also dances wildly about me, baring her breast nymph-like over her robe in sorrow while she remembers Pentheus ; old Cithairon urges me to sing, stretching out his mourning hand, fearing lest I proclaim the unhallowed bed or the fatherslaying son, the husband who lay beside her who bore swallows a bird and eight chicks; this is interpreted as of sa Sia built the walls, Amphion taking the because his replaying was 50 (in the literal sense) ar ee stones followed him of to their places in the walls. Cf. 417 ff.

the best known rhetorical figures, comparison of the person or thing praised with others of the same class (here sons of Zeus), who are declared inferior ; and as they are ex hypothesi admirable, the err of the panegyric must be more so. superior to Demeter, Dionysos and Heracles as a god visited in the form of a shower of Her father Acrisios set her and her child afloat ere ) in a chest, and they drifted ashore at the island of Seriphos. The loval king, him. I hear the twang of the Aonian? lyre: tell me, Muses, what new Amphion is pulling dead stones to a run? I know where that sound comes from: surely it is the Dorian ° tune of Pindar’s lyre sounding Indians : for Time never saw before another struggle like the Eastern War, nor after the Indian War in later days has Enyo seen its equal. No such army came to Ilion, no such host of men. But I will set up the toils and sweat of Dionysos in rivalry with both new and old?; I will judge the manhood of the sons of Zeus, and see who endured such an encounter, who was like unto Bacchos.

Polydectes (84), when Perseus had grown to manhood, tried to get rid of him by sending him on the quest for the head of Medusa (38), the only mortal one of the three Gorgons (the others were Sthenno 54, and Euryale 58), the sight of which turned the beholder into stone. He was helped by Athena and Hermes (55-56) who gave him Harpe, the curved Sword of Sharpness, the Shoon of Swiftness, which enabled him to fly (130, 131), and a (probably magical) wallet in which to carry the head. He found the way there by stealing the one eye (36) of the Graiai, daughters of Phorcys, and refusing to give it back unless he was told. The home of the Gorgons was in Africa (51); Perseus flew there invisible, for he had also been given the Cap of Darkness, cut Medusa’s head off without looking at her, and later used it to turn into stone a sea-monster which was going to devour Andromeda, daughter of Cepheus and Cassiepeia, king and queen of Ethiopia boasting that she was fairer than the Nereids (135). All concerned were afterwards turned into constellations. Later, Perseus used the head to destroy Polydectes, who was trying to force Danaé to marry him. Medusa, when killed, was pregnant by Poseidon (39 ff.) and the winged horse Pegasos sprang from her headless trunk.

held his course near the clouds, a wayfarer pacing through the air, if he really did fly. But what was the good if he swung his ankles and swam the winds with that strange oarage of legs? and then crept up on tiptoe, keeping his footfall noiseless, and with hollowed hand and robber’s fist caught the roving eye of Phorcys’ unsleeping daughter, then shore off the snaky swathe of one Medusa, while her womb was still burdened and swollen with young, still in foal of Pegasus ; what good if the sickle played the part of childbirth Eileithyia, and reaped the neck of the pregnant Gorgon, firstfruits of a horsebreeding neck? There was no battle when swiftshoe Perseus lifted the lifeless token of victory, the snaky sheaf of Gorgon hair, relics of the head dripping drops of blood, gently wheezing a half-heard hiss through the severed throats: he did not march to battle with men, no din of conflict was there then on land, no maritime Ares on the sea with battle-rousing winds bellied the sails of ships of war against a warrior Perseus, no Libyan Nereus was reddened with showers of blood, no fatal water swallowed a dead body rolling helplessly. No! Perseus fled with flickering wings trembling at the hiss of mad Sthenno’s hairy snakes, although he bore the cap of Hades and the sickle of Pallas, with Hermes’ wings though Zeus was his father; he sailed a fugitive on swiftest shoes, listening for no trumpet but Euryale’s bellowing—having despoiled a little Libyan hole!

He slew no army of men, he burnt no city with fiery Bacchos was no sneaking champion, crawling along in his armour ; he laid no ambush for the sentinel eye of Phorcys, the ball of the sleepless eye that passed from hand to hand, giving each her share under the wing of sleep in turn; he won no womanish match over a Medusa unarmed. But he cut the lines of his enemies in a double victory, battle on land and tumult at the ford ; he soaked the earth with gore, he mingled the waves with blood, he dyed the Nereids purple in their reddened streams, as he killed the barbarian hordes. Great was the harvest of highcrested Indians buried headless in mother earth; shoals of dead Indians slain by the sharp thyrsus floated at random and voyaged over the deep, a multitude! 1 pass by that billowy warfare, when the battlestirring river hurled his waves against invincible Lyaios, when the blazing torch of Bacchos kindled the barbarian stream with a damp spark, and watery Hydaspes with waves boiling hot puffed out smoke from his the sea; with the Gorgon’s eye he turned to stone a leviathan of the deep!’ What was the good, if Polydectes, looking upon deadly Medusa’s eye, changed his human limbs to another kind and transformed himself into stone? The terrible exploits of Bacchos were not one Gorgon, not an airsoaring seabeaten cliff, not a Polydectes. No, Bacchos reaped the stubble of snakehaired giants, a conquering hero with a tiny manbreaking wand, when he cast the battling ivy against Porphyrion, when he buffeted Encelados and drove off Aleyoneus with a volley of leaves : then the wands flew in showers, and brought the earthborn down in defence of Olympos, when the coiling sons of Earth with two hundred hands, who pressed the starry vault with manynecked heads, bent the knee before a flimsy javelin of vineleaves or a spear of ivy. Not so great a swarm fell to the fiery thunderbolt as fell to the manbreaking thyrsus.

velled when he saw the sweat of Dionysos, as he slew Indians on the eastern soil: over the western gulf, Selene in the evening saw Perseus on wings outspread, after he had had a small task to do with a curving piece of bronze: as much as Phaéthon has glory above the Moon, so much better than Perseus I will declare Bacchos to be. Inachos was witness of both, when the heavy bronze pikes of Mycenai resisted the ivy and deadly fennel, when Perseus sickle in hand gave way to Bacchos with his wand, and fled before the fury of Satyrs crying Euoi; Perseus cast a raging spear, and hit frail Ariadne unarmed instead of Lyaios the warrior. I do not admire Perseus for killing one woman, in her bridal dress still breathing of love. But rainy Zeus did not raise Danaé to his heaven, to glorify a few loving drops of creative dew in that furtive union. Semele did mount into heaven to touch one table with Zeus and the Blessed, to sit beside her son Dionysos of the vine; but Danaé received no home in Olympos. She the bride of Zeus went voyaging in a chest over the sea, regretting the deceitful rain of wedded love, after the unstable happiness of a passing shower.

garland of Ariadne at her with details about the powers of love Minos are pure allegory. Minos, king of Crete son of Zeus by Olympos ; but she is unhappy still even in the sky. Often the poor creature thus complained with reyou brought me into the sky? A precious bridegift was your Olympos to me! The Seamonster chases me even here among the stars! After earth and all that terror of the sea, I still have chains like the old ones, even among the stars! Your heavenly sickle has not saved me. In vain Medusa’s eye softens for me in Olympos as it shines among the stars. The Monster chases me still, and you do not stretch your light wings! my mother Cassiepeia is vexed and presses me, because the poor thing must dive herself through the air into the brine, trembling at the Nereids and she deems the Bear happy in his course, never drenched in the Ocean never touching the sea; old Cepheus is unhappy still, when he sees Andromeda’s fear, and the Monster of Olympos coming, after what happened here on earth! ”’ utter in her heavy chains ; she called on Perseus, and her husband helped her not. And if Perseus is proud of Andromeda too in the stars, do but cast your eye towards that side of the heavens, where the brilliant Ophiuchos is conspicuous holding up his encircling Serpent; and you will see the circlet of Ariadne’s Crown, the Sun’s companion, which rises with the Moon and proclaims the desire of crownloving Dionysos.

Europa, besieged Megara, whose king, Nisos, had a purple lock which was the luck of the city and prevented it from being taken. His daughter Scylla fell in love with Minos, cut off the lock while Nisos slept, and so gave Minos the victory. It is the widespread tale of Maiden Castle. battle accomplished, handling the lovegirdle instead of the shieldstrap, when Cypris wore a gleaming helmet, when Peitho shook a brazen spear and turned into Pallas Athena to stand by Minos in the fray, when the bridal swarm of unwarlike Loves shot their arrows in battle ; I know how tender Desire sacked a city, when the Cydonian trumpet blared against Nisos of Megara and his people, when brazen Ares shrank back for very shame, when he saw his Rout and his Terror supporting the Loves, when he beheld Aphrodite holding a buckler and Desire casting a lance, while daintyrobe Eros wrought a fairhair victory against the fighting meninarms. For Scylla, while her uncropt father was lying asleep, had cut off from his hair the purple cluster which had grown there from his birth, and by severing one tress from the sceptred head with her iron shears, sacked a won the prize of the battle ; he conquered not by steel, but by love and desire. But when Lyaios armed for battle, no Desire tamed the fray of Indian spearmen, no Paphian armed to support Lyaios, or conquered by beauty, no girl mad with passion gave by herself the prize of battle to Dionysos, no lover’s trick, no curls of Deriades’ hair, but the changes and chances of Indian wars far-scattered gave him the glory of victory ever renewed.

examine all his labours. circled the lion’s neck entangled in mighty grip, explaining; they are detailed in every handbook of and so without weapon brought death, in that spot where the breath passes through the gullet of the lifesufficing throat. I see nothing surprising in that. There was Cyrene, a champion in the leafy forest with her lionslaying hands, that girl did an exploit quite as good, when she also mastered a male lion with a woman’s grip which he could not shake off. Bacchos too when still a young lad, while playing in the mountains, grasped a deadly lion by the shaggy throat with one hand, dragged him away and presented him to his mother Rheia, pressing down the maned neck of the gaping beast—dragged him still alive, and fastened him under the yokestrap, put on the guiding bridle over slavish cheeks, then seated high in the car whipt the back of the frightful creatures. Troops of panthers also and the ravening tribe of bears were slaves to the baby hands of Dionysos.

but for Lyaios, boars and the brood of lions were the playthings of childhood. that trouble to liberate some little snaky brook like Lerna, by cutting down the selfgrowing firstfruits of the lurking serpent, as that plentiful crop of snakeheads grew spiking up? If only he had done the killing alone! instead of calling in his distress for Iolaos, to destroy the heads as they grew afresh, by lifting a burning torch, until the two together managed to get the better of one female serpent. I do not see how to praise two fellows fighting with a miserable viper, and one job divided between two. But Euios wand in hand cut down the snaky prominent part in the battle with the Giants and the gods could not have won without him. story. The whole point of the labour was that it was sacred sons of Earth alone —that champion of Zeus! attacked them all, with huge serpents flowing over their shoulders equally on both sides much bigger than the Inachian snake, while they went hissing restlessly about among the stars of heaven, not in the pool of Lerna. Forgive me Iolaos, for you burnt the hydra’s body, and Heracles, only Heracles, grabbed the name of victory.

from loud-roaring throats, no paltry Lerna,; by cutting down a bush of heads which ever grew again on so many necks ; he took for heralds of his fourfold victory West Wind and South Wind, the feet of the North and the wing of the East, and filled Ocean, land and sea with his exploits. If a serpent brings fame to a man, if lurking snakes, these are the birthday garlands of Bacchos, these are the terrible serpentine fillets of his snaky hair, ever since he left the teeming fold of his father’s thigh. horns ; I will not disparage great Heracles as the slayer ὃ of asingle deer. Forget the timid deer: for killing of fawns and hunting of prickets is a only little play for the Bacchant woman. cannot admire just a mad bull which he chased, and how shaking that great club he knocked off a little horn.¢ One woman alone has often done as much ; and a Bacchant woman, the least of the servants of oxhorn Dionysos, has often butchered a vast herd of and might not be hurt, but must be caught by sheer speed horned bulls. Often if a mad ox showed fight with his horns, she has pulled back the sharp curved horns and brought down to his knees a bull that has Geryones ; for my Dionysos with his fleshcutting ivy shore through Alpos,? that godfighting son of Earth, Alpos with a hundred vipers on his head for hair, who touched the Sun, and pulled back the Moon, and tormented the company of stars with his tresses.

mortal Zeus, when for three moonlights he possessed the fruitful bed of Alemene, were a petty job in the mountains: but the exploits of Bacchos, whether Giant of many arms or chief of the highcrested Indians, were not a deer, no herds of oxen, no shaggy boar, no dog or bull, no goldglinting fruit ὃ and its roots, no dung, no random wandering bird with silly wing-shafts not made of steel, no horse’s man-eating teeth, no little belt of Hippolyta. The victory of Dionysos was huge Deriades and twenty- Achaia, may your book pardon me, immortal as the Dawn! I will not speak of the Trojan War ; for I do not compare Dionysos to Aiacides, or Deriades to Hector. Your Muse ought to have hymned so great and mighty a struggle, how Bacchos brought low the Giants, and ought to have left the labours of Achilles to other bards, had not Thetis stolen that glory from you. But breathe into me your inspired breath to sing my lay; for I need your lovely speech, since I make nothing of the sweat of Dionysos, the fatal foe of India, when I hymn so great a war.

Indians again, holding the inspired spear and shield of Father Homer, while I attack Morrheus and the folly of Deriades, armed by the side of Zeus and Bromios ! Let me hear the syrinx of Bacchos summon the host to battle, and the ceaseless call of the trumpet in Homer’s verse, that I may destroy what is left of the Indians with my spear of the spirit. the host of Bacchos, at home on the lonely rocks, during this pause in the war. Ganges was shaken with fear, pitying his children; all the city was moved at the fate of the lately dead; the streets resounded with the mournful noise of the women’s dirge. shame, for he had already heard all ; and most deeply was he grieved when he saw by a glance aside that Hydaspes had lost his divine aspect, and murmured black with waves of wine. a slow step, since the hapless man was in the dark shadow of blindness. He sprinkled the yellow drops of the nomorepain liquor upon his fast-closed eyes ; and as his face felt the drops of wine, his eyes were opened. The old man danced for joy, and praised the purple juice of the evil-averting river ; then with his old hands he ladled up the purple liquor in torrents, and filled his fragrant skins, and kindled the altar for Zeus and Dionysos giver of wine, now he had seen at last the sun which he had not seen for so long.

A lad hunting on the mountains with the Archeress left his dogs on the river bank, drunken and lapping the rich water of the reddening river, and returned to the city, to tell incredulous Deriades about the sweet stream of the drunk-reeling river. through the city on the soft warm breeze, and intoxicating all the streets, foretelling victory for Indianslaying Lyaios. The people spent the night on the lofty towers in fear, and the guards of the highcrested citadel lined its wall with their shields. On the hills, Dionyses often angrily reproached Hera, that she had again checked his battle with the Indians for jealousy, having measured a course of thirty dawns for the battle ¢ after the moon returning again and again had fulfilled ten circuits, while the winds scattered all his hopes of victory. When he saw the lions idle beside their manger, he roared like a lion and mourned in the woods with tearless eyes. But while Bacchos was thus despondent, came a messenger in haste through the Scythian mountains from divine Rheia, sterile Attis in his trailing robe, whipping up the travelling team of lions. He once had stained with a knife the creative stalk of marriage-consecrating youth, and threw away the burden of the plowshare without love or wedlock, the man’s harvest-offering ; so he showered upon his two thighs the bloody generative drops, and made womanish his warm body with the shearing steel.

This was the messenger’ who came driving the car of goddess Cybele, to comfort discouraged Lyaios. Seeing him Dionysos sprang up, thinking perchance he might have brought the allconquering Rheia to the Indian War. Attis checked the wild team, and hung the reins on the handrail, and disclosing the Pape he is thinking of the two divisions of Ethiopians. onnos is more than usually tasteless in divine armour for Dionysos, who is divten already. Homer smooth surface of his rosy cheeks, called out a flood of loud. words to Bacchos— Rheia! Answer me: when will you destroy the woollyheaded nation of Indians and come back to the Lydian land? Not yet has Rheia seen your blackskin captives; not yet has she wiped off the sweat from your Mygdonian lions after the war, beside the highland manger, where the rich river of Pactolos runs ; but without a sound you roll out the conflict through circuits of everlasting years! Not yet have you brought a herd of eastern lions from India as a token of victory for the breeder of beasts, the mother of gods! Very well, accept from Hephaistos and your immortal Rheia this armour which the Lemnian anvil made? ; you will see upon it earth and sea, the sky and the company of stars! ”’ ¢ I can destroy the Indian city in one day with my ivybound spear: but the jealousy of stepmother Hera keeps me back from victory, do what I will. Furious Ares openly stands up as champion for Deriades, and assails my Satyrs. Often I have meant to wound him with my wand, but Cronion menacing with claps of thunder has checked my attack. Just let heavenly Zeus for this day give rest to the noise of his heavyrattling clouds, and to-morrow I will shackle Ares until I cut down the harvest of helmeted Indians ! ” provides it for the mortal Achilles, who at the crisis of his fortunes needs and receives supernatural help.

violate, my friend, you need not tremble before the wrath of Ares, or the jealousy of Hera, or all the company of the Blessed, while Allmother Rheia is with you ; you need fear no army with bended bows, lest they cast their spears and strike Helios or wound Selene! Who could blunt the sword of Orion with a knife, or shoot the Waggoner with earthly arrows ? Perhaps you will name the hornstrong father of Deriades: but what could Hydaspes do to you, when you can bring in Oceanos ? for my Rheia has prophesied victory for you at last. The war shall not end until the four Seasons complete the sixth year. So much the eye of Zeus and the threads of the unturning Fate have granted to the will of Hera; in the seventh lichtgang which follows, you shall destroy the Indian city.” Bromios ; then he tasted of the feast, and cheered his heart with unmixed cups of nomorepain wine.

When he had satisfied his appetite at table, once more he touched up the flanks of his lions with the whip, and guided the hillranging car on the road back to Phrygia. He drove along the heights above the Caucasian valleys, the Assyrian peaks and the dangerous Bactrian mountains, the summits of Libanos and the crests of Tauros, until he passed into the Maionian land. There he entered the divine precinct selfbuilt of Rheia, mother of mighty sons. He freed his ravening lions from the yokestraps, and haltered them at the manger which he filled with ambrosial fodder. inspired message, he mingled thyrsus-mad with the Bacchant women upon the hills. He threw to the winds his burden of anxious pain, as he shook the shield curiously wrought, the shield of Olympos, the clever work of Hephaistos. wonders of Olympian art, shining wonders which a heavenly hand had made. The shield was emblazoned in many colours. In the middle was the circle of the earth, sea joined to land, and round about it the heaven dotted with a troop of stars ; in the sky was Helios in the basket of his blazing chariot, made of gold, and the white round circle of the full moon in silver. All the constellations were there which adorn the upper air, surrounding it as with a crown of many shining jewels throughout the seven zones. Beside the socket of the axle were the poles of the two heavenly Waggons,?

never touched by the water; for these both move head to loin together round a point higher than Oceanos, and the head of the sinking Bear always bends down exactly as much as the neck of the rising Bear stretches up. Between the two Waggons he made the Serpent, which is close by and joins the two separated bodies, bending his heavenly belly in spiral shape and turning to and fro his speckled body, like the spirals of Maiandros and its curving murmuring waters, as it runs to and fro in twists and turns over the ground : the Serpent keeps his eye ever fixt on the head of Helice, while his body is girdled with starry scales. The constellations of the Bears encompass him round: on the point of his tongue is held out a sparkling star, which close to his lips shoots light, and spits forth flame from the midst of his worked on the back of the wellwrought shield, in the middle ; and to please Lyaios he wrought also the harpbuilt walls of cowfounded “ Thebes, when one after another the seven gateways were a-building in a row.

There was Zethos carrying a load of stones on his chafing shoulder, and working hard for his country ; while Amphion played and twanged the harp, and at the tune a whole hill rolled along of itself as if bewitched and seemed to dance even on the shield. It was only a work of art, but you might have said, the immovable rock went lightly skipping and tripping along! When you saw the man busy with his silent harp, striking up a quick tune on his makebelieve strings, you would quickly come closer to stretch your ear and delight your own heart with that harp which could build a wall, to hear the music of seven strings which could make the stones to move. scene amid the sparkling company of the stars, where the Trojan winepourer ὃ was cunningly depicted with art divine being carried into the court of Zeus. There well wrought was the Eagle, just as we see in pictures, on the wing, holding him fast in his predatory talons. Zeus appeared to be anxious as he flew through the air, holding the terrified boy with claws that tore not, gently moving the wings and sparing his strength, for he feared that Ganymede might slip and fall headlong from the sky, and the deadly surf of the sea might be named the Ganymedean, as the Icarian Sea was named : when Icaros fell into it after his wax wings melted. The name Hellespont (‘sea of Helle” in popular was derived from Helle daughter of Athamas, who was phere fallen into it from the back of the ram as it went to whose story no one but Nonnos tells fully, though there are drown him. Even more he feared the Fates, and hoped that the lovely youth might not first give his name to the sea below and rob Helle of the honour which was reserved for her in future.¢ Next the boy was depicted at the feast of the heavenly table, as one ladling the wine. There was a mixing-bowl beside him full of self-flowing nectarean dew, and he offered a cup to Zeus at the table. There Hera sat, looking furious even upon the shield, and showing in her mien how jealousy filled her soul; for she was pointing a finger at the boy, to show goddess Pallas who sat next her how a cowboy Ganymedes walked among the stars to pour out their wine, the sweet nectar of Olympos, and there he was handing the cups which were the lot of virgin Hebe.

nurse of Bacchos; and Moria, and the dappled serpent, and the divine plant, and Damasen Serpentkiller the terrible son of Earth; Tylos, also, who lived in Maionia so short a time, was there mangled in his quick poisonous death.? bank of neighbouring Hermos the Mygdonian River, when his hand touched a serpent. The creature lifted his head and stretched his hood, opened wide his ruthless gaping mouth and leapt on the man, whipt round the man’s loins his trailing tail and hissed like a whistling wind, curled round the man’s body in clingallusions to it elsewhere ; it is said to have been recounted in the historical work of Xanthos the Lydian. Tylos is Tylon, supposed ancestor of the Tylonians, a Lydian clan. Under this affected telling of the story may well be hidden a genuine Lydian legend. The incident of the snake-wort which gives life to the dead is a very old mdrchen-theme. ing rings, then darting at his face tore the cheeks and downy chin with sharp rows of teeth, and spat the juice of Fate out of his poisonous jaws. The man struggled with all that weight on his shoulders, while his neck was encircled by the coiling tail, a snaky necklace of death bringing Fate very near.

Then he fell dead to the ground, like an uprooted dead before her eyes; she wailed over the body beside her, and pulled off the monstrous beast, to bring him down. For this was not the first wayfarer that he had laid low, not the first shepherd, Tylos not the only one he had killed untimely; lurking in his thicket he battened on the wild beasts, and often pulled up a tree by the roots and dragged it in, then under the joints of his jaws swallowed it into his dank darksome throat, blowing out again a great blast from his mouth. Often he pulled in the wayfarer terrified by his lurking breath, and dragged him rolling over and over into his mouth—he could be seen from afar swallowing the man whole in his gaping maw. murderer ; the nymph trembled with fear when she beheld the serried ranks of poisonous teeth, and the garland of death wrapt round his neck. Wailing loudly beside the dragonvittling den, she met Damasen, a gigantic son of Earth, whom his mother once conceived of herself and brought forth by herself.

From his birth, a thick hairy beard covered his chin. At his birth, Quarrel was his nurse, spears his mother’s pap, carnage his bath, the corselet his swaddlings. Under the heavy weight of those long broad limbs, a warlike babe, he cast lances as a boy ; touching the sky, from birth he shook a spear born with him ; no sooner did he appear than Eileithyia armed the nursling with a shield. fertile slope of the woodland. She bowed weeping before him in prayer, and pointed to the horrible reptile, her brother’s murderer, and Tylos newly mangled and still breathing in the dust. The Giant did not reject her prayer, that monstrous champion ; but he seized a tree and tore it up from its roots in mother earth, then stood and came sidelong upon the ravening dragon. The coiling champion fought him in serpent fashion, hissing battle from the wartrumpet of his throat, a fiftyfurlong serpent coil upon coil.

With two circles he bound first Damasen’s feet, madly whipping his writhing coils about his body, and opened the gates of his raging teeth to show a mad chasm: rolling his wild eyes, breathing death, he shot watery spurts from his lips, and spat into the giant’s face fountains of poison in showers from his jaws, and sent a long spout of yellow foam out of his teeth. He darted up straight and danced over the giant’s highcrested head, while the movement of his body made the earth quake. mountains, and threw off the weight of the serpent’s long spine. His hand whirled aloft his weapon, shooting straight like a missile the great tree with all its leaves, and brought down the plant roots and all upon the serpent’s head, where the backbone joins it at the narrow part of the rounded neck. Then the tree took root again, and the serpent lay on the ground immovable, a coiling corpse.

Suddenly the female serpent his mate came coiling up, scraping the ground with her undulating train, and crept about seeking for her misshapen husband, like a woman who missed her husband dead. She wound her long trailing spine with all speed among the tall rocks, hurrying towards the herbdecked hillside; in the coppice she plucked the flower of Zeus with her snaky jaws, and brought back the painkilling herb in her lips, dropt the antidote of death into the dry nostril of the horrible dead, and gave life with the flower to the stark poisonous corpse. The body moved of itself and shuddered ; part of it still had no life, another part stirred, half-restored the body shook another part and the tail moved of itself ; breath came again through the cold jaws, slowly the throat opened and the familiar sound came out, pouring the same long hiss again. At last the serpent moved, and disappeared into his furtive hole. laid the lifegiving herb in the lifebegetting nostril. The wholesome plant with its painhealing clusters brought back the breathing soul into the dead body and made it rise again. Soul came into body the second time ; the cold frame grew warm with the help of the inward fire. The body, busy again with the beginning of life, moved the sole of the right foot, rose upon the left and stood firmly based on both feet, like a man lying in bed who shakes the sleep from his eyes in the morning. His blood boiled again; the hands of the newly breathing corpse were lifted, the body recovered its rhythm, the feet their movement, the eyes their sight, and the lips their voice.

the swaddled stone which she trick seemed to hold in her arms pressed to her bosom a mock-child she had not borne, all worked by the artist’s hands; aye, cunning Rheia offered to her callous consort a babe of stone, a spiky heavy dinner. There was the father swallowing the stony son, the thing shaped like humanity, in his voracious maw, and making his meal of another pretended Zeus. There he was again in heavy labour, with the stone inside him, bringing up all those children squeezed together and disgorging the burden from his pregnant artist’s clever hand upon the warshield, brought for Lyaios from Olympos with its becks and brooks. All thronged about to see the bearer of the round shield, admiring each in turn, and praising the fiery Olympian crossed the west and veiled the light of her fire-eyed face ; quiet Night covered all the earth in her dark shades, and after their evening meal all the people lay down in their mountain bed, scattered on pallets here and there over the ground.

instead of Zeus. He Jater was caused to vomit the stone and the elder children (Hestia, Demeter, Hera, Poseidon and Hades) with it. geographic knowledge which took place after the century of the Roman Empire. He knows nothing extensive exploration of all Indian coasts by merchants of the first and second centuries after and bases his phy in very ill fashion on the tional record of Alsendes invasion of India in the century before pig an that τον ha τς vague wledge of the borderlands ndia, Kush mountains, and of North-Western India,