Preface (cont. 8)

But, as I walked with the blessed gods, having Helen the Treasure of Hades beside me, we went to and fro, walking delicately over the monstrous wrigglings of titans, victims of my bow, as men pick their way among earthquakes, lightly leaping hither and thither. But the mind in my breast was contriving new wiles.

Then said Delphic Phoibos Apollon, the Knight of the Sun: “We have tarried long enough in the kingdom of twilight; and I yearn to go back to blazing noon. Return with us, O Master of Wisdom; and be sure of olympian welcomes.”

Then said Arkadian Hermes Psykhopompos, the Knight of East and West and North and South: “Never yet have I led articulately-speaking men out of this place: but rather my business is to bring them hither when they are dead. But very gladly will I bear thee and thine away with swift-winged feet, O Master my child. Return, therefore, with us; and be sure of olympian welcomes.”

Then said Lemnian Hephaistos, the Knight of the Brazen Serpent: “There be many dints and notches in thy silver-shining armour, and many of thy lovely rock-crystals and blue moonstones have been shattered in battle, and what shall we say of thy nodding crest of the prides of nine white peacocks. But, indeed, my fingers itch to have thee in my smithy where I may restore thee. Return, therefore, with us, O Master of Arms; and be sure of olympian welcomes.”

And, in like manner, all the divine ones spoke, very affably.

But white Death and black Sleep, being young, stood modestly aside: for the general rule is that the last may not come to man without an invitation, and that the first may come only at a particular time. And that time for me had not even been discussed by the authorities. For which cause, the pale god moved away, going about more pressing business: but the dark one lingered, lifting his horn of dust to tempt me. But, though I was not unwilling to receive the kindly gift of Sleep, the mind in my noble breast reminded me that many things still remained for me to do. Wherefore I addressed unwinged words to the blessed gods, saying: “Gladly, O divine ones, will I escape from this nasty neighbourhood, and gladly will I visit the height of Olympos, bringing with me Helen the Treasure of Hades, and Love, the Crown of All Wisdom.”

Thus I spoke, as we came forth from the hall into the misty meadows of Asphodel. But, behind us in the House of Hades, we left incalculable pudder and turmoil. For, beside the roars of the wounded, the innumerable shades of all the dead since Cain slew Abel,[50] being worried with pique and jealousy, were pouring themselves out helter-skelter, snuffling in clusters, whimpering and maudling and mumbling, waving themselves all over the place like streamers of seaweed, all in a most embarrassing manner. And it seemed as though my passage would be impeded by them, as by inextricable mazes of cobwebs.

Wherefore, I (to make an end) summoned Thalos, nimbly loaded with my gear by him collected and skipping after me; and of him I inquired whereabouts might be my silver chariot. Who answered me, saying that my squire Neandros was not ceasing from driving about the asphodeline meadows, being unseen, and keeping alert for my call: yet he knew not precisely where the chariot might be at the moment. And he mentioned his opinion that Neandros would be glad of a meal, not because he was dying of hunger as another youth would have died, famished (for his life was bound to my life, so that he lived while I lived), but just because it was the custom of mortals to eat at intervals. And inextinguishable laughter arose among the immortal gods when they heard the apt speech of my foot-boy.

Then, the Great Twins, impatient of delay, moved to the other side of their golden sister, as though to protect her from the mobs of gibbering shades: but I, on my part, uttered the _Spell_ called _The Call Which Must Be Answered_; and, instantly, Neandros drove my silver-shining chariot toward us out of the imperscrutable mist. But the gods, when they saw that I was furnished with so suitable a vehicle with its equipage of four mad stallions of the divine breed of Laomedon, departed, flying up earthward through the riven roof of the netherworld, and thence onward to the height of Olympos. Thus the gods themselves were my heralds.

But I placed Golden Helen (divine one of the goddesses) beside Neandros in the chariot; and, when Thalos had mounted in the rear placing his beautiful bundle on the silver floor, I, also, was about to ascend to my place: but a very fearful occurrence delayed me. For the shade of woman-mad Paris, partly embodied again, darted toward us out of the mist; and his sufficiently-solid hand had been armed by shady Hades with the sword of dead Hektor his brother. Now had I been blameless Hades in these circumstances, I would have embodied the shade of Hektor and employed him as my assassin rather than the feeble and fatuous Paris: but Hades was not at all wily. And the woman-mad one ran, gibbering frightfully, leering like a lunatic who after long seeking has found; and he, squealing (for his throat was not quite firmly finished), slashed as he passed with his blade at my harness, so that the snow-white leathern thongs were divided, and the reins fell severed from the hands of my charioteer. But the horses went madder, bounding upward; and careered (trace-free) to their native pastures in the rolling heavens, leaving us half-blinded by their hoof-sparks and (so to speak) fixed immoveably below. And, every moment, the mobs of malignant ghosts surrounding us became more impertinently menacing.

But I, having won the Crown of All Wisdom (which is Love), and the Treasure of Hades (which is Golden Helen), and being unwilling to forego the enjoyment of my beautiful spoils, and remembering the word which Hermes had said by my altar on black Tanairon, lifted up my voice very loudly indeed, uttering the most mighty but two of all spells. And thus I said: “Hear, O oldest and youngest of all the blessed gods, sweet one, sly one, dire one, winged one, blind one, arch-archer, lord of unquenchable flame, thou who art somewhere in the rich state of heaven or on the grain-giving earth, for thou everywhere canst see and hear a man in affliction, hear now, and aid me in my need. Come, Love, come.”

And, instantly, through the gigantic fissure yawning overhead, came the sound of merry childish laughter. And Divine Eros dived out of the darkness like a flash of ruddy lightning, folding his white wings to stand before us, lifting the bandage from his sparkling eyes to warm us with their radiance. And we, who had been shivering with ghostly cold and bound to the soil of hell a moment before, felt all our limbs a-thrill with life and joy and in our hearts a splendour at the coming of the bird of the gods. For he, indeed, was a very large and lovely boy, slim, and rounded, and so ruddy that his form had scarce been known within a fiery furnace of clear flame: but, when we saw the freedom with which he flung abroad his sprightly limbs, and his quick incessant movements, it was clear that he could have no rival in energy or strength. And, while we gazed, he was darting here and there, peering into my silver chariot’s secret parts, having pulled out the pole and cast it away for inquisitive ghosts to sniff at and mumble. And even I stood amazed: for, notwithstanding my magic, I had not suspected that such marvels could be as those which Love laid bare. For, here, he pressed certain beautiful knops carven on the panels; and, forthwith, lids opened in the silver floor, whereunto he wept copious torrents of wet tears, because of foolish men; and, having closed the lids, he shewed us his ruddy young face wreathed with laughter. And, there, he ran his fingers over the bosses of other silver panels inlaid with crabs and moons in mother-of-pearl; and other lids opened; and a fragrance as of smooth oil was wafted in the air. But all this, and very much more, was done in a moment of time.

And Love urgently charged us to mount to our places: but he was sprawling on his supple back, underneath, between the well-carved wheels, and belching streams of heavenly fire from his rose-red lips. But we four mounted, and clung to the rail: for the mighty chariot was beginning to hum and pulsate like a creature having life, so that (though I was not afraid, but rather exultant with joy unspeakable), I made the _Sign of Safety_ from height to depth and from here to there, which is the test and the touchstone and the palladium of all white magic.

But the immortal god arose, sweeping the air once with his great white wings; and he swooped upward, diving into the very image of himself, larger than life, blindfolded, naked, most alluringly proportioned, which stood poised on the front of the rail, winged, and ready to fly. And the whiteness and ruddiness of Eros totally disappeared in the silver image of him, nor was the silver any longer hard and still, like silver, but smooth and firm and supple as young flesh, being alive in very fact and altogether godlike in potency.

And the silver Love hooted aloud in mockery of the gibbering shades; and he swept back the air with his winged arms, as a strong swimmer slipping through the wavelets of the innumerable laughter of the ocean,[51] setting all mortal means at naught, needing neither oar nor sail saving his wings, winnowing the winds with those eternal plumes.[52] And the wheels of the chariot whirred astonishingly with the swiftness of our flight toward the fissure in the firmament of hell. But I, looking downward at the fearful ghosts, saw Kastor and Polydeykes catching treacherous Paris by hair and heels and slinging him into fiery Pyriphthlegethon. Awfully scorched was what there was of him when he scrambled out; and the Great Twins left him licking his burns on the bank: but they went back to the house of Hades, to serve the rest of that day in the netherworld for a religious reason, such being their immutable doom.

But the living silver Love bore us upward out of darkness. But I looked upon the walls of the vast chasm as we passed them by; and I saw the depths of rich earth’s bosom all laid bare. Here, were pockets full of white gold or korinthic bronze which is platinum[53] and of gold and of silver and of copper, and of iron, and of gleaming tin. There, were mounds of marble and porphyry and granite. Here, were rivers of chalcedonyx and jasper, and streams of rose-quartz and violet amethyst and rock-crystal and blue moonstone and mysterious green-and-purple alexandrolith. There, were caverns full of buried and forgotten treasures. And, scattered everywhere, like the stars upon the floor of heaven, were very precious stones, in clots, or alone in glittering glory. But, above all these, we passed the pregnant soil of earth the cupboard of mortals, pierced in every direction by the juicy roots of herbs and trees.

I turned my gaze to my dear companions. The stalwart Neandros clung to the rail at the back; and his bold eyes stirred not from the god who had deposed him from his place as charioteer, for he was meditating an unmentioned and unthought-of work, which I will narrate at a suitable time. Thalos crouched on his hams on the floor, clinging with one arm to the straight legs of Neandros, but his other arm steadied the bundle of my gear. And, by my side, stood long-robed Helen, the divine one of goddesses. She was as purely white as the kernel of a nut; and her hair floated behind like a web of woven sunbeams. One gleaming arm round me, and the other on the rail near the feet of the silver Love, held her still. Her head was quiet and happy on my breast. Silent were her lips of coral. Eloquent beyond mortal words were her amber eyes: wherein gazing at my ease, I read of her pride, her meekness, her power, her weakness, her fidelity, her faith, her wisdom, her generosity, her pure unsullied soul, her worship, and her love. What she read in mine, I also know; and, that we two know it, is enough.

We were ascending from twilight to daylight. Not for nothing had those other divine ones gone before, announcing our coming: for the whole world was set agog to behold us. Heavenly breezes rustled down the shaft to refresh us with their clean breath. Little rills of sparkling water trickled over the cleft earth’s lips in haste to greet us. And the forests bowed their green heads, like a canopy, above us flashing through the reft rock, as we reached the kindly-smiling earth once more.

In this pomp, I came triumphantly a third time out of the netherworld, with the Treasure of Hades and the Crown of All Wisdom. And Love himself was my charioteer.

FOOTNOTES:

[50] This is, or might very well be taken to be, an excessively nasty one in the eye for the obsolete delusion once called “Modernism.” A. H.

[51] This ΑΝΡΗΙΘΜΟΝ ΓΕΛΑϹΜΑ is certainly a tag. A. H.

[52] It is hardly conceivable that Dante Alighieri can have lifted these delicious phrases from Mr. C. The whole question is extremely perplexing. A. H.

[53] Oh, really! But this is a little more definite in its dogmatism. A. H.

THE TWENTY-SECOND PAPYRUS

But, when we had come to the beautiful plains of earth, there were spread before our feet (for us to walk upon) pleasaunces of emerald grass studded with jewels of daisies and bluebells and daffodils and buttercups and cyclamen, with swathes of poppies, and with splashes of pure gold crocus dropped straight down from the radiant sun. Then, indeed, I (as a mortal man) found a fit time when I might give way to human weakness: for a man who does godlike deeds must pay a price. And, because my head swam with weariness, and because every part of me ached from my sunned skin to my white bones, and because every sense of me was sickened by the slime and corrupt blood of hellish menials wherewith I was crusted from crest to sandals, then, I longed to be visited by barbers and clean slaves, and, also, I had a keen remembrance of the willing and alluring look which the young god with the horn of eye-closing dust had shot at me by shady Hades’ hall, seeming to ask for an invitation. But I thought on these things particularly, as (with Golden Helen) I paced a soft meadow bloomed of violets and parsley, breathing the sweet air.

And Golden Helen perceived how it was with me: for two (who love) are one. Beside, being a woman, she needed but a single service from me, to wit, that I should never leave untold the never-to-be-outworn story of my love for her; and that (to me) was no toil, but a pleasure perennial. And, for the rest, she (the one woman of women and the divine one of goddesses) had no other joy than that of caring for her lover. Wherefore, she sat down on a thymy bank in the shade of a may-bush: but I reclined by her side. Thus, we rested, during a little while, watching the slaves beginning to clear my chariot and my gear: for a cheerful brook ran by the place, sparing enough water for their work, but not enough for the cleansing of a man as well. But I intended, after resting, to seek a site apart, for my own embellishment. And, while these things were being done, a remarkable portent and a signal favour of a god were manifested, which I will at once narrate.

For, when we emerged from the fissure in the earth whereby we evacuated the abysm, it clapped-to behind us, just as did that other gulph which formerly yawned for showy Curtius in the forum of Rome.[54] And the living silver Love, my charioteer, folded his wings, while we paused to breathe the upper air. But when we sat down to rest upon the thymy bank, his clear young voice, with a shout of laughter, called us by name. But we, starting, looked toward the sound; and the silver Love, poised all alive on the front of the chariot, bade us to come near and observe him closely. Thus we did; and the large volatile boy turned on his hips, spreading his quivering wings to balance himself; and he shewed us (and we perceived it) that he was girded about the reins with a fine silver chain, the two taslets whereof dangled down behind him as far as the rail of the chariot. And thus he chirruped: “Lady of Love, and Lord of the Lady of Love, give me leave to make other lovers happy in the intervals. But call me to serve you when you will, pulling the chain this way or that, having enslaved me and bound me to you by unbreakable fetters at present unseen.”

And, with the word, the god returned to his position, poising himself as before with wide-spread wings. But he came (a large boy’s form of flesh, ruddy and white as roses, slender and splendidly rounded), out of the silver leaving his image behind him. And, leaping free with far-flung limbs and strongly-waving arms, he stretched himself out at length, swimming in the higher air out of our sight.

But my head began to whirl faster and faster. I saw Neandros and Thalos arising after they had adored the blooming god, and I felt that Golden Helen was conducting me again to the thymy bank. And, coming nearer, I heard the sweet sound of a syrinx of pipes, and the bushes rustled as though some divine one were approaching. But, instantly, the divine of goddesses cried out, saying: “Oh Pan! O obliging Pan!”

But the country-god pushed aside the branches, peering at us from the screen of green leaves, being shy in the quivering sunshine of noon. And, when he saw who we were, he came forth and greeted us; and he led us through the may-bushes to a little grove, on the bank of a deep stream, with a waterfall and a pool, and mossy-soft couches of moly in the shade, all of which (I believe) he invented at the moment. And, having gathered handfuls of the herb All-heal, knowing Pan eased me of my dinted armour: but fair Helen bathed me, and she bound the magic herb on my bruised and weary limbs. Then, indeed, I summoned benign Sleep, while Pan piped me a simple rustic ballad very soothing to the mind.

And there, in the grove, we rested during several days. For I contrived a new wile, which was that I would not hurry on my journey to lofty Olympos, but rather delay a little: for an unwilling guest has the greater honour. Moreover, I did not wish to appear before the blessed gods in a squalid or a sordid guise, but rather as a personage more accustomed to giving than to receiving, since I was actually a suppliant to great Zeys for the hand of his daughter; and it is the custom of gods and men to give the best gifts to well-seeming mortals. For which causes, I took my fill of rest, so that my strength returned, while my slaves (in the neighbouring glade) polished my arms and my chariot as best they might, to make a respectable appearance. For magic is waived before Pan, and men must depend entirely on their natural powers in his presence unless the god himself suggests otherwise.

But, by chance, Hermes (my grandsire), passing by on a message, espied us one day; and he stayed his flight while he spoke with us. He said that there was much talk on the height of Olympos, because of our absence, and because the divine ones (witnesses of my acts in the house of shady Hades) had entered into a compact one with another to keep silence on those matters, so that the whole areiopagos of heaven might hear them (if I so willed) from my own mouth. Which was a very pleasant hearing for me; and, indeed, I thought it extremely nice and delicate on the part of the gods. But I answered Hermes meekly enough, saying that it was not for me, a mortal, to enter heavenly dominions in a manner unworthy of my grandsire. And my wile proved to be an excellent one. For Hermes, having had a word with kindly Pan, fled (swift-footed) away, presently returning with slow-footed Hephaistos and a portable smithy. For Hephaistos, being proud of the armour which he made for the son of silver-footed Thetis, was unwilling that the hands of slaves should renew its splendour. But when his forge was set up, in the neighbouring glade, the divine artificer (out of admiration for me) deigned to employ Neandros and Thalos as his assistants instead of a parcel of kyklops of immoderate unsightliness: more, also, he let them learn several very important tricks of his trade, when he observed that they were intelligent workmen of ingenious and reverend mind. Such mortals, as a matter of fact, do the gods usually select, when imparting knowledge of the arts.

Thus, then, we passed the time, living on cheeses and nuts and blackberries and dandelions with the luscious milk of incontinent goats of amiable demeanour, while I continued to repose myself, cared-for by the divine one of goddesses and cheered by old Pan. He, indeed, entertained me vastly with stories of the youth of the world, when Great Zeys lay hid in Krete and the older gods were yet unborn; and, at other times, he attuned his reedy pipes intonating quaint songs of the woodlands. And once, while long-robed Helen slept in the heat of the day, the knowing old god persuaded some dryads to come out of the oak-trees in the grove to fan away the flies when I was dozing: but he himself sat among the reeds not far away, chatting with the cheerful little brown and silver river. They were very slim young girls (these dryads), with flesh as white as an acorn-kernel, with long smooth hair of the colour of oak-bark, and shy green eyes of the colour of oak-leaves, and excessively modest and timid of disposition. But, when fair Helen awakened from sleep, and spied the industrious little creatures, her sweet face flushed like rosy dawn, and she frightened the shy nymphs quite away by her bleak mode of thanking them for their care of me. Nor was I puffed with vanity: for I am not the only complacent mortal who has been an occasion of jealousy to a goddess.

But, at another time, while sweet Helen was washing her robes in the pool, rustic Pan took leave to inform me (as a friend) of her history during the previous ten centuries. And I will say that Pan was the only one of all the blessed gods who did not ascribe my own stories about myself, and about my future life in the kingdom of Victory queen of the stalwart stately Anglicans, to some one or other of my usual altogether-unexpected wiles. But Pan knows all. And he told me how that (when I fell dead in my former chariot, from the arrow of unknowing Telegonos), my son and that awful goddess Kirke’s, in Egypt, more than a thousand years before, then, the divine one of goddesses, Helen, had behaved very queerly indeed: for she shewed as much grief as though she herself had caused my demise. Pan said that many persons called her grief remorse: which is absurd. But, having vowed herself anyhow to my memory, she prepared to wander through time, mourning, until my coming again. And heroes and kings’ sons without number sought her in marriage: whom having scorned fearfully (as far as so gentle a creature could scorn), she retired to find commodious seclusion on lofty Olympos. But, there, a certain Kyknos, a son (they say) of far-darting Phoibos Apollon, persuaded that god to demand her for him from Great Zeys. But the father and king of gods and men only confirmed (with a nod) the maiden’s right of choice. Thereat, blameless Kyknos would have taken her by force, following the custom of Olympians: but her brothers, Kastor the tamer of horses and Polydeykes the pugilist, beat on his nose so very bitterly, that beef-eating Herakles wakened from slumber adding his shouts to the tumult. Which having been explained to him, he promptly tossed Kyknos to earth from lofty Olympos, breaking him. And Phoibos Apollon felt it incumbent upon him to take up the cause of Kyknos and to be extremely prepotent about it. But Great Zeys, upset by cow-eyed Hera (most righteous of goddesses), shrouded himself in black clouds, having decreed that the fragments of broken Kyknos must stay below to satisfy Golden Helen, and that she (the divine one of goddesses) must not stay above, being a cause of disorderly conduct among the young gods. But Phoibos Apollon collected the pieces of Kyknos, as many as he could find, wherewith he made a new swan (that lickerish fowl) entirely black.[55] But Golden Helen, debarred from the height of Olympos, and her honour in peril from hairy men down below, betook herself further, even to the profundity of the netherworld, where the gods were austere, and men but senseless shades, phantoms of men worn out. And there she lived in exile, all for the sake of me, divested of godlihood, enduring ten centuries of sorrow, the inevitable penance for the glowing glory of her immortal inmarcesible youth.

But, having heard all these things babbled-of by rustic Pan one day when we dawdled together (and I could not learn them from fair Helen, for reasons of modesty), then, indeed, I held a sort of council with the mind in my noble breast. And I determined that, as far as I was concerned, she certainly should be rewarded for her grievous pains. For the best of women wants no more than a little true love; and well indeed did I know that that man is a blind besotted imbecile who, in pride or what-not, denies himself the pleasure of making a woman happy with what she wants, excepting (of course) for a religious reason. And, furthermore, I was aware that I myself was by way of owing a clearly-defined duty to the golden one of goddesses, in that I owed a debt of love to her, not only for her fidelity, or as amends for her wrongs, but chiefly because she had procured for me several pleasing and exciting and singular adventures, teaching me how to win the Crown of All Wisdom. The which debt I determined to pay forthwith.

Thereafter, I spoke not a word of these pious matters: but fair Helen was not unaware that I knew all that Pan could tell me, not as her accredited embassador but as the trusty friend of us both. And, when I suddenly became very eager and insistent for nuptials, she would not deny me: but she mentioned that a bride ought to be brought from her paternal home to the house of her husband. Which doctrine I accepted. And I said that I would contain myself till her case and my case had been suitably pleaded before very mighty many-named Zeys. That, then, was to be the object of our visit to the height of Olympos. For it pleased me better to go thus, on a matter of business, than merely to arrive, sleek, grinning, and complacent, to receive prizes and praises for athletic achievements and feats of endurance and wiliness, which, though most meritorious and praiseworthy, and valuable also, inasmuch as they gained for me the friendship of several very important gods (whose friendship is much preferable to their enmity), were, I affirm, rather to be classed with my ordinary habits than with my virtues.

Anon, cunning Hephaistos restored to me my shining armour of silver with adornments of rock-crystals and blue moonstones in all its pristine splendour: but he returned forthwith to Olympian palaces. Neandros and Thalos also brought my silver chariot, polished in all its parts with a sheen like the full moon, and its secret recesses were well-filled with water and oil. But, when we had placed my gear therein, we said farewell to kindly Pan. And, in the cool of the evening, I led the divine one of goddesses to her place at the front: but I mounted by her side; and the slaves climbed up behind. But fair Helen pulled the fine chain by its taslet; and the whole chariot vibrated for sheer joy, panting and pulsating like a creature enjoying sweet life: for, at the same moment, young Eros dived out of open space, and the silver image of him started into perfervid life, boiling with force and merrily hooting.[56] But we, leaping forward with his beating wings, skimmed into distance more swiftly than an owl in flight. All through the cool night we went at tireless speed: but, whether over sea or land, I cannot say. For, in good sooth, I was not aware of anything, save that the moon serene and the flagrant Crab smiled upon me from the dark-blue sky, that I was no longer dawdling but active and very strong, that Golden Helen was with me for good and all, and that Love was my charioteer.

In this manner, I set forth from the silvan grove where goat-footed Pan had been entertaining me.

FOOTNOTES:

[54] This is valuable. I suppose “formerly” helps to date these papyrè, at least within a century or so. But Mr. C.’s epithet for Marcus Curtius strikes me as being a little what I might almost term original. “Showy” hardly seems the just word for a hero. But, of course, Mr. C. wrote only a few centuries after the young Roman’s celebrated header, which perhaps did not seem extraordinarily impressive to contemporary professionals. Distance does sometimes lend inchantment to the view, I believe. A. H.

[55] I cannot help citing Juvenal, _Sat._ VI., 165, in this connection: “_Rara avis in terris nigroque simillima cycno._” A. H.

[56] I cannot help remarking that this sounds rather awfully like what I might almost venture to term an ante-Christian automobile or motorcar, with its secret recesses filled with oil and water, its vibrations, its pantings, its pulsations, _and_ its hooter on the front. If this conjecture of mine could be clearly substantiated, it would furnish a fresh exemplification of the adage “Nothing new under the sun,” I fancy. A. H.

THE TWENTY-THIRD PAPYRUS

But, when rosy-fingered Dawn had donned her saffron robes, arising from her couch in the ocean to bring light to mortals and immortals, then, indeed, we were nearing Tainaron, where lay the hollow ship with the shipmen expecting my coming. And, when they saw us whizzing out of a dusty cloud like a flash of white thunder (for, on the one side, the hair of Golden Helen streamed behind us as streams a long ray of sunbeams in no breeze, and, on the other side, my mantle of silver tissue lined with white fur and clasped with the Moon and the Crab in rock-crystals and blue moonstones floated at large and at length beneath my towering crest of the prides of nine white peacocks), and, when they saw Neandros and Thalos, mysteriously lost, returning, and, when they saw the large silver Love very much alive, and, when they heard the gleeful whoopings of untameable Love and the terrible whirring of the chariot-wheels, then, indeed, their knees tottered, and their breath popped out, and their hearts stood quite still for fear, so that their life left them, and pale Death veiled their eyes.

But we lighted in the middle of the lofty prow, even as a bird lights on the branch of a blooming tree;[57] and, when fair Helen pulled the silver chain, instantly ruddy-white Love soared out of his silver image into the boundless empyrean; and thus we came to the end of our journey by land.

And now I was in a sort of quandary. For, knowing that I should need all my strength of mind and body on lofty Olympos, knowing (also) that rule of magic which says that a man of fluid temper (such as I am) can best collect a reserve of such strength from the sea, I had determined to go, by favour of azure-haired Poseidon, in my galley, from Tainaron in the south, by the Eyboik Gulph, to the small port of Myrai at the foot of mighty Mount Ossa in the north. But the rest of the journey would be made more splendidly, in my silver-shining chariot, by land.

But (such is the lot of miserable mortals, who forget to inquire the length of the life-threads, which the blameless Fates have spun for their fellows), I found myself, at the very outset of my voyage by sea, possessed of a huge well-benched ship with all its appurtenances in perfect order, but encumbered with the corpses of one-and-sixty mariners suddenly deceased, and a mere toy for the sea-gods. For which causes, I sat me down on the lofty poop, taking my dear head in my hands: and I began to contrive most astonishing wiles. But Golden Helen sat by my side, like a true lover who knows when to speak to her man and when to hold her peace. But my two slaves waited silently in their places.

And, at length, it appeared to the mind in my lordly breast that the gods, divine ones inhabiting olympian palaces, are wont to deal with mortal men in this manner, shewing them singular favours so that they may be encouraged to expect (and, even, to insist on) a continuance of the same. For, as it is with a man, when he can do a certain deed very well, straightway he desires also to do it very often, for the benefit of the race of men and for all sorts of other pious and religious reasons, so, also, indeed, precisely, is it with the blessed gods, givers of good things. Wherefore, then, seeing that tameless Love had willingly bound himself (with a silver chain) to serve me and long-robed Helen, I contrived an altogether unmentioned and unthought-of magic: so that that ruddy bird of heaven might not have cause to complain that I let his blooming wings grow rusty with disuse.

Wherefore, I said unwinged words to Neandros and Thalos, explaining to them what they were to do. But, first, having pitched the dead mariners overboard to lighten the ship, together we drew in the long oars, bestowing them tidily as a rampart inside the bulwarks and fixing them there with well-twisted knots. These things having been accomplished, and the whole ship having been set in a new order, we took a spare sail, white and vermilion, silken, with certain cordage, out of the store. And, when we had ascended the lofty prow, we fastened the wheels of the silver-shining chariot, fixing it where it stood, immoveably, in the middle of the prow, so that a man might walk round and about it if he pleased, then, indeed, we hanged the beautiful sail over it, and fastened the same to the bulwarks, in the manner of an awning with vermilion fringes. Thus, the splendour of the chariot was concealed from the eyes of casual inquisitives: but the silver image of Love emerged above the awning as a figure-head for my galley: and the taslets of the silver chain about his reins dangled down inside.

And, all being ready, I (with my slaves) weighed anchor: but Golden Helen pulled the chain of the silver image. And, instantly, young Love descended into his image; and the silver Love lived, flying with his tireless wings; so that the great ship moved most rapidly across the frightened sea, having neither oars nor other sail. But I governed the course with the steering-oar; and the divine one of goddesses was near me.[58]

Now when I came again to hold council with my noble mind, I was aware that (in winning the Treasure of Hades) I procured for myself such a companion as I never had had before. In sooth I have had comrades a many in my various lives; and, among them I will name the most desirable Red Heart of the southern sea, and the glorious son of Sycorax, and the unchangeable George of the Roses, and timidly-false Aubrey, and Hugh the priest devoured by hidden hatred and envy and prepotence, and blind Karterikos of Bosporos, and loving Vergilio, and naïve elegant Khekkhi, and also Diomedes of the loud war-cry, and great-hearted yellow-headed Akhilleys. Now, with a man, a man may fight, and (at any rate) must quarrel: or there can be no true love, for love is not proved true until it has been tested by reconciliation after strife, preferably very bloody. And herein is the difference between a comrade and a companion.[59] For, with a woman, no man may dispute: but, if she has an evil mind, he may avoid her or annul her: but, when the gods, givers of good gifts, send to a man such a woman as he may fitly take for a companion, then, indeed, he becomes one with her, in that her ill is his hurt and her good his benefit. For it is very pleasing to the pride of a man to have a treasure to guard and to care for. And, until this time, all my wiles and all my wisdom had not won for me such a treasure. Not but what Queen Penelope had been a true wife to me while she had life on the earth: but, of those years there were twenty, when wars and the displeasure of certain blameless gods kept me away from her, so that (speaking with perfect respect to her face) I may say that she was a faithful wife and a most prudent housewife, but not by any means a companion. And, as for the quite-irrelevant matter of those divine ones of goddesses with whom I had intimate relations, to wit, deathless Kirke and Kalypso of the greasy braided tresses, who (I ask) can presume to talk about companionship when a man is imprisoned, with an awful woman, on a little islet surrounded by the boundless ruthlessly-smiling sea. But Golden Helen was altogether different from these three. Thus I meditated in my Love-sped galley.

But, coming to Khalkis, we stayed there, to procure sweet water and nutriments, before proceeding northward by the Eyboik Gulph. And hard-hearted envious Hera, that arch-mischiefmaker among goddesses, sent me a horrid adventure, in the hope of impeding my progress.

For, while my slave Neandros was negociating with merchants on the quay, loading the hollow ship with cheeses, and wheat (the marrow of men), and the flesh of bulls and swine, with herbs and dainty birds, and jars of oil and wine and beer, and casks of sweet water, I, with long-robed Helen, landed privately to view the city. For I had heard that Romans were occupying holy Eyboia at that time, the island of rich vines, whence Elephenor son of Khalkodon led the proud long-haired Abantes in forty black ships to the siege of windy Ilion. And, neither in the future from which (for a religious reason) I had come, nor in the past from which also I had come, had I ever seen the conquering Romans in their togas as they lived, excepting once by chance in Khem. For which cause I determined to use this opportunity of informing my inquisitive mind.

And we too, therefore, happy as children who have found out a new game, disguised ourselves before we went to play truant in Khalkis. For fair Helen covered herself with a dark robe, veiling also her hair like a web of woven sunbeams: but I did on a tunic of grey wolves’ skins having on my head a berreta of ferret-skins, taking also a very sharp sword and a pouch full of silver and gold. And, when we came to the landward end of the quay, a beak-nosed soldier armed in cheap bronze stopped us; and he demanded of us diplomas permitting us to draw sweet breath in Roman territory. For it seemed that the Romans, like locusts, were infesting the whole earth. I, indeed, began to try to edge in a wily word about a beverage: but the soldier led me to the guard-house to settle the matter with his decurion, who, also, was a dull boor amenable neither to words nor bribes. For I told him that my name was Ithakides son of Ithakos son of Ptenopedilos son of Kelainephes Polyonomos, and that I came from Egypt where I had been collecting antiquities: all of which was perfectly true and entirely misleading, simply because the lout was ignorant of the various uses of words. Also I said that the lady was my wife, sister of certain friends of mine by cognomen Asterostephanoi, who was taking a voyage for the benefit of her health and to visit her aged father in Thessaly. And that also was true. But it seemed that the decurion’s duty was only to ask questions, but not to pay the slightest regard to the answers. And he would not take a bribe, because (I am sure) no one had ever offered him such a thing before, and he was dreadfully afraid. But he said merely that I must go to prison pending an inquiry.