EXPLANATION.

Cicero (On the Nature of the G.o.ds, Book iii.) tells us, that Lycaon had a daughter who delighted in the chase, and that Jupiter, the second of that name, the king of Arcadia, fell in love with her. This was the ground on which she was said to have been a favorite of Diana.

The story of Calisto having been received into Heaven, and forming the Constellation of the Bear, was perhaps grounded on the fact of Lycaon, her father, having been the first known to take particular notice of this Constellation. The story of the request of Juno, that Tethys will not receive this new Constellation into the Ocean, is probably derived from the circ.u.mstance, that the Bear, as well as the other stars within the Arctic Circle, never sets.

Possibly, Arcas, the son of Calisto, dying at a youthful age, may have been the origin of the Constellation of the Lesser Bear.

FABLE VIII. [II.551-590]

A virgin, the favorite of Apollo, of the same name with Coronis, is changed into a crow, for a story which she tells Minerva, concerning the basket in which Ericthonius was enclosed.

"Consider what I was, and what I am, and inquire into my deserts. Thou wilt find that my fidelity was my ruin. For once upon a time, Pallas had enclosed Ericthonius, an offspring born without a mother, in a basket made of Actaean twigs; and had given it to keep to the three virgins born of the two-shaped[71] Cecrops, and had given them this injunction, that they should not inquire into her secrets. I, being hidden among the light foliage, was watching from a thick elm what they were doing. Two {of them}, Pandrosos and Herse, observe their charge without {any} treachery; Aglauros alone calls her sisters cowards, and unties the knots with her hand; but within they behold a child, and a dragon extended by him. I told the G.o.ddess what was done; for which such a return as this is made to me, that I am said to have been banished from the protection of Minerva, and am placed after the bird of the night. My punishment may warn birds not to incur dangers, by their chattering. But I consider {that} she courted me with no inclination of my own, nor asking for any such {favors}. This thou mayst ask of Pallas thyself; although she is angry, she will not, with all her anger, deny this. For Coroneus, one famous in the land of Phocis (I mention what is well known) begot me: and {so} I was a virgin of royal birth, and was courted by rich suitors ({so} despise me not). My beauty was the cause of my misfortune; for while I was pa.s.sing with slow steps along the sea-sh.o.r.e, on the surface of the sand, as I was wont {to do}, the G.o.d of the Ocean beheld me, and was inflamed; and when he had consumed his time to no purpose, in entreating me with soft words, he prepared {to use} violence, and followed me. I fled, and I left the firm sh.o.r.e, and wearied myself in vain on the yielding sand. Then I invoked both G.o.ds and men; but my voice did not reach any mortal. A virgin was moved for a virgin, and gave me a.s.sistance. I was extending my arms toward heaven; {when those} arms began to grow black with light feathers. I struggled to throw my garments from off my shoulders, but they were feathers, and had taken deep root in my skin. I tried to beat my naked breast with my hands, but I had now neither hands nor naked breast. I ran; and the sand did not r.e.t.a.r.d my feet as before, and I was lifted up from the surface of the ground. After that, being lifted up, I was carried through the air, and was a.s.signed, as a faultless companion, to Minerva. Yet what does this avail me, if Nyctimene, made a bird for a horrid crime, has succeeded me in my honor?"

[Footnote 71: _Two-shaped._--Ver. 555. Cecrops is here so called, and in the Greek, d?f??? from the fact of his having been born in Egypt, and having settled in Greece, and was thus to be reckoned both as an Egyptian, and in the number of the Greeks.]

EXPLANATION.

Ericthonius was fabled to be the son, or foster-child, of Athene, or Minerva, perhaps because he was the son of the daughter of Cranaus, who had the name of Athene, by a priest of Vulcan, which Divinity was said to have been his progenitor. St. Augustine alleges that he was exposed, and found in a temple dedicated to Minerva and Vulcan. His name being composed of two words, ???? and ????, signifying 'contention,' and 'earth,' Strabo imagines that he was the son of Vulcan and the Earth. But it seems that the real ground on which he was called by that name was, that he disputed the right to the crown of Athens with Amphictyon, on the death of Cranaus, the second king.

Amphictyon prevailed, but Ericthonius succeeded him. To hide his legs, which were deformed, he is said to have invented chariots; though that is not likely, as Egypt, from which Greece had received many colonies, was acquainted with the use of them from the earliest times. He is also said to have inst.i.tuted the festival of the Panathenaea, at Athens, whence, in process of time, it was adopted by the whole of Greece.

Hyginus tells us, that after his death he was received into heaven as the constellation 'Auriga,' or 'the Charioteer;' and he further informs us, that the deformity of his legs gave occasion to the saying, that he was half man and half a serpent. Apollodorus says that he was born in Attica; that he was the son of Cranae, the daughter of Attis; and that he dethroned Amphictyon, and became the fourth king of Athens.

FABLE IX. [II.591-632]

Nyctimene having entertained a criminal pa.s.sion for her father, Nycteus, the G.o.ds, to punish her incest, transform her into an owl.

Apollo pierces the breast of Coronis with an arrow, on the raven informing him of the infidelity of his mistress.

"Has not the thing, which is very well known throughout the whole of Lesbos,[72] been heard of by thee, that Nyctimene defiled the bed of her father? She is a bird indeed; but being conscious of her crime, she avoids {the human} gaze and the light, and conceals her shame in the darkness; and by all {the birds} she is expelled entirely from the sky."

The raven says to him, saying such things, "May this, thy calling of me back, prove a mischief to thee, I pray; I despise the worthless omen."

Nor does he drop his intended journey; and he tells his master, that he has seen Coronis lying down with a youth of Haemonia. On hearing the crime of his mistress, his laurel fell down; and at the same moment his usual looks, his plectrum,[73] and his color, forsook the G.o.d. And as his mind was {now} burning with swelling rage, he took up his wonted arms, and levelled his bow bent from the extremities, and pierced, with an unerring shaft, that bosom, that had been so oft pressed to his own breast. Wounded, she uttered a groan, and, drawing the steel from out of the wound, she bathed her white limbs with purple blood; and she said, "I might {justly}, Phbus, have been punished by thee, but {still I might} have first brought forth; now we two shall die in one." Thus far {she spoke}; and she poured forth her life, together with her blood.

A deadly coldness took possession of her body deprived of life.

The lover, too late, alas! repents of his cruel vengeance, and blames himself that he listened {to the bird, and} that he was so infuriated.

He hates the bird, through which he was forced to know of the crime and the cause of his sorrow; he hates, too, the string, the bow, and his hand; and together with his hand, {those} rash weapons, the arrows. He cherishes her fallen to the ground, and by late resources endeavors to conquer her destiny; and in vain he practices his physical arts.

When he found that these attempts were made in vain, and that the funeral pile was being prepared, and that her limbs were about to be burnt in the closing flames, then, in truth, he gave utterance to sighs fetched from the bottom of his heart (for it is not allowed the celestial features to be bathed with tears). No otherwise than, as when an axe, poised from the right ear {of the butcher}, dashes to pieces, with a clean stroke, the hollow temples of the sucking calf, while the dam looks on. Yet after Phbus had poured the unavailing perfumes on her breast, when he had given the {last} embrace and had performed the due obsequies prematurely hastened, he did not suffer his own offspring to sink into the same ashes; but he s.n.a.t.c.hed the child from the flames and from the womb of his mother, and carried him into the cave of the two-formed Chiron. And he forbade the raven, expecting for himself the reward of his tongue that told no untruth, to perch any longer among the white birds.

[Footnote 72: _Lesbos._--Ver. 591. This was an island in the aegean sea, lying to the south of Troy.]

[Footnote 73: _Plectrum._--Ver. 601. This was a little rod, or staff, with which the player used to strike the strings of the lyre, or cithara, on which he was playing.]

EXPLANATION.

History does not afford us the least insight into the foundation of the story of Coronis transformed into a crow, for making too faithful a report, nor that of the raven changed from white to black, for talking too much. If they are based upon some events which really happened, we must be content to acknowledge that these Fables refer to the history of two persons entirely unknown to us, and who, perhaps, lived as far back as the time of the daughters of Cecrops, to whom the story seems to bear some relation. Coronis being the name of a crow as well as of a Nymph, Lucian and other writers have fabled that her son, aesculapius, was produced from the egg of that bird, and was born in the shape of a serpent, under which form he was very generally worshipped.

FABLE X. [II.633-675]

Ocyrrhoe, the daughter of the Centaur Chiron, attempting to predict future events, tells her father the fate of the child aesculapius, on which the G.o.ds transform her into a mare.

In the meantime the half-beast {Chiron} was proud of a pupil of Divine origin, and rejoiced in the honor annexed to the responsibility. Behold!

the daughter of the Centaur comes, having her shoulders covered with her yellow hair; whom once the nymph Chariclo,[74] having borne her on the banks of a rapid stream, called Ocyrrhoe. She was not contented to learn her father's arts {only; but} she sang the secrets of the Fates.

Therefore, when she had conceived in her mind the prophetic transports, and grew warm with the G.o.d, whom she held confined within her breast, she beheld the infant, and she said, "Grow on, child, the giver of health to the whole world; the bodies of mortals shall often owe their {own existence} to thee. To thee will it be allowed to restore life when taken away; and daring to do that once against the will of the G.o.ds, thou wilt be hindered by the bolts of thy grandsire from being able any more to grant that {boon}. And from a G.o.d thou shalt become a lifeless carcase; and a G.o.d {again}, who lately wast a carcase; and twice shalt thou renew thy destiny. Thou likewise, dear father, now immortal, and produced at thy nativity, on the condition of enduring for ever, wilt then wish that thou couldst die, when thou shalt be tormented on receiving the blood of a baneful serpent[75] in thy wounded limbs; and the G.o.ds shall make thee from an immortal {being}, subject to death, and the three G.o.ddesses[76] shall cut thy threads."

Something still remained in addition to what she had said. She heaved a sigh from the bottom of her breast, and the tears bursting forth, trickled down her cheeks, and thus she said: "The Fates prevent me, and I am forbidden to say any more, and the use of my voice is precluded. My arts, which have brought the wrath of a Divinity upon me, were not of so much value; I wish that I had not been acquainted with the future. Now the human shape seems to be withdrawing from me; now gra.s.s pleases {me} for my food; now I have a desire to range over the extended plains; I am turned into a mare, and into a shape kindred {to that of my father}. But yet, why entirely? For my father partakes of both forms."

As she was uttering such words as these, the last part of her complaint was but little understood; and her words were confused. And presently neither {were} they words indeed, nor did it appear to be the voice of a mare, but of one imitating a mare. And in a little time she uttered perfect neighing, and stretched her arms upon the gra.s.s. Then did her fingers grow together, and a smooth hoof united five nails in one continued piece of horn. The length of her face and of her neck increased; the greatest part of her long hair became a tail. And as the hairs lay scattered about her neck, they were transformed into a mane {lying} upon the right side; at once both her voice and her shape were changed. And this wondrous change gave her the {new} name {of Enippe}.

[Footnote 74: _Chariclo._--Ver. 636. She was the daughter of Apollo, or of Ocea.n.u.s, but is supposed not to have been the same person that is mentioned by Apollodorus as the mother of the prophet Tiresias.]

[Footnote 75: _A baneful serpent._--Ver. 652. This happened when one of the arrows of Hercules, dipped in the poison of the Lernaean Hydra, pierced the foot of Chiron while he was examining it.]

[Footnote 76: _The three G.o.ddesses._--Ver. 654. Namely, Clotho, Lachesis, and Atropos, the 'Parcae,' or 'Destinies.']

FABLE XI. [II.676-707]

Mercury, having stolen the oxen of Apollo, and Battus having perceived the theft, he engages him, by a present, to keep the matter secret.

Mistrusting, however, his fidelity, he a.s.sumes another shape, and tempting him with presents, he succeeds in corrupting him. To punish his treachery, the G.o.d changes him into a touchstone.

The Philyrean[77] hero wept, and in vain, {G.o.d} of Delphi, implored thy a.s.sistance; but neither couldst thou reverse the orders of great Jupiter, nor, if thou couldst have reversed them wast thou then present; {for then} thou wast dwelling in Elis and the Messenian[78] fields. This was the time when a shepherd's skin garment was covering thee, and a stick cut out of the wood was the burden of thy left hand, {and} of the other, a pipe unequal with its seven reeds. And while love is thy concern, while thy pipe is soothing thee, some cows are said to have strayed un.o.bserved into the plains of Pylos.[79] The son of Maia the daughter of Atlas, observes them, and with his {usual} skill hides them, driven off, in the woods. n.o.body but an old man, well-known in that country, had noticed the theft: all the neighborhood called him Battus.

He was keeping the forests and the gra.s.sy pastures, and the set of fine-bred mares of the rich Neleus.[80]

{Mercury} was afraid of him, and took him aside with a gentle hand, and said to him, "Come, stranger, whoever thou art, if, perchance any one should ask after these herds, deny that thou hast seen them; and, lest no requital be paid thee for so doing, take a handsome cow as thy reward;" and {thereupon} he gave {him one}. On receiving it, the stranger returned this answer: "Thou mayst go in safety. May that stone first make mention of thy theft;" and he pointed to a stone. The son of Jupiter feigned to go away. {But} soon he returned, and changing his form, together with his voice, he said, "Countryman, if thou hast seen any cows pa.s.s along this way, give me thy help, and break silence about the theft; a female, coupled together with its bull shall be presented thee as a reward." But the old man,[81] after his reward was {thus} doubled, said, "They will be beneath those hills;" and beneath those hills they {really} were. The son of Atlas laughed and said, "Dost thou, treacherous man, betray me to my own self? Dost betray me to myself?"

and {then} he turned his perjured breast into a hard stone, which even now is called the "Touchstone;"[82] and this old disgrace is {attached} to the stone that {really} deserves it not.

[Footnote 77: _Philyrean._--Ver. 676. Chiron was the son of Philyra, by Saturn.]

[Footnote 78: _Messenian._--Ver. 679. Elis and Messenia were countries of Peloponnesus; the former was on the northwest, and the latter on the southwest side of it.]

[Footnote 79: _Plains of Pylos._--Ver. 684. There were three cities named Pylos in Peloponnesus. One was in Elis, another in Messenia, and the third was situate between the other two. The latter is supposed to have been the native place of Nestor, though they all laid claim to that honor.]

[Footnote 80: _Neleus._--Ver. 689. He was the king of Pylos, and the father of Nestor.]

[Footnote 81: _The old man._--Ver. 702. Clarke quaintly translates 'at senior,' 'but then the old blade.']

[Footnote 82: _The 'Touchstone.'_--Ver. 706. It is a matter of doubt among commentators whether 'index' here means a general term for the touchstone, by which metals are tested; or whether it means that Battus was changed into one individual stone, which afterwards was called 'index.' Lactantius, by his words, seems to imply that the latter was the case. He says, 'He changed him into a stone, which, from this circ.u.mstance, is called "index" about Pylos.' 'Index' was a name of infamy, corresponding with the Greek word s???f??t??, and with our term 'spy.']

EXPLANATION.

The Centaurs, fabulous monsters, half men and half horses, were perhaps the first hors.e.m.e.n in Thessaly and its neighborhood. It is also probable that Chiron, who was one of these, acquired great fame by the knowledge he had acquired at a time and in a country where learning was little cultivated. The ancients regarded him as the first promulgator of the utility of medicines, in which he was said to have instructed his pupil aesculapius. He was also considered to be an excellent musician and a good astronomer, as we learn from Homer, Diodorus Siculus, and other authors. Most of the heroes of that age, and among them Hercules and Jason, studied under him. Very probably, the only foundation for the story of the transformation of Ocyrrhoe, was the skill and address which, under her father's instruction, she acquired in riding and the management of horses. For if, as it seems really was the case, the hors.e.m.e.n of that age were taken for monsters, half men and half horses, it is not surprising to find the story that the daughter of a Centaur was transformed into a mare.

Chiron is generally supposed to have marked out the Constellations, for the purpose of directing the Argonauts in their voyage for the recovery of the Golden Fleece.