[Footnote 46: _Lofty habitation._--Ver. 352. The mountains of Thessaly are so called, because Chiron, the son of the Nymph Phillyra, lived there.]

[Footnote 47: _Cerambus._--Ver. 353. Antoninus Liberalis, quoting from Nicander, calls him Terambus, and says that he lived at the foot of Mount Pelion; he incurred the resentment of the Nymphs, who changed him into a scarabaeus, or winged beetle. Flying to the heights of Parna.s.sus, at the time of the flood of Deucalion, he thereby made his escape. Some writers say that he was changed into a bird.]

[Footnote 48: _Pitane._--Ver. 357. This was a town of aetolia, in Asia Minor, near the mouth of the river Caicus.]

[Footnote 49: _The long dragon._--Ver. 358. He alludes, most probably, to the story of the Lesbian changed into a dragon or serpent, which is mentioned in the Eleventh book, line 58.]

[Footnote 50: _Wood of Ida._--Ver. 359. This was the grove of Ida, in Phrygia. It is supposed that he refers to the story of Thyoneus, the son of Bacchus, who, having stolen an ox from some Phrygian shepherds, was pursued by them; on which Bacchus, to screen his son, changed the ox into a stag, and invested Thyoneus with the garb of a hunter.]

[Footnote 51: _Father of Corythus._--Ver. 361. Paris was the father of Corythus, by none. He was said to have been buried at Cebrena, a little town of Phrygia, near Troy.]

[Footnote 52: _Maera._--Ver. 362. This was the name of the dog of Icarius, the father of Erigone, who discovered the murder of his master by the shepherds of Attica, and was made a Constellation, under the name of the Dog-star. As, however, the flight of Medea was now far distant from Attica, it is more likely that the Poet refers to the transformation of some female, named Maera, into a dog, whose story has not come down to us; indeed, Lactantius expresses this as his opinion. Burmann thinks that it refers to the transformation of Hecuba, mentioned in the 13th book, line 406; and that 'Maera' is a corruption for some other name of Hecuba.]

[Footnote 53: _Eurypylus._--Ver. 363. He was a former king of the Isle of Cos, in the aegean Sea, and was much famed for his skill as an augur.]

[Footnote 54: _The Coan matrons._--Ver. 363. Lactantius says that the women of Cos, extolling their own beauty as superior to that of Venus, incurred the resentment of that G.o.ddess, and were changed by her into cows. Another version of the story is, that these women, being offended at Hercules for driving the oxen of aegeon through their island, were very abusive, on which Juno transformed them into cows: to this latter version reference is made in the present pa.s.sage.]

[Footnote 55: _Hercules._--Ver. 364. He besieged and took the chief city of the island, which was also called Cos; and having slain Eurypylus, carried off his daughter Chalciope.]

[Footnote 56: _Phbean Rhodes._--Ver. 365. The island of Rhodes, in the Mediterranean, off the coast of Asia Minor, was sacred to the Sun, and was said never to be deserted by his rays.]

[Footnote 57: _Ialysian Telchines._--Ver. 365. Ialysus was one of the three most ancient cities of Rhodes, and was said to have been founded by Ialysus, whose parent was the Sun. The Telchines, or Thelchines, were a race supposed to have migrated thither from Crete. They were persons of great artistic skill, on which account they may, possibly, have obtained the character of being magicians; such was the belief of Strabo.]

[Footnote 58: _Whose eyes._--Ver. 366. The evil eye was supposed by the ancients not only to have certain fascinating powers, but to be able to destroy the beauty of any object on which it was turned.]

[Footnote 59: _Cea._--Ver. 368. This island, now Zia, is in the aegean sea, near Euba. Carthaea was a city there, the ruins of which are still in existence.]

[Footnote 60: _Alcidamas._--Ver. 369. Antoninus Liberalis says, that Alcidamas lived not at Carthaea, but at Iulis, another city in the Isle of Cea.]

[Footnote 61: _Lakes of Hyrie._--Ver. 371. Hyrie was the mother of Cycnus; and pining away with grief on the transformation of her son, she was changed into a lake, called by her name.]

[Footnote 62: _Cycneian Tempe._--Ver. 371. This was not Thessalian Tempe, but a valley of Teumesia, or Teumesus, a mountain of Botia.]

[Footnote 63: _Pleuron._--Ver. 382. This was a city of aetolia, near Mount Curius. It was far distant from Botia and Lake Hyrie.

Some commentators, therefore, suggest that the reading should be Brauron, a village of Attica, near the confines of Botia.]

[Footnote 64: _Combe._--Ver. 383. She was the mother of the Curetes of aetolia, who, perhaps, received that name from Mount Curius. There was another Combe, the daughter of Asopus, who discovered the use of brazen arms, and was called Chalcis, from that circ.u.mstance. She was said to have borne a hundred daughters to her husband.]

[Footnote 65: _Calaurea._--Ver. 384. This was an island between Crete and the Peloponnesus, in the Saronic gulf, which was sacred to Apollo. Latona resided there, having given Delos to Neptune in exchange for it. Demosthenes died there.]

[Footnote 66: _Menephron._--Ver. 386. Hyginus says, that he committed incest both with his mother Blias, and with Cyllene, his daughter.]

[Footnote 67: _Cephisus._--Ver. 388. The river Cephisus, in Botia, had a daughter, Praxithea. She was the wife of Erectheus, and bore him eight sons, the fate of one of whom is perhaps here referred to.]

[Footnote 68: _Eumelus._--Ver. 390. He was the king of Patrae, on the sea-coast of Achaia. Triptolemus visited him with his winged chariot; on which, Antheas, the son of Eumelus, ascended it while his father was sleeping, and falling from it, he was killed. He is, probably, here referred to; and the reading should be 'natum,'

and not 'natam.' Some writers, however, suppose that his daughter was changed into a bird.]

[Footnote 69: _Pirenian Ephyre._--Ver. 391. Corinth was so called from Ephyre, the daughter of Neptune, who was said to have lived there. Its inhabitants were fabled to have sprung from mushrooms.]

[Footnote 70: _t.i.tanian dragons._--Ver. 398. Her dragons are so called, either because, as Pindar says, they had sprung from the blood of the t.i.tans, or because, according to the Greek tradition, the chariot and winged dragons had been sent to Medea by the Sun, one of whose names was t.i.tan.]

[Footnote 71: _Phineus._--Ver. 399. Any further particulars of the person here named are unknown. Some commentators suggest 'Phini,'

and that some female of the name of Phinis is alluded to, making the adjective 'justissime' of the feminine gender.]

[Footnote 72: _Periphas._--Ver. 400. He was a very ancient king of Attica, before the time of Cecrops, and was said to have been changed into an eagle by Jupiter, while his wife was transformed into an osprey.]

[Footnote 73: _Polypemon._--Ver. 401. This was a name of the robber Procrustes, who was slain by Theseus. Halcyone, the daughter of his son Scyron, having been guilty of incontinence, was thrown into the sea by her father, on which she was changed into a kingfisher, which bore her name.]

EXPLANATION.

Jason being reconciled to the children of Pelias, gave the crown to his son Acastus. Becoming tired of Medea, he married Glauce, or Creusa, the daughter of Creon, king of Corinth. Medea, hastening to that place, left her two sons in the temple of Juno, and set fire to Creon's palace, where he and his daughter were consumed to ashes, after which she killed her own children. Euripides, in his tragedy of Medea, makes a chorus of Corinthian women say, that the Corinthians themselves committed the murder, and that the G.o.ds sent a plague on the city, as a punishment for the deed. Pausanias also says, that the tomb of Medea's children, whom the Corinthians stoned to death, was still to be seen in his time; and that the Corinthians offered sacrifices there every year, to appease their ghosts, as the oracle had commanded them.

Apollodorus relates this story in a different manner. He says, that Medea sent her rival a crown, dipped in a sort of gum of a combustible nature; and that when Glauce had put it on her head, it began to burn so furiously, that the young princess perished in the greatest misery.

Medea afterwards retired to Thebes, where Hercules engaged to give her a.s.sistance against Jason, which promise, however, he failed to perform. Going thence to Athens, she married aegeus.

The story of her winged dragons may, perhaps, be based on the fact, that her ship was called 'the Dragon.' In recounting the particulars of her flight, Ovid makes allusion to several stories by the way, the most of which are entirely unknown to us. With regard to these fictions, it may not be out of place to remark here, as affording a key to many of them, that where a person escaped from any imminent danger, it was published that he had been changed into a bird. If, to avoid pursuit, a person hid himself in a cave, he was said to be transformed into a serpent; and if he burst into tears, from excess of grief, he was reported to have changed into a fountain; while, if a damsel lost herself in a wood, she became a Nymph, or a Dryad. The resemblance of names, also, gave rise to several fictions: thus, Alopis was changed into a fox; Cygnus into a swan; Coronis into a crow; and Cerambus into a horned beetle. As some few of the stories here alluded to by Ovid, refer to historical events, it may be remarked, that the account of the women of Cos being changed into cows, is thought by some to have been founded on the cruel act of the companions of Hercules, who sacrificed some of them to the G.o.ds of the country. The inhabitants of the Isle of Rhodes were said to have been changed into rocks, because they perished in an inundation, which laid a part of that island under water, and particularly the town of Ialysus. The fruitfulness of the daughter of Alcidamas occasioned it to be said, that she was changed into a dove. The rage of Maera is shown by her transformation into a b.i.t.c.h; and Arne was changed into a daw, because, having sold her country, her avarice was well depicted under the symbol of that bird, which, according to the popular opinion, is fond of money. Phillyra, the mother of the Centaur Chiron, was said to be changed into a linden-tree, probably because she happened to bear the name of that tree, which in the Greek language is called f????a.

FABLE IV. [VII.402-468]

Hercules chains the dog Cerberus, the guardian of the gates of the Infernal Regions. Theseus, after his exploits at Corinth, arrives at Athens, where Medea prepares a cup of poison for him. The king, however, recognizing his son, just as he is about to drink, s.n.a.t.c.hes away the cup from him, while Medea flies in her chariot. aegeus then makes a festival, to celebrate the arrival and preservation of Theseus. In the mean time, Minos, the king of Crete, solicits several princes to a.s.sist him in a war against Athens, to revenge the death of his son Androgeus, who had been murdered there.

aegeus, to be blamed for this deed alone, shelters her; and hospitality is not enough, he also joins her {to himself} by the ties of marriage.

And now was Theseus, his son, arrived, unknown to his father, who, by his valor, had established peace in the Isthmus between the two seas.

For his destruction Medea mingles the wolfsbane, which she once brought with her from the sh.o.r.es of Scythia. This, they say, sprang from the teeth of the Echidnean dog. There is a gloomy cave,[74] with a dark entrance, {wherein} there is a descending path, along which the Tirynthian hero dragged away Cerberus resisting, and turning his eyes sideways from the day and the shining rays {of the Sun}, in chains formed of adamant; he, filled with furious rage, filled the air with triple barkings at the same moment, and sprinkled the verdant fields with white foam. This, they suppose, grew solid, and, receiving the nourishment of a fruitful and productive soil, acquired the power of being noxious. Because, full of life, it springs up on the hard rock, the rustics call it aconite.[75]

This, by the contrivance of his wife, the father aegeus himself presented to his son,[76] as though to an enemy. Theseus had received the presented cup with unsuspecting right hand, when his father perceived upon the ivory hilt of his sword the tokens of his race,[77] and struck the guilty {draught} from his mouth. She escaped death, having raised clouds by her enchantments.

But the father, although he rejoices at his son's being safe, astonished that so great a wickedness can be committed with so narrow an escape from death, heats the altars with fires, and loads the G.o.ds with gifts; and the axes strike the muscular necks of the oxen having their horns bound with wreaths. No day is said {ever} to have shone upon the people of Erectheus more famous than that--the senators and the common people keep up the festivity; songs, too, they sing, wine inspiring wit. "Thee, greatest Theseus," said they, "Marathon[78] admired for {shedding} the blood of the Cretan bull; and that the husbandman ploughs Cromyon[79] in safety from the boar, is thy procurement and thy work. By thy means the country of Epidaurus saw the club-bearing son of Vulcan[80] fall; {and} the banks of the river Cephisus[81] saw the cruel Procrustes {fall by thee}. Eleusis, sacred to Ceres, beheld the death of Cercyon.[82]

Sinnis[83] fell too, who barbarously used his great powers; who was able to bend {huge} beams, and used to pull pine trees from aloft to the earth, destined to scatter {human} bodies far and wide. The road to Alcathoe,[84] the Lelegean city, is now open in safety, Scyron[85]

being laid low {in death}: {and} the earth denies a resting-place, the water, {too}, denies a resting-place to the bones of the robber scattered piecemeal; these, long tossed about, length of time is reported to have hardened into rocks. To {these} rocks the name of Scyron adheres. If we should reckon up thy glorious deeds, and thy years, thy actions would exceed thy years {in number}. For thee, bravest {hero}, we make public vows: in thy honor do we quaff the draughts of wine." The palace rings with the acclamations of the populace, and the prayers of those applauding; and there is no place sorrowing throughout the whole city.

And yet (so surely is the pleasure of no one unalloyed, and some anxiety is {ever} interposing amid joyous circ.u.mstances), aegeus does not have his joy undisturbed, on receiving back his son. Minos prepares for war; who, though he is strong in soldiers, strong in shipping, is still strongest of all in the resentment of a parent, and, with retributive arms, avenges the death of {his son} Androgeus. Yet, before the war, he obtains auxiliary forces, and crosses the sea with a swift fleet, in which he is accounted strong. On the one side, he joins Anaphe[86] to himself; and the realms of Astypale; Anaphe by treaty, the realms of Astypale by conquest; on the other side, the low Myconos, and the chalky lands of Cimolus,[87] and the flourishing Cythnos, Scyros, and the level Seriphos;[88] Paros, too, abounding in marble, and {the island} wherein the treacherous Sithonian[89] betrayed the citadel, on receiving the gold, which, in her covetousness, she had demanded. She was changed into a bird, which even now has a pa.s.sion for gold, the jackdaw {namely}, black-footed, and covered with black feathers.

[Footnote 74: _A gloomy cave._--Ver. 409. This cavern was called Acherusia. It was situate in the country of the Mariandyni, near the city of Heraclea, in Pontus, and was said to be the entrance of the Infernal Regions. Cerberus was said to have been dragged from Tartarus by Hercules, through this cave, which circ.u.mstance was supposed to account for the quant.i.ty of aconite, or wolfsbane, that grew there.]

[Footnote 75: _Call it aconite._--Ver. 419. From the Greek a????, 'a whetstone.']

[Footnote 76: _Presented to his son._--Ver. 420. Medea was anxious to secure the succession to the throne of Athens to her son Medus, and was therefore desirous to remove Theseus out of the way.]

[Footnote 77: _Tokens of his race._--Ver. 423. aegeus, leaving aethra at Trzen, in a state of pregnancy, charged her, if she bore a son, to rear him, but to tell no one whose son he was. He placed his own sword and shoes under a large stone, and directed her to send his son to him when he was able to lift the stone, and to take them from under it; and he then returned to Athens, where he married Medea. When Theseus had grown to the proper age, his mother led him to the stone under which his father had deposited his sword and shoes, which he raised with ease, and took them out.

It was, probably, by means of this sword that aegeus recognized his son in the manner mentioned in the text.]

[Footnote 78: _Marathon._--Ver. 434. This was a town of Attica, adjoining a plain of the same name, where the Athenians, under the command of Miltiades, overthrew the Persians with immense slaughter. The bull which Theseus slew there was presented by Neptune to Minos. Being brought into Attica by Hercules, it laid waste that territory until it was slain by Theseus.]

[Footnote 79: _Cromyon._--Ver. 435. This was a village of the Corinthian territory, which was infested by a wild boar of enormous size, that slew both men and animals. It was put to death by Theseus.]

[Footnote 80: _Vulcan._--Ver. 437. By Antilia, Vulcan was the father of Periphetes, a robber who infested Epidaurus, in the Peloponnesus. He was so formidable with his club, that he was called Corynetas, from ??????, the Greek for 'a club.']