His other important book, 'De Animalium Natura' (On the Nature of Animals), is a medley of his own observations, both in Italy and during his travels as far as Egypt. For several hundred years it was a popular and standard book on zooelogy; and even as late as the fourteenth century, Manuel Philes, a Byzantine poet, founded upon it a poem on animals. Like the 'Varia Historia', it is scrappy and gossiping. He leaps from subject to subject: from elephants to dragons, from the liver of mice to the uses of oxen. There was, however, method in this disorder; for as he says, he sought thereby to give variety and hold his reader's attention. The book is interesting, moreover, as giving us a personal glimpse of the man and of his methods of work; for in a concluding chapter he states the general principle on which he composed: that he has spent great labor, thought, and care in writing it; that he has preferred the pursuit of knowledge to the pursuit of wealth; that for his part, he found more pleasure in observing the habits of the lion, the panther, and the fox, in listening to the song of the nightingale, and in studying the migrations of cranes, than in mere heaping up of riches and finding himself numbered among the great; and that throughout his work he has sought to adhere to the truth.

Aelianus was more of a moralizer than an artist in words; his style has no distinctive literary qualities, and in both of his chief works is the evident intention to set forth religious and moral principles. He wrote, moreover, some treatises expressly on religious and philosophic subjects, and some letters on husbandry.

The 'Varia Historia' has been twice translated into English: by Abraham Fleming in 1576, and by Thomas Stanley, son of the poet and philosopher Stanley, in 1665. Fleming was a poet and scholar of the English Renaissance, who translated from the ancients, and made a digest of Holinshed's 'Historie of England.' His version of Aelianus loses nothing by its quaint wording, as will be seen from the subjoined stories. The full title of the book is 'A Registre of Hystories containing martiall Exploits of worthy Warriours, politique Practices and civil Magistrates, wise Sentences of famous Philosophers, and other Matters manifolde and memorable written in Greek by Aelianus Claudius and delivered in English by Abraham Fleming' (1576).



[All the selections following are from 'A Registre of Hystories']

OF CERTAIN NOTABLE MEN THAT MADE THEMSELVES PLAYFELLOWES WITH CHILDREN

Hercules (as some say) assuaged the tediousness of his labors, which he sustayned in open and common games, with playing. This Hercules, I say, being an incomparable warriour, and the sonne of Jupiter and Latona, made himselfe a playfellowe with boys. Euripides the poet introduceth, and bringeth in, the selfe same god speaking in his owne person, and saying, "I play because choyce and chaunge of labors is delectable and sweete unto me," whiche wordes he uttered holdinge a boy by the hande. Socrates also was espied of Alcibiades upon a time, playing with Lamprocles, who was in manner but a childe. Agesilaus riding upon a rude, or cock-horse as they terme it, played with his sonne beeing but a boy: and when a certayn man passing by sawe him so doe and laughed there withall, Agesilaus sayde thus, Now hold thy peace and say nothing; but when thou art a father I doubt not thou wilt doe as fathers should doe with their children. Architas Tarentinus being both in authoritie in the commonwealth, that is to say a magestrat, and also a philosopher, not of the obscurest sorte, but a precise lover of wisdom, at that time he was a housband, a housekeeper, and maintained many servauntes, he was greatly delighted with their younglinges, used to play oftentimes with his servauntes' children, and was wonte, when he was at dinner and supper, to rejoyce in the sight and presence of them: yet was Tarentinus (as all men knowe) a man of famous memorie and noble name.

OF A CERTAINE SICILIAN WHOSE EYSIGHT WAS WOONDERFULL SHARPE AND QUICK

There was in Sicilia a certaine man indued with such sharpnesse, quicknesse, and clearnesse of sight (if report may challenge credite) that hee coulde see from Lilybaeus to Carthage with such perfection and constancy that his eies coulde not be deceived: and that he tooke true and just account of all ships and vessels which went under sayle from Carthage, over-skipping not so much as one in the universall number.

Something straunge it is that is recorded of Argus, a man that had no lesse than an hundred eyes, unto whose custody Juno committed Io, the daughter of Inachus, being transformed into a young heifer: while Argus (his luck being such) was slaine sleeping, but the Goddess Juno so provided that all his eyes (whatsoever became of his carkasse) should be placed on the pecock's taile; wherupon (sithence it came to passe) the pecock is called Avis Junonia, or Lady Juno Birde. This historic is notable, but yet the former (in mine opinion) is more memorable.

THE LAWE OF THE LACEDAEMONIANS AGAINST COVETOUSNESS

A certain young man of Lacedaemonia having bought a plot of land for a small and easy price (and, as they say, dogge cheape) was arrested to appear before the magistrates, and after the trial of his matter he was charged with a penalty. The reason why hee was judged worthy this punishment was because he being but a young man gaped so gredely after gain and yawned after filthy covetousness. For yt was a most commendable thing among the Lacedaemonians not only to fighte against the enemie in battell manfully; but also to wrestle and struggle with covetousness (that misschievous monster) valliauntly.

THAT SLEEP IS THE BROTHER OF DEATH, AND OF GORGIAS DRAWING TO HIS END

Gorgias Leontinus looking towardes the end of his life and beeing wasted with the weaknes and wearysomenesse of drooping olde age, falling into sharp and sore sicknesse upon a time slumbered and slept upon his soft pillowe a little season. Unto whose chamber a familiar freend of his resorting to visit him in his sicknes demaunded how he felt himself affected in body. To whom Gorgias Leontinus made this pithy and plausible answeer, "Now Sleep beginneth to deliver me up into the jurisdiction of his brother-germane, Death."

OF THE VOLUNTARY AND WILLING DEATH OF CALANUS

The ende of Calanus deserveth no lesse commendation than it procureth admiration; it is no less praiseworthy than it was worthy wonder. The manner, therefore, was thus. The within-named Calanus, being a sophister of India, when he had taken his long leave and last farewell of Alexander, King of Macedonia, and of his life in lyke manner, being willing, desirous, and earnest to set himselfe at lybertie from the cloggs, chaines, barres, boults, and fetters of the prison of the body, pyled up a bonnefire in the suburbs of Babylon of dry woodde and chosen sticks provided of purpose to give a sweete savour and an odoriferous smell in burning. The kindes of woodde which hee used to serve his turne in this case were these: Cedre, Rosemary, Cipres, Mirtle, and Laurell. These things duely ordered, he buckled himselfe to his accustomed exercise, namely, running and leaping into the middest of the wodstack he stoode bolte upright, having about his head a garlande made of the greene leaves of reedes, the sunne shining full in his face, as he stoode in the pile of stycks, whose glorious majesty, glittering with bright beams of amiable beuty, he adored and worshipped. Furthermore he gave a token and signe to the Macedonians to kindle the fire, which, when they had done accordingly, hee beeing compassed round about with flickering flames, stoode stoutly and valiauntly in one and the selfe same place, and dyd not shrincke one foote, until hee gave up the ghost, whereat Alexander unvailyng, as at a rare strange sight and worldes wonder, saide (as the voice goes) these words:—"Calanus hath subdued, overcome, and vanquished stronger enemies than I. For Alexander made warre against Porus, Taxiles, and Darius. But Calanus did denounce and did battell to labor and fought fearcely and manfully with death."

OF DELICATE DINNERS, SUMPTUOUS SUPPERS, AND PRODIGALL BANQUETING

Timothy, the son of Conon, captain of the Athenians, leaving his sumptuous fare and royall banqueting, beeing desired and intertained of Plato to a feast philosophicall, seasoned with contentation and musick, at his returning home from that supper of Plato, he said unto his familiar freends:—"They whiche suppe with Plato, this night, are not sick or out of temper the next day following;" and presently upon the enunciation of that speech, Timothy took occasion to finde fault with great dinners, suppers, feasts, and banquets, furnished with excessive fare, immoderate consuming of meats, delicates, dainties, toothsome junkets, and such like, which abridge the next dayes joy, gladnes, delight, mirth, and pleasantnes. Yea, that sentence is consonant and agreeable to the former, and importeth the same sense notwithstanding in words it hath a little difference. That the within named Timothy meeting the next day after with Plato said to him:—"You philosophers, freend Plato, sup better the day following than the night present."

OF BESTOWING TIME, AND HOW WALKING UP AND DOWNE WAS NOT ALLOWABLE AMONG THE LACEDAEMONIANS

The Lacedaemonians were of this judgment, that measureable spending of time was greatly to be esteemed, and therefore did they conforme and apply themselves to any kinde of laboure moste earnestly and painfully, not withdrawing their hands from works of much bodyly mooving, not permitting any particular person, beeing a citizen, to spend the time in idlenes, to waste it in unthrifty gaming, to consume it in trifling, in vain toyes and lewd loytering, all whiche are at variance and enmity with vertue. Of this latter among many testimonyes, take this for one.

When it was reported to the magistrates of the Lacedaemonians called Ephori, in manner of complaint, that the inhabitants of Deceleia used afternoone walkings, they sent unto them messengers with their commandmente, saying:—"Go not up and doune like loyterers, nor walke not abrode at your pleasure, pampering the wantonnes of your natures rather than accustoming yourself to exercises of activity. For it becometh the Lacedaemonians to regarde their health and to maintaine their safety not with walking to and fro, but with bodily labours."

HOW SOCRATES SUPPRESSED THE PRYDE AND HAUTINESSE OF ALCIBIADES

Socrates, seeing Alcibiades puft up with pryde and broyling in ambitious behavioure (because possessor of such great wealth and lorde of so large lands) brought him to a place where a table did hang containing a discription of the worlde universall. Then did Socrates will Alcibiades to seeke out the situation of Athens, which when he found Socrates proceeded further and willed him to point out that plot of ground where his lands and lordships lay. Alcibiades, having sought a long time and yet never the nearer, sayde to Socrates that his livings were not set forth in that table, nor any discription of his possession therein made evident. When Socrates, rebuked with this secret quip: "And art thou so arrogant (sayeth he) and so hautie in heart for that which is no parcell of the world?"

OF CERTAINE WASTGOODES AND SPENDTHRIFTES

Prodigall lavishing of substance, unthrifty and wastifull spending, voluptuousness of life and palpable sensuality brought Pericles, Callias, the sonne of Hipponicus, and Nicias not only to necessitie, but to povertie and beggerie. Who, after their money waxed scant, and turned to a very lowe ebbe, they three drinking a poysoned potion one to another (which was the last cuppe that they kissed with their lippes) passed out of this life (as it were from a banquet) to the powers infernall.



AESCHINES

(389-314 B.C.)

The life and oratory of Aeschines fall fittingly into that period of Greek history when the free spirit of the people which had created the arts of Pindar and Sophocles, Pericles, Phidias, and Plato, was becoming the spirit of slaves and of savants, who sought to forget the freedom of their fathers in learning, luxury, and the formalism of deducers of rules. To this slavery Aeschines himself contributed, both in action with Philip of Macedon and in speech. Philip had entered upon a career of conquest; a policy legitimate in itself and beneficial as judged by its larger fruits, but ruinous to the advanced civilization existing in the Greek City-States below, whose high culture was practically confiscated to spread out over a waste of semi-barbarism and mix with alien cultures. Among his Greek sympathizers, Aeschines was perhaps his chief support in the conquest of the Greek world that lay to the south within his reach.



Aeschines was born in 389 B.C., six years before his lifelong rival Demosthenes. If we may trust that rival's elaborate details of his early life, his father taught a primary school and his mother was overseer of certain initiatory rites, to both of which occupations Aeschines gave his youthful hand and assistance. He became in time a third-rate actor, and the duties of clerk or scribe presently made him familiar with the executive and legislative affairs of Athens. Both vocations served as an apprenticeship to the public speaking toward which his ambition was turning. We hear of his serving as a heavy-armed soldier in various Athenian expeditions, and of his being privileged to carry to Athens, in 349 B.C., the first news of the victory of Tamynae, in Euboea, in reward for the bravery he had shown in the battle.

Two years afterward he was sent as an envoy into the Peloponnesus, with the object of forming a union of the Greeks against Philip for the defense of their liberties. But his mission was unsuccessful. Toward the end of the same year he served as one of the ten ambassadors sent to Philip to discuss terms of peace. The harangues of the Athenians at this meeting were followed in turn by a speech of Philip, whose openness of manner, pertinent arguments, and pretended desire for a settlement led to a second embassy, empowered to receive from him the oath of allegiance and peace. It was during this second embassy that Demothenes says he discovered the philippizing spirit and foul play of Aeschines. Upon their return to Athens, Aeschines rose before the assembly to assure the people that Philip had come to Thermopylae as the friend and ally of Athens. "We, your envoys, have satisfied him," said Aeschines. "You will hear of benefits still more direct which we have determined Philip to confer upon you, but which it would not be prudent as yet to specify."

But the alarm of the Athenians at the presence of Philip within the gates was not allayed. The king, however, anxious to temporize with them until he could receive his army supplies by sea, suborned Aeschines, who assured his countrymen of Philip's peaceful intentions. On another occasion, by an inflammatory speech at Delphi, he so played upon the susceptibilities of the rude Amphictyones that they rushed forth, uprooted their neighbors' harvest fields, and began a devastating war of Greek against Greek. Internal dissensions promised the shrewd Macedonian the conquest he sought. At length, in August, 338, came Philip's victory at Chaeronea, and the complete prostration of Greek power. Aeschines, who had hitherto disclaimed all connection with Philip, now boasted of his intimacy with the king. As Philip's friend, while yet an Athenian, he offered himself as ambassador to entreat leniency from the victor toward the unhappy citizens.

The memorable defense of Demosthenes against the attack of Aeschines was delivered in 330 B.C. Seven years before this, Ctesiphon had proposed to the Senate that the patriotic devotion and labors of Demosthenes should be acknowledged by the gift of a golden crown—a recognition willingly accorded. But as this decision, to be legal, must be confirmed by the Assembly, Aeschines gave notice that he would proceed against Ctesiphon for proposing an unconstitutional measure. He managed to postpone action on the notice for six years. At last he seized a moment when the victories of Philip's son and successor, Alexander, were swaying popular feeling, to deliver a bitter harangue against the whole life and policy of his political opponent. Demosthenes answered in that magnificent oration called by the Latin writers 'De Corona' Aeschines was not upheld by the people's vote. He retired to Asia, and, it is said, opened a school of rhetoric at Rhodes. There is a legend that after he had one day delivered in his school the masterpiece of his enemy, his students broke into applause: "What," he exclaimed, "if you had heard the wild beast thunder it out himself!"

Aeschines was what we call nowadays a self-made man. The great faults of his life, his philippizing policy and his confessed corruption, arose, doubtless, from the results of youthful poverty: a covetousness growing out of want, and a lack of principles of conduct which a broader education would have instilled. As an orator he was second only to Demosthenes; and while he may at times be compared to his rival in intellectual force and persuasiveness, his moral defects—which it must be remembered that he himself acknowledged—make a comparison of character impossible.

His chief works remaining to us are the speeches 'Against Timarchus,' 'On the Embassy,' 'Against Ctesiphon,' and letters, which are included in the edition of G.E. Benseler (1855-60). In his 'History of Greece,' Grote discusses at length—of course adversely—the influence of Aeschines; especially controverting Mitford's favorable view and his denunciation of Demosthenes and the patriotic party. The trend of recent writing is toward Mitford's estimate of Philip's policy, and therefore less blame for the Greek statesmen who supported it, though without Mitford's virulence toward its opponents. Mahaffy ('Greek Life and Thought') holds the whole contest over the crown to be mere academic threshing of old straw, the fundamental issues being obsolete by the rise of a new world under Alexander.

A DEFENSE AND AN ATTACK

From the 'Oration against Ctesiphon'

In regard to the calumnies with which I am attacked, I wish to say a word or two before Demosthenes speaks. He will allege, I am told, that the State has received distinguished services from him, while from me it has suffered injury on many occasions; and that the deeds of Philip and Alexander, and the crimes to which they gave rise, are to be imputed to me. Demosthenes is so clever in the art of speaking that he does not bring accusation against me, against any point in my conduct of affairs or any counsels I may have brought to our public meetings; but he rather casts reflections upon my private life, and charges me with a criminal silence.

Moreover, in order that no circumstance may escape his calumny, he attacks my habits of life when I was in school with my young companions; and even in the introduction of his speech he will say that I have begun this prosecution, not for the benefit of the State, but because I want to make a show of myself to Alexander and gratify Alexander's resentment against him. He purposes, as I learn, to ask why I blame his administration as a whole, and yet never hindered or indicted any one separate act; why, after a considerable interval of attention to public affairs, I now return to prosecute this action....

But what I am now about to notice—a matter which I hear Demosthenes will speak of—about this, by the Olympian deities, I cannot but feel a righteous indignation. He will liken my speech to the Sirens', it seems, and the legend anent their art is that those who listen to them are not charmed, but destroyed; wherefore the music of the Sirens is not in good repute. Even so he will aver that knowledge of my words and myself is a source of injury to those who listen to me. I, for my part, think it becomes no one to urge such allegations against me; for it is a shame if one who makes charges cannot point to facts as full evidence. And if such charges must be made, the making surely does not become Demosthenes, but rather some military man—some man of action—who has done good work for the State, and who, in his untried speech, vies with the skill of antagonists because he is conscious that he can tell no one of his deeds, and because he sees his accusers able to show his audience that he had done what in fact he never had done. But when a man made up entirely of words,—of sharp words and overwrought sentences,—when he takes refuge in simplicity and plain facts, who then can endure it?—whose tongue is like a flute, inasmuch as if you take it away the rest is nothing....

This man thinks himself worthy of a crown—that his honor should be proclaimed. But should you not rather send into exile this common pest of the Greeks? Or will you not seize upon him as a thief, and avenge yourself upon him whose mouthings have enabled him to bear full sail through our commonwealth? Remember the season in which you cast your vote. In a few days the Pythian Games will come round, and the convention of the Hellenic States will hold its sessions. Our State has been concerned on account of the measures of Demosthenes regarding present crises. You will appear, if you crown him, accessory to those who broke the general peace. But if, on the other hand, you refuse the crown, you will free the State from blame. Do not take counsel as if it were for an alien, but as if it concerned, as it does, the private interest of your city; and do not dispense your honors carelessly, but with judgment; and let your public gifts be the distinctive possession of men most worthy. Not only hear, but also look around you and consider who are the men who support Demosthenes. Are they his fellow-hunters, or his associates in old athletic sports? No, by Olympian Zeus, he was never engaged in hunting the wild boar, nor in care for the well-being of his body; but he was toiling at the art of those who keep up possessions.

Take into consideration also his art of juggling, when he says that by his embassy he wrested Byzantium from the hands of Philip, and that his eloquence led the Acarnanians to revolt, and struck dumb the Thebans. He thinks, forsooth, that you have fallen to such a degree of weakness that he can persuade you that you have been entertaining Persuasion herself in your city, and not a vile slanderer. And when at the conclusion of his argument he calls upon his partners in bribe-taking, then fancy that you see upon these steps, from which I now address you, the benefactors of your State arrayed against the insolence of those men. Solon, who adorned our commonwealth with most noble laws, a man who loved wisdom, a worthy legislator, asking you in dignified and sober manner, as became his character, not to follow the pleading of Demosthenes rather than your oaths and laws. Aristides, who assigned to the Greeks their tributes, to whose daughters after he had died the people gave portions—imagine Aristides complaining bitterly at the insult to public justice, and asking if you are not ashamed that when your fathers banished Arthurias the Zelian, who brought gold from the Medes (although while he was sojourning in the city and a guest of the people of Athens they were scarce restrained from killing him, and by proclamation forbade him the city and any dominion the Athenians had power over), nevertheless that you are going to crown Demosthenes, who did not indeed bring gold from the Medes, but who received bribes and has them still in his possession. And Themistocles and those who died at Marathon and at Plataea, and the very graves of your ancestors—will they not cry out if you venture to grant a crown to one who confesses that he united with the barbarians against the Greeks?

And now, O earth and sun! virtue and intelligence! and thou, O genius of the humanities, who teachest us to judge between the noble and the ignoble, I have come to your succor and I have done. If I have made my pleading with dignity and worthily, as I looked to the flagrant wrong which called it forth, I have spoken as I wished. If I have done ill, it was as I was able. Do you weigh well my words and all that is left unsaid, and vote in accordance with justice and the interests of the city!



AESCHYLUS

(B.C. 525-456)

BY JOHN WILLIAMS WHITE

The mightiest of Greek tragic poets was the son of Euphorion, an Athenian noble, and was born B.C. 525. When he was a lad of eleven, the tyrant Hipparchus fell in a public street of Athens under the daggers of Harmodius and Aristogeiton. Later, Aeschylus saw the family of tyrants, which for fifty years had ruled Attica with varying fortunes, banished from the land. With a boy's eager interest he followed the establishment of the Athenian democracy by Cleisthenes. He grew to manhood in stirring times. The new State was engaged in war with the powerful neighboring island of Aegina; on the eastern horizon was gathering the cloud that was to burst in storm at Marathon, Aeschylus was trained in that early school of Athenian greatness whose masters were Miltiades, Aristides, and Themistocles.



During the struggle with Persia, fought out on Greek soil, the poet was at the height of his physical powers, and we may feel confidence in the tradition that he fought not only at Marathon, but also at Salamis. Two of his extant tragedies breathe the very spirit of war, and show a soldier's experience; and the epitaph upon his tomb, which was said to have been written by himself, recorded how he had been one of those who met the barbarians in the first shock of the great struggle and had helped to save his country.

"How brave in battle was Euphorion's son, The long-haired Mede can tell who fell at Marathon."

Before Aeschylus, Attic tragedy had been essentially lyrical. It arose from the dithyrambic chorus that was sung at the festivals of Dionysus. Thespis had introduced the first actor, who, in the pauses of the choral song, related in monologue the adventures of the god or engaged in dialogue with the leader of the chorus. To Aeschylus is due the invention of the second actor. This essentially changed the character of the performance. The dialogue could now be carried on by the two actors, who were thus able to enact a complete story. The functions of the chorus became less important, and the lyrical element was subordinated to the action. (The word "drama" signifies action.) The number of actors was subsequently increased to three, and Aeschylus in his later plays used this number. This restriction imposed upon the Greek playwright does not mean that he was limited to two or three characters in his play, but that only two, or at the most three, of these might take part in the action at once. The same actor might assume different parts. The introduction of the second actor was so capital an innovation that it rightly entitles Aeschylus to be regarded as the creator of the drama, for in his hands tragedy first became essentially dramatic. This is his great distinction, but his powerful genius wrought other changes. He perfected, if he did not discover, the practice of introducing three plays upon a connected theme (technically named a trilogy), with an after-piece of lighter character. He invented the tragic dress and buskin, and perfected the tragic mask. He improved the tragic dance, and by his use of scenic decoration and stage machinery, secured effects that were unknown before him. His chief claim to superior excellence, however, lies after all in his poetry. Splendid in diction, vivid in the portraiture of character, and powerful in the expression of passion, he is regarded by many competent critics as the greatest tragic poet of all time.

The Greek lexicographer, Suidas, reports that Aeschylus wrote ninety plays. The titles of seventy-two of these have been handed down in an ancient register. He brought out the first of these at the age of twenty-five, and as he died at the age of sixty-nine, he wrote on an average two plays each year throughout his lifetime. Such fertility would be incredible, were not similar facts authentically recorded of the older tragic poets of Greece. The Greek drama, moreover, made unusual demands on the creative powers of the poet. It was lyrical, and the lyrics were accompanied by the dance. All these elements—poetry, song, and dance—the poet contributed; and we gain a new sense of the force of the word "poet" (it means "creator"), when we contemplate his triple function. Moreover, he often "staged" the play himself, and sometimes he acted in it. Aeschylus was singularly successful in an age that produced many great poets. He took the first prize at least thirteen times; and as he brought out four plays at each contest, more than half his plays were adjudged by his contemporaries to be of the highest quality. After the poet's death, plays which he had written, but which had not been acted in his lifetime, were brought out by his sons and a nephew. It is on record that his son Euphorion took the first prize four times with plays of his father; so the poet's art lived after him and suffered no eclipse.

Only seven complete plays of Aeschylus are still extant. The best present source of the text of these is a manuscript preserved in the Laurentian Library, at Florence in Italy, which was written in the tenth or eleventh century after Christ. The number of plays still extant is small, but fortunately, among them is the only complete Greek trilogy that we possess, and luckily also the other four serve to mark successive stages in the poet's artistic development. The trilogy of the 'Oresteia' is certainly his masterpiece; in some of the other plays he is clearly seen to be still bound by the limitations which hampered the earlier writers of Greek tragedy. In the following analysis the seven plays will be presented in their probable chronological order.

The Greeks signally defeated Xerxes in the great sea fight in the bay of Salamis, B.C. 480. The poet made this victory the theme of his 'Persians.' This is the only historical Greek tragedy which we now possess: the subjects of all the rest are drawn from mythology. But Aeschylus had a model for his historical play in the 'Phoenician Women' of his predecessor Phrynichus, which dealt with the same theme. Aeschylus, indeed, is said to have imitated it closely in the 'Persians.' Plagiarism was thought to be a venial fault by the ancients, just as in the Homeric times piracy was not considered a disgrace. The scene of the play is not Athens, as one might expect, but Susa. It opens without set prologue. The Chorus consists of Persian elders, to whom the government of the country has been committed in the absence of the King. These venerable men gather in front of the royal palace, and their leader opens the play with expressions of apprehension: no news has come from the host absent in Greece. The Chorus at first express full confidence in the resistless might of the great army; but remembering that the gods are jealous of vast power and success in men, yield to gloomy forebodings. These grow stronger when Atossa, the aged mother of Xerxes, appears from the palace and relates the evil dreams which she has had on the previous night, and the omen that followed. The Chorus beseech her to make prayer to the gods, to offer libations to the dead, and especially to invoke the spirit of Darius to avert the evil which threatens his ancient kingdom. Too late! A messenger arrives and announces that all is lost. By one fell stroke the might of Persia has been laid low at Salamis. At Atossa's request, the messenger, interrupted at first by the lamentations of the Chorus, recounts what has befallen. His description of the battle in the straits is a passage of signal power, and is justly celebrated. The Queen retires, and the Chorus sing a song full of gloomy reflections. The Queen reappears, and the ghost of Darius is invoked from the lower world. He hears from Atossa what has happened, sees in this the fulfillment of certain ancient prophecies, foretells disaster still to come, and warns the Chorus against further attempts upon Greece. As he departs to the underworld, the Chorus sing in praise of the wisdom of his reign. Atossa has withdrawn. Xerxes now appears with attendants, laments with the Chorus the disaster that has overtaken him, and finally enters the palace.

The economy of the play is simple: only two actors are required. The first played the parts of Atossa and Xerxes, the second that of the messenger and the ghost of Darius. The play well illustrates the conditions under which Aeschylus at this period wrote. The Chorus was still of first importance; the ratio of the choral parts in the play to the dialogue is about one to two.

The exact date of the 'Suppliants' cannot be determined; but the simplicity of its plot, the lack of a prologue, the paucity of its characters, and the prominence of the Chorus, show that it is an early play. The scene is Argos. The Chorus consists of the daughters of Danaues, and there are only three characters,—Danaues, a Herald, and Pelasgus King of Argos.

Danaues and Aegyptus, brothers, and descendants of Io and Epaphus, had settled near Canopus at the mouth of the Nile. Aegyptus sought to unite his fifty sons in marriage with the fifty daughters of the brother. The daughters fled with their father to Argos. Here his play opens. The Chorus appeal for protection to the country, once the home of Io, and to its gods and heroes. Pelasgus, with the consent of the Argive people, grants them refuge, and at the end of the play repels the attempt to seize them made by the Herald of the sons of Aegyptus.

A part of one of the choruses is of singular beauty, and it is doubtless to them that the preservation of the play is due. The play hardly seems to be a tragedy, for it ends without bloodshed. Further, it lacks dramatic interest, for the action almost stands still. It is a cantata rather than a tragedy. Both considerations, however, are sufficiently explained by the fact that this was the first play of a trilogy. The remaining plays must have furnished, in the death of forty-nine of the sons of Aegyptus, both action and tragedy in sufficient measure to satisfy the most exacting demands.

The 'Seven Against Thebes' deals with the gloomy myth of the house of Laius. The tetralogy to which it belonged consisted of the 'Laius,' 'Oedipus,' 'Seven Against Thebes,' and 'Sphinx.' The themes of Greek tragedy were drawn from the national mythology, but the myths were treated with a free hand. In his portrayal of the fortunes of this doomed race, Aeschylus departed in important particulars, with gain in dramatic effect, from the story as it is read in Homer.

Oedipus had pronounced an awful curse upon his sons, Eteocles and Polynices, for their unfilial neglect,—"they should one day divide their land by steel." They thereupon agreed to reign in turn, each for a year; but Eteocles, the elder, refused at the end of the first year to give up the throne. Polynices appealed to Adrastus King of Argos for help, and seven chiefs appeared before the walls of Thebes to enforce his claim, and beleaguered the town. Here the play opens, with an appeal addressed by Eteocles to the citizens of Thebes to prove themselves stout defenders of their State in its hour of peril. A messenger enters, and describes the sacrifice and oath of the seven chiefs. The Chorus of Theban maidens enter in confusion and sing the first ode. The hostile army is hurrying from its camp against the town; the Chorus hear their shouts and the rattling din of their arms, and are overcome by terror. Eteocles reproves them for their fears, and bids them sing a paean that shall hearten the people. The messenger, in a noteworthy scene, describes the appearance of each hostile chief. The seventh and last is Polynices. Eteocles, although conscious of his father's curse, nevertheless declares with gloomy resoluteness that he will meet his brother in single combat, and, resisting the entreaties of the Chorus, goes forth to his doom. The attack on the town is repelled, but the brothers fall, each by the other's hand. Thus is the curse fulfilled. Presently their bodies are wheeled in. Their sisters, Antigone and Ismene, follow and sing a lament over the dead. A herald announces that the Theban Senate forbid the burial of Polynices; his body shall be cast forth as prey of dogs. Antigone declares her resolution to brave their mandate, and perform the last sad rites for her brother.

"Dread tie, the common womb from which we sprang,— Of wretched mother born and hapless sire."

The Chorus divides. The first semi-chorus sides with Antigone; the second declares its resolution to follow to its last resting-place the body of Eteocles. And thus the play ends. The theme is here sketched, just at the close of the play, in outline, that Sophocles has developed with such pathetic effect in his 'Antigone.'

The 'Prometheus' transports the reader to another world. The characters are gods, the time is the remote past, the place a desolate waste in Scythia, on the confines of the Northern Ocean. Prometheus had sinned against the authority of Zeus. Zeus wished to destroy the old race of mankind; but Prometheus gave them fire, taught them arts and handicrafts, developed in them thought and consciousness, and so assured both their existence and their happiness. The play deals with his punishment. Prometheus is borne upon the scene by Force and Strength, and is nailed to a lofty cliff by Hephaestus. His appeal to Nature, when his tormentors depart and he is left alone, is peculiarly pathetic. The daughters of Oceanus, constituting the Chorus, who have heard the sound of the hammer in their ocean cave, are now borne in aloft on a winged car, and bewail the fate of the outraged god. Oceanus appears upon a winged steed, and offers his mediation; but this is scornfully rejected. The resolution of Prometheus to resist Zeus to the last is strengthened by the coming of Io. She too, as it seems, is a victim of the Ruler of the Universe; driven by the jealous wrath of Hera, she roams from land to land. She tells the tale of her sad wandering, and finally rushes from the scene in frenzy, crazed by the sting of the gadfly that Hera has sent to torment her. Prometheus knows a secret full of menace to Zeus. Relying on this, he prophesies his overthrow, and defies him to do his worst. Hermes is sent to demand with threats its revelation, but fails to accomplish his purpose. Prometheus insults and taunts him. Hermes warns the Chorus to leave, for Zeus is about to display his wrath. At first they refuse, but then fly affrighted: the cliff is rending and sinking, the elements are in wild tumult. As he sinks, about to be engulfed in the bowels of the earth, Prometheus cries:—

"Earth is rocking in space! And the thunders crash up with a roar upon roar, And the eddying lightnings flash fire in my face, And the whirlwinds are whirling the dust round and round, And the blasts of the winds universal leap free And blow each upon each with a passion of sound, And aether goes mingling in storm with the sea."

The play is Titanic. Its huge shapes, its weird effects, its mighty passions, its wild display of the forces of earth and air,—these impress us chiefly at first; but its ethical interest is far greater. Zeus is apparently represented in it as relentless, cruel, and unjust,—a lawless ruler, who knows only his own will,—whereas in all the other plays of Aeschylus he is just and righteous, although sometimes severe. Aeschylus, we know, was a religious man. It seems incredible that he should have had two contradictory conceptions of the character of Zeus. The solution of this problem is to be found in the fact that this 'Prometheus' was the first play of the trilogy. In the second play, the 'Prometheus Unbound,' of which we have only fragments, these apparent contradictions must have been reconciled. Long ages are supposed to elapse between the plays. Prometheus yields. He reveals the secret and is freed from his bonds. What before seemed to be relentless wanton cruelty is now seen to have been only the harsh but necessary severity of a ruler newly established on his throne. By the reconciliation of this stern ruler with the wise Titan, the giver of good gifts to men, order is restored to the universe. Prometheus acknowledges his guilt, and the course of Zeus is vindicated; but the loss of the second play of the trilogy leaves much in doubt, and an extraordinary number of solutions of the problem has been proposed. The reader must not look for one of these, however, in the 'Prometheus Unbound' of Shelley, who deliberately rejected the supposition of a reconciliation.

The three remaining plays are founded on the woful myth of the house of Atreus, son of Pelops, a theme much treated by the Greek tragic poets. They constitute the only existing Greek trilogy, and are the last and greatest work of the poet. They were brought out at Athens, B.C. 458, two years after the author's death. The 'Agamemnon' sets forth the crime,—the murder, by his wife, of the great King, on his return home from Troy; the 'Choephori,' the vengeance taken on the guilty wife by her own son; the 'Eumenides,' the atonement made by that son in expiation of his mother's murder.

Agamemnon on departing for Troy left behind him in his palace a son and a daughter, Orestes and Electra. Orestes was exiled from home by his mother Clytemnestra, who in Agamemnon's absence lived in guilty union with Aegisthus, own cousin of the King, and who could no longer endure to look upon the face of her son.

The scene of the 'Agamemnon' is the royal palace in Argos. The time is night. A watchman is discovered on the flat roof of the palace. For a year he has kept weary vigil there, waiting for the beacon-fire that, sped from mountain-top to mountain-top, shall announce the fall of Troy. The signal comes at last, and joyously he proclaims the welcome news. The sacrificial fires which have been made ready in anticipation of the event are set alight throughout the city. The play naturally falls into three divisions. The first introduces the Chorus of Argive elders, Clytemnestra, and a Herald who tells of the hardships of the siege and of the calamitous return, and ends with the triumphal entrance of Agamemnon with Cassandra, and his welcome by the Queen; the second comprehends the prophecy of the frenzied Cassandra of the doom about to fall upon the house and the murder of the King; the third the conflict between the Chorus, still faithful to the murdered King, and Clytemnestra, beside whom stands her paramour Aegisthus.

Interest centres in Clytemnestra. Crafty, unscrupulous, resolute, remorseless, she veils her deadly hatred for her lord, and welcomes him home in tender speech:—

"So now, dear lord, I bid thee welcome home— True as the faithful watchdog of the fold, Strong as the mainstay of the laboring bark, Stately as column, fond as only child, Dear as the land to shipwrecked mariner, Bright as fair sunshine after winter's storms, Sweet as fresh fount to thirsty wanderer— All this, and more, thou art, dear love, to me."

Agamemnon passes within the palace; she slays him in his bath, enmeshed in a net, and then, reappearing, vaunts her bloody deed:

"I smote him, and he bellowed; and again I smote, and with a groan his knees gave way; And as he fell before me, with a third And last libation from the deadly mace, I pledged the crowning draught to Hades due, That subterranean Saviour—of the dead! At which he spouted up the Ghost in such A flood of purple as, bespattered with, No less did I rejoice than the green ear Rejoices in the largesse of the skies That fleeting Iris follows as it flies."

Aeschylus departs from the Homeric account, which was followed by other poets, in making the action of the next play, the 'Choephori,' follow closer upon that of the 'Agamemnon.' Orestes has heard in Phocis of his father's murder, and returns in secret, with his friend Pylades, to exact vengeance. The scene is still Argos, but Agamemnon's tomb is now seen in front of the palace. The Chorus consists of captive women, who aid and abet the attempt. The play sets forth the recognition of Orestes by Electra; the plot by which Orestes gains admission to the palace; the deceit of the old Nurse, a homely but capital character, by whom Aegisthus is induced to come to the palace without armed attendants; the death of Aegisthus and Clytemnestra; the appearance of the avenging Furies; and the flight of Orestes.

The last play of the trilogy, the 'Eumenides,' has many singular features. The Chorus of Furies seemed even to the ancients to be a weird and terrible invention; the scene of the play shifts from Delphi to Athens; the poet introduces into the play a trial scene; and he had in it a distinct political purpose, whose development occupies one-half of the drama.

Orestes, pursued by the avenging Furies, "Gorgon-like, vested in sable stoles, their locks entwined with clustering snakes," has fled to Delphi to invoke the aid of Apollo. He clasps the navel-stone and in his exhaustion falls asleep. Around him sleep the Furies. The play opens with a prayer made by the Pythian priestess at an altar in front of the temple. The interior of the sanctuary is then laid bare. Orestes is awake, but the Furies sleep on. Apollo, standing beside Orestes, promises to protect him, but bids him make all haste to Athens, and there clasp, as a suppliant, the image of Athena. Orestes flies. The ghost of Clytemnestra rises from the underworld, and calls upon the Chorus to pursue. Overcome by their toil, they moan in their sleep, but finally start to their feet. Apollo bids them quit the temple.

The scene changes to the ancient temple of Athena on the Acropolis at Athens, where Orestes is seen clasping the image of the goddess. The Chorus enter in pursuit of their victim, and sing an ode descriptive of their powers.

Athena appears, and learns from the Chorus and from Orestes the reasons for their presence. She declares the issue to be too grave even for her to decide, and determines to choose judges of the murder, who shall become a solemn tribunal for all future time. These are to be the best of the citizens of Athens. After an ode by the Chorus, she returns, the court is established, and the trial proceeds in due form. Apollo appears for the defense of Orestes. When the arguments have been presented, Athena proclaims, before the vote has been taken, the establishment of the court as a permanent tribunal for the trial of cases of bloodshed. Its seat shall be the Areopagus. The votes are cast and Orestes is acquitted. He departs for Argos. The Furies break forth in anger and threaten woes to the land, but are appeased by Athena, who establishes their worship forever in Attica. Heretofore they have been the Erinnyes, or Furies; henceforth they shall be the Eumenides, or Gracious Goddesses. The Eumenides are escorted from the scene in solemn procession.

Any analysis of the plays so brief as the preceding is necessarily inadequate. The English reader is referred to the histories of Greek Literature by K.O. Mueller and by J.P. Mahaffy, to the striking chapter on Aeschylus in J.A. Symonds's 'Greek Poets,' and, for the trilogy, to Moulton's 'Ancient Classical Drama.' If he knows French, he should add Croiset's 'Histoire de la Litterature Grecque,' and should by all means read M. Patin's volume on Aeschylus in his 'Etudes sur les Tragique Grecs.' There are translations in English of the poet's complete works by Potter, by Plumptre, by Blackie, and by Miss Swanwick. Flaxman illustrated the plays. Ancient illustrations are easily accessible in Baumeister's 'Denkmaeler,' under the names of the different characters in the plays. There is a translation of the 'Prometheus' by Mrs. Browning, and of the 'Suppliants' by Morshead, who has also translated the Atridean trilogy under the title of 'The House of Atreus.' Goldwin Smith has translated portions of six of the plays in his 'Specimens of Greek Tragedy.' Many translations of the 'Agamemnon' have been made, among others by Milman, by Symmons, by Lord Carnarvon, and by Fitzgerald. Robert Browning also translated the play, with appalling literalness.

THE COMPLAINT OF PROMETHEUS

PROMETHEUS (alone)

O holy Aether, and swift-winged Winds, And River-wells, and laughter innumerous Of yon Sea-waves! Earth, mother of us all, And all-viewing cyclic Sun, I cry on you,— Behold me a god, what I endure from gods! Behold, with throe on throe, How, wasted by this woe, I wrestle down the myriad years of Time! Behold, how fast around me The new King of the happy ones sublime Has flung the chain he forged, has shamed and bound me! Woe, woe! to-day's woe and the coming morrow's I cover with one groan. And where is found me A limit to these sorrows? And yet what word do I say? I have foreknown Clearly all things that should be; nothing done Comes sudden to my soul—and I must bear What is ordained with patience, being aware Necessity doth front the universe With an invincible gesture. Yet this curse Which strikes me now, I find it hard to brave In silence or in speech. Because I gave Honor to mortals, I have yoked my soul To this compelling fate. Because I stole The secret fount of fire, whose bubbles went Over the ferrule's brim, and manward sent Art's mighty means and perfect rudiment, That sin I expiate in this agony, Hung here in fetters, 'neath the blanching sky. Ah, ah me! what a sound, What a fragrance sweeps up from a pinion unseen Of a god, or a mortal, or nature between, Sweeping up to this rock where the earth has her bound, To have sight of my pangs, or some guerdon obtain— Lo, a god in the anguish, a god in the chain! The god Zeus hateth sore, And his gods hate again, As many as tread on his glorified floor, Because I loved mortals too much evermore. Alas me! what a murmur and motion I hear, As of birds flying near! And the air undersings The light stroke of their wings— And all life that approaches I wait for in fear.

From E.B. Browning's Translation of 'Prometheus.'

A PRAYER TO ARTEMIS

STROPHE IV

Though Zeus plan all things right, Yet is his heart's desire full hard to trace; Nathless in every place Brightly it gleameth, e'en in darkest night, Fraught with black fate to man's speech-gifted race.

ANTISTROPHE IV

Steadfast, ne'er thrown in fight, The deed in brow of Zeus to ripeness brought; For wrapt in shadowy night, Tangled, unscanned by mortal sight, Extend the pathways of his secret thought.

STROPHE V

From towering hopes mortals he hurleth prone To utter doom; but for their fall No force arrayeth he; for all That gods devise is without effort wrought. A mindful Spirit aloft on holy throne By inborn energy achieves his thought.

ANTISTROPHE V

But let him mortal insolence behold:— How with proud contumacy rife, Wantons the stem in lusty life My marriage craving;—frenzy over-bold, Spur ever-pricking, goads them on to fate, By ruin taught their folly all too late.

STROPHE VI

Thus I complain, in piteous strain, Grief-laden, tear-evoking, shrill; Ah woe is me! woe! woe! Dirge-like it sounds; mine own death-trill I pour, yet breathing vital air. Hear, hill-crowned Apia, hear my prayer! Full well, O land, My voice barbaric thou canst understand; While oft with rendings I assail My byssine vesture and Sidonian veil.

ANTISTROPHE VI

My nuptial right in Heaven's pure sight Pollution were, death-laden, rude; Ah woe is me! woe! woe! Alas for sorrow's murky brood! Where will this billow hurl me? Where? Hear, hill-crowned Apia, hear my prayer; Full well, O land, My voice barbaric thou canst understand, While oft with rendings I assail My byssine vesture and Sidonian veil.

STROPHE VII

The oar indeed and home with sails Flax-tissued, swelled with favoring gales, Staunch to the wave, from spear-storm free, Have to this shore escorted me, Nor so far blame I destiny. But may the all-seeing Father send In fitting time propitious end; So our dread Mother's mighty brood, The lordly couch may 'scape, ah me, Unwedded, unsubdued!

ANTISTROPHE VII

Meeting my will with will divine, Daughter of Zeus, who here dost hold Steadfast thy sacred shrine,— Me, Artemis unstained, behold, Do thou, who sovereign might dost wield, Virgin thyself, a virgin shield;

So our dread Mother's mighty brood The lordly couch may 'scape, ah me, Unwedded, unsubdued!

From Miss Swanwick's Translation of 'The Suppliants.'



THE DEFIANCE OF ETEOCLES

MESSENGER

Now at the Seventh Gate the seventh chief, Thy proper mother's son, I will announce, What fortune for this city, for himself, With curses he invoketh:—on the walls Ascending, heralded as king, to stand, With paeans for their capture; then with thee To fight, and either slaying near thee die, Or thee, who wronged him, chasing forth alive, Requite in kind his proper banishment. Such words he shouts, and calls upon the gods Who o'er his race preside and Fatherland, With gracious eye to look upon his prayers. A well-wrought buckler, newly forged, he bears, With twofold blazon riveted thereon, For there a woman leads, with sober mien, A mailed warrior, enchased in gold; Justice her style, and thus the legend speaks:— "This man I will restore, and he shall hold The city and his father's palace homes." Such the devices of the hostile chiefs. 'Tis for thyself to choose whom thou wilt send; But never shalt thou blame my herald-words. To guide the rudder of the State be thine!

ETEOCLES

O heaven-demented race of Oedipus, My race, tear-fraught, detested of the gods! Alas, our father's curses now bear fruit. But it beseems not to lament or weep, Lest lamentations sadder still be born. For him, too truly Polyneikes named,— What his device will work we soon shall know; Whether his braggart words, with madness fraught, Gold-blazoned on his shield, shall lead him back. Hath Justice communed with, or claimed him hers, Guided his deeds and thoughts, this might have been; But neither when he fled the darksome womb, Or in his childhood, or in youth's fair prime, Or when the hair thick gathered on his chin, Hath Justice communed with, or claimed him hers, Nor in this outrage on his Fatherland Deem I she now beside him deigns to stand. For Justice would in sooth belie her name, Did she with this all-daring man consort. In these regards confiding will I go, Myself will meet him. Who with better right? Brother to brother, chieftain against chief, Foeman to foe, I'll stand. Quick, bring my spear, My greaves, and armor, bulwark against stones.

From Miss Swanwick's Translation of 'The Seven Against Thebes.'

THE VISION OF CASSANDRA

CASSANDRA

Phoebus Apollo!

CHORUS

Hark! The lips at last unlocking.

CASSANDRA

Phoebus! Phoebus!

CHORUS

Well, what of Phoebus, maiden? though a name 'Tis but disparagement to call upon In misery.

CASSANDRA

Apollo! Apollo! Again! Oh, the burning arrow through the brain! Phoebus Apollo! Apollo!

CHORUS

Seemingly Possessed indeed—whether by—

CASSANDRA

Phoebus! Phoebus! Through trampled ashes, blood, and fiery rain, Over water seething, and behind the breathing War-horse in the darkness—till you rose again, Took the helm—took the rein—

CHORUS

As one that half asleep at dawn recalls A night of Horror!

CASSANDRA

Hither, whither, Phoebus? And with whom, Leading me, lighting me—

CHORUS

I can answer that—

CASSANDRA

Down to what slaughter-house! Foh! the smell of carnage through the door Scares me from it—drags me toward it— Phoebus Apollo! Apollo!

CHORUS

One of the dismal prophet-pack, it seems, That hunt the trail of blood. But here at fault— This is no den of slaughter, but the house Of Agamemnon.

CASSANDRA

Down upon the towers, Phantoms of two mangled children hover—and a famished man, At an empty table glaring, seizes and devours!

CHORUS

Thyestes and his children! Strange enough For any maiden from abroad to know, Or, knowing—

CASSANDRA

And look! in the chamber below The terrible Woman, listening, watching, Under a mask, preparing the blow In the fold of her robe—

CHORUS

Nay, but again at fault: For in the tragic story of this House— Unless, indeed the fatal Helen—No woman—

CASSANDRA

No Woman—Tisiphone! Daughter Of Tartarus—love-grinning Woman above, Dragon-tailed under—honey-tongued, Harpy-clawed, Into the glittering meshes of slaughter She wheedles, entices him into the poisonous Fold of the serpent—

CHORUS

Peace, mad woman, peace! Whose stony lips once open vomit out Such uncouth horrors.

CASSANDRA

I tell you the lioness Slaughters the Lion asleep; and lifting Her blood-dripping fangs buried deep in his mane, Glaring about her insatiable, bellowing, Bounds hither—Phoebus Apollo, Apollo, Apollo! Whither have you led me, under night alive with fire, Through the trampled ashes of the city of my sire, From my slaughtered kinsmen, fallen throne, insulted shrine, Slave-like to be butchered, the daughter of a royal line!

From Edward Fitzgerald's Version of the 'Agamemnon.'



THE LAMENT OF THE OLD NURSE

NURSE

Our mistress bids me with all speed to call Aegisthus to the strangers, that he come And hear more clearly, as a man from man, This newly brought report. Before her slaves, Under set eyes of melancholy cast, She hid her inner chuckle at the events That have been brought to pass—too well for her, But for this house and hearth most miserably,— As in the tale the strangers clearly told. He, when he hears and learns the story's gist, Will joy, I trow, in heart. Ah, wretched me! How those old troubles, of all sorts made up, Most hard to bear, in Atreus's palace-halls Have made my heart full heavy in my breast! But never have I known a woe like this. For other ills I bore full patiently, But as for dear Orestes, my sweet charge, Whom from his mother I received and nursed . . . And then the shrill cries rousing me o' nights, And many and unprofitable toils For me who bore them. For one needs must rear The heedless infant like an animal, (How can it else be?) as his humor serve For while a child is yet in swaddling clothes, It speaketh not, if either hunger comes, Or passing thirst, or lower calls of need; And children's stomach works its own content. And I, though I foresaw this, call to mind, How I was cheated, washing swaddling clothes, And nurse and laundress did the selfsame work. I then with these my double handicrafts, Brought up Orestes for his father dear; And now, woe's me! I learn that he is dead, And go to fetch the man that mars this house; And gladly will he hear these words of mine.

From Plumptre's Translation of 'The Libation-Pourers.'

THE DECREE OF ATHENA

Hear ye my statute, men of Attica— Ye who of bloodshed judge this primal cause; Yea, and in future age shall Aegeus's host Revere this court of jurors. This the hill Of Ares, seat of Amazons, their tent, What time 'gainst Theseus, breathing hate, they came, Waging fierce battle, and their towers upreared, A counter-fortress to Acropolis;— To Ares they did sacrifice, and hence This rock is titled Areopagus. Here then shall sacred Awe, to Fear allied, By day and night my lieges hold from wrong, Save if themselves do innovate my laws, If thou with mud, or influx base, bedim The sparkling water, nought thou'lt find to drink. Nor Anarchy, nor Tyrant's lawless rule Commend I to my people's reverence;— Nor let them banish from their city Fear; For who 'mong men, uncurbed by fear, is just? Thus holding Awe in seemly reverence, A bulwark for your State shall ye possess, A safeguard to protect your city walls, Such as no mortals otherwhere can boast, Neither in Scythia, nor in Pelops's realm. Behold! This Court august, untouched by bribes, Sharp to avenge, wakeful for those who sleep, Establish I, a bulwark to this land. This charge, extending to all future time, I give my lieges. Meet it as ye rise, Assume the pebbles, and decide the cause, Your oath revering. All hath now been said.

From Miss Swanwick's Translation of 'The Eumenides.'



AESOP

(Seventh Century B.C.)

BY HARRY THURSTON PECK

Like Homer, the greatest of the world's epic poets, Aesop (Aesopus), the most famous of the world's fabulists, has been regarded by certain scholars as a wholly mythical personage. The many improbable stories that are told about him gain some credence for this theory, which is set forth in detail by the Italian scholar Vico, who says:—"Aesop, regarded philosophically, will be found not to have been an actually existing man, but rather an abstraction representing a class,"—in other words, merely a convenient invention of the later Greeks, who ascribed to him all the fables of which they could find no certain author.



The only narrative upon which the ancient writers are in the main agreed represents Aesop as living in the seventh century before Christ. As with Homer, so with Aesop, several cities of Asia Minor claimed the honor of having been his birthplace. Born a slave and hideously ugly, his keen wit led his admiring master to set him free; after which he traveled, visiting Athens, where he is said to have told his fable of King Log and King Stork to the citizens who were complaining of the rule of Pisistratus. Still later, having won the favor of King Croesus of Lydia, he was sent by him to Delphi with a gift of money for the citizens of that place; but in the course of a dispute as to its distribution, he was slain by the Delphians, who threw him over a precipice.

The fables that bore his name seem not to have been committed by him to writing, but for a long time were handed down from generation to generation by oral tradition; so that the same fables are sometimes found quoted in slightly different forms, and we hear of men learning them in conversation rather than from books. They were, however, universally popular. Socrates while in prison amused himself by turning some of them into verse. Aristophanes cites them in his plays; and he tells how certain suitors once tried to win favor of a judge by repeating to him some of the amusing stories of Aesop. The Athenians even erected a statue in his honor. At a later period, the fables were gathered together and published by the Athenian statesman and orator, Demetrius Phalereus, in B.C. 320, and were versified by Babrius (of uncertain date), whose collection is the only one in Greek of which any substantial portion still survives. They were often translated by the Romans, and the Latin version by Phaedrus, the freedman of Augustus Caesar, is still preserved and still used as a school-book. Forty-two of them are likewise found in a Latin work by one Avianus, dating from the fifth century after Christ. During the Middle Ages, when much of the classical literature had been lost or forgotten, Aesop, who was called by the mediaevals "Isopet," was still read in various forms; and in modern times he has served as a model for a great number of imitations, of which the most successful are those in French by Lafontaine and those in English by John Gay.

Whether or not such a person as Aesop ever lived, and whether or not he actually narrated the fables that are ascribed to him, it is certain that he did not himself invent them, but merely gave them currency in Greece; for they can be shown to have existed long before his time, and in fact to antedate even the beginnings of Hellenic civilization. With some changes of form they are found in the oldest literature of the Chinese; similar stories are preserved on the inscribed Babylonian bricks; and an Egyptian papyrus of about the year 1200 B.C. gives the fable of 'The Lion and the Mouse' in its finished form. Other Aesopic apologues are essentially identical with the Jatakas or Buddhist stories of India, and occur also in the great Sanskrit story-book, the 'Panchatantra,' which is the very oldest monument of Hindu literature.

The so-called Aesopic Fables are in fact only a part of the primitive folk-lore, that springs up in prehistoric times, and passes from country to country and from race to race by the process of popular story-telling. They reached Greece, undoubtedly through Egypt and Persia, and even in their present form they still retain certain Oriental, or at any rate non-Hellenic elements, such as the introduction of Eastern animals,—the panther, the peacock, and the ape. They represent the beginnings of conscious literary effort, when man first tried to enforce some maxim of practical wisdom and to teach some useful truth through the fascinating medium of a story. The Fable embodies a half-unconscious desire to give concrete form to an abstract principle, and a childish love for the picturesque and striking, which endows rocks and stones and trees with life, and gives the power of speech to animals.

That beasts with the attributes of human beings should figure in these tales involves, from the standpoint of primeval man, only a very slight divergence from probability. In nothing, perhaps, has civilization so changed us as in our mental attitude toward animals. It has fixed a great gulf between us and them—a gulf far greater than that which divided them from our first ancestors. In the early ages of the world, when men lived by the chase, and gnawed the raw flesh of their prey, and slept in lairs amid the jungle, the purely animal virtues were the only ones they knew and exercised. They adored courage and strength, and swiftness and endurance. They respected keenness of scent and vision, and admired cunning. The possession of these qualities was the very condition of existence, and they valued them accordingly; but in each one of them they found their equals, and in fact their superiors, among the brutes. A lion was stronger than the strongest man. The hare was swifter. The eagle was more keen-sighted. The fox was more cunning. Hence, so far from looking down upon the animals from the remotely superior height that a hundred centuries of civilization have erected for us, the primitive savage looked up to the beast, studied his ways, copied him, and went to school to him. The man, then, was not in those days the lord of creation, and the beast was not his servant; but they were almost brothers in the subtle sympathy between them, like that which united Mowgli, the wolf-nursed shikarri, and his hairy brethren, in that most weirdly wonderful of all Mr. Kipling's inventions—the one that carries us back, not as his other stories do, to the India of the cities and the bazaars, of the supercilious tourist and the sleek Babu, but to the older India of unbroken jungle, darkling at noonday through its green mist of tangled leaves, and haunted by memories of the world's long infancy when man and brute crouched close together on the earthy breast of the great mother.

The Aesopic Fables, then, are the oldest representative that we have of the literary art of primitive man. The charm that they have always possessed springs in part from their utter simplicity, their naivete, and their directness; and in part from the fact that their teachings are the teachings of universal experience, and therefore appeal irresistibly to the consciousness of every one who hears them, whether he be savage or scholar, child or sage. They are the literary antipodes of the last great effort of genius and art working upon the same material, and found in Mr. Kipling's Jungle Books. The Fables show only the first stirrings of the literary instinct, the Jungle Stories bring to bear the full development of the fictive art,—creative imagination, psychological insight, brilliantly picturesque description, and the touch of one who is a daring master of vivid language; so that no better theme can be given to a student of literary history than the critical comparison of these two allied forms of composition, representing as they do the two extremes of actual development.

The best general account in English of the origin of the Greek Fable is that of Rutherford in the introduction to his 'Babrius' (London, 1883). An excellent special study of the history of the Aesopic Fables is that by Joseph Jacobs in the first volume of his 'Aesop' (London, 1889). The various ancient accounts of Aesop's life are collected by Simrock in 'Aesops Leben' (1864). The best scientific edition of the two hundred and ten fables is that of Halm (Leipzig, 1887). Good disquisitions on their history during the Middle Ages are those of Du Meril in French (Paris, 1854) and Bruno in German (Bamberg, 1892). See also the articles in the present work under the titles 'Babrius,' 'Bidpai,' 'John Gay,' 'Lafontaine,' 'Lokman,' 'Panchatantra,' 'Phaedrus,' 'Reynard the Fox.'

H.J. Peck

THE FOX AND THE LION

The first time the Fox saw the Lion, he fell down at his feet, and was ready to die of fear. The second time, he took courage and could even bear to look upon him. The third time, he had the impudence to come up to him, to salute him, and to enter into familiar conversation with him.

THE ASS IN THE LION'S SKIN

An Ass, finding the skin of a Lion, put it on; and, going into the woods and pastures, threw all the flocks and herds into a terrible consternation. At last, meeting his owner, he would have frightened him also; but the good man, seeing his long ears stick out, presently knew him, and with a good cudgel made him sensible that, notwithstanding his being dressed in a Lion's skin, he was really no more than an Ass.

THE ASS EATING THISTLES

An Ass was loaded with good provisions of several sorts, which, in time of harvest, he was carrying into the field for his master and the reapers to dine upon. On the way he met with a fine large thistle, and being very hungry, began to mumble it; which while he was doing, he entered into this reflection:—"How many greedy epicures would think themselves happy, amidst such a variety of delicate viands as I now carry! But to me this bitter, prickly thistle is more savory and relishing than the most exquisite and sumptuous banquet."

THE WOLF IN SHEEP'S CLOTHING

A Wolf, clothing himself in the skin of a sheep, and getting in among the flock, by this means took the opportunity to devour many of them. At last the shepherd discovered him, and cunningly fastening a rope about his neck, tied him up to a tree which stood hard by. Some other shepherds happening to pass that way, and observing what he was about, drew near, and expressed their admiration at it. "What!" says one of them, "brother, do you make hanging of a sheep?" "No," replied the other, "but I make hanging of a Wolf whenever I catch him, though in the habit and garb of a sheep." Then he showed them their mistake, and they applauded the justice of the execution.

THE COUNTRYMAN AND THE SNAKE

A Villager, in a frosty, snowy winter, found a Snake under a hedge, almost dead with cold. He could not help having a compassion for the poor creature, so brought it home, and laid it upon the hearth, near the fire; but it had not lain there long, before (being revived with the heat) it began to erect itself, and fly at his wife and children, filling the whole cottage with dreadful hissings. The Countryman heard an outcry, and perceiving what the matter was, catched up a mattock and soon dispatched him; upbraiding him at the same time in these words:—"Is this, vile wretch, the reward you make to him that saved your life? Die as you deserve; but a single death is too good for you."

THE BELLY AND THE MEMBERS

In former days, when the Belly and the other parts of the body enjoyed the faculty of speech, and had separate views and designs of their own, each part, it seems, in particular for himself, and in the name of the whole, took exception to the conduct of the Belly, and were resolved to grant him supplies no longer. They said they thought it very hard that he should lead an idle, good-for-nothing life, spending and squandering away, upon his own ungodly guts, all the fruits of their labor; and that, in short, they were resolved, for the future, to strike off his allowance, and let him shift for himself as well as he could. The Hands protested they would not lift up a finger to keep him from starving; and the Mouth wished he might never speak again if he took in the least bit of nourishment for him as long as he lived; and, said the Teeth, may we be rotten if ever we chew a morsel for him for the future. This solemn league and covenant was kept as long as anything of that kind can be kept, which was until each of the rebel members pined away to skin and bone, and could hold out no longer. Then they found there was no doing without the Belly, and that, idle and insignificant as he seemed, he contributed as much to the maintenance and welfare of all the other parts as they did to his.

THE SATYR AND THE TRAVELER

A Satyr, as he was ranging the forest in an exceeding cold, snowy season, met with a Traveler half-starved with the extremity of the weather. He took compassion on him, and kindly invited him home to a warm, comfortable cave he had in the hollow of a rock. As soon as they had entered and sat down, notwithstanding there was a good fire in the place, the chilly Traveler could not forbear blowing his fingers' ends. Upon the Satyr's asking why he did so, he answered, that he did it to warm his hands. The honest sylvan having seen little of the world, admired a man who was master of so valuable a quality as that of blowing heat, and therefore was resolved to entertain him in the best manner he could. He spread the table before him with dried fruits of several sorts; and produced a remnant of cold wine, which as the rigor of the season made very proper, he mulled with some warm spices, infused over the fire, and presented to his shivering guest. But this the Traveler thought fit to blow likewise; and upon the Satyr's demanding a reason why he blowed again, he replied, to cool his dish. This second answer provoked the Satyr's indignation as much as the first had kindled his surprise: so, taking the man by the shoulder, he thrust him out of doors, saying he would have nothing to do with a wretch who had so vile a quality as to blow hot and cold with the same mouth.

THE LION AND THE OTHER BEASTS

The Lion and several other beasts entered into an alliance, offensive and defensive, and were to live very sociably together in the forest. One day, having made a sort of an excursion by way of hunting, they took a very fine, large, fat deer, which was divided into four parts; there happening to be then present his Majesty the Lion, and only three others. After the division was made, and the parts were set out, his Majesty, advancing forward some steps and pointing to one of the shares, was pleased to declare himself after the following manner:— "This I seize and take possession of as my right, which devolves to me, as I am descended by a true, lineal, hereditary succession from the royal family of Lion. That [pointing to the second] I claim by, I think, no unreasonable demand; considering that all the engagements you have with the enemy turn chiefly upon my courage and conduct, and you very well know that wars are too expensive to be carried on without proper supplies. Then [nodding his head toward the third] that I shall take by virtue of my prerogative; to which, I make no question but so dutiful and loyal a people will pay all the deference and regard that I can desire. Now, as for the remaining part, the necessity of our present affairs is so very urgent, our stock so low, and our credit so impaired and weakened, that I must insist upon your granting that, without any hesitation or demur; and hereof fail not at your peril."

THE ASS AND THE LITTLE DOG

The Ass, observing how great a favorite the little Dog was with his Master, how much caressed and fondled, and fed with good bits at every meal; and for no other reason, as he could perceive, but for skipping and frisking about, wagging his tail, and leaping up into his Master's lap: he was resolved to imitate the same, and see whether such a behavior would not procure him the same favors. Accordingly, the Master was no sooner come home from walking about his fields and gardens, and was seated in his easy-chair, but the Ass, who observed him, came gamboling and braying towards him, in a very awkward manner. The Master could not help laughing aloud at the odd sight. But his jest was soon turned into earnest, when he felt the rough salute of the Ass's fore-feet, who, raising himself upon his hinder legs, pawed against his breast with a most loving air, and would fain have jumped into his lap. The good man, terrified at this outrageous behavior, and unable to endure the weight of so heavy a beast, cried out; upon which, one of his servants running in with a good stick, and laying on heartily upon the bones of the poor Ass, soon convinced him that every one who desires it is not qualified to be a favorite.

THE COUNTRY MOUSE AND THE CITY MOUSE

An honest, plain, sensible Country Mouse is said to have entertained at his hole one day a fine Mouse of the Town. Having formerly been playfellows together, they were old acquaintances, which served as an apology for the visit. However, as master of the house, he thought himself obliged to do the honors of it in all respects, and to make as great a stranger of his guest as he possibly could. In order to do this he set before him a reserve of delicate gray pease and bacon, a dish of fine oatmeal, some parings of new cheese, and, to crown all with a dessert, a remnant of a charming mellow apple. In good manners, he forbore to eat any himself, lest the stranger should not have enough; but that he might seem to bear the other company, sat and nibbled a piece of a wheaten straw very busily. At last, says the spark of the town:—"Old crony, give me leave to be a little free with you: how can you bear to live in this nasty, dirty, melancholy hole here, with nothing but woods, and meadows, and mountains, and rivulets about you? Do not you prefer the conversation of the world to the chirping of birds, and the splendor of a court to the rude aspect of an uncultivated desert? Come, take my word for it, you will find it a change for the better. Never stand considering, but away this moment. Remember, we are not immortal, and therefore have no time to lose. Make sure of to-day, and spend it as agreeably as you can: you know not what may happen to-morrow." In short, these and such like arguments prevailed, and his Country Acquaintance was resolved to go to town that night. So they both set out upon their journey together, proposing to sneak in after the close of the evening. They did so; and about midnight made their entry into a certain great house, where there had been an extraordinary entertainment the day before, and several tit-bits, which some of the servants had purloined, were hid under the seat of a window. The Country Guest was immediately placed in the midst of a rich Persian carpet: and now it was the Courtier's turn to entertain; who indeed acquitted himself in that capacity with the utmost readiness and address, changing the courses as elegantly, and tasting everything first as judiciously, as any clerk of the kitchen. The other sat and enjoyed himself like a delighted epicure, tickled to the last degree with this new turn of his affairs; when on a sudden, a noise of somebody opening the door made them start from their seats, and scuttle in confusion about the dining-room. Our Country Friend, in particular, was ready to die with fear at the barking of a huge mastiff or two, which opened their throats just about the same time, and made the whole house echo. At last, recovering himself:—"Well," says he, "if this be your town-life, much good may you do with it: give me my poor, quiet hole again, with my homely but comfortable gray pease."

THE DOG AND THE WOLF

A lean, hungry, half-starved Wolf happened, one moonshiny night, to meet with a jolly, plump, well-fed Mastiff; and after the first compliments were passed, says the Wolf:—"You look extremely well. I protest, I think I never saw a more graceful, comely person; but how comes it about, I beseech you, that you should live so much better than I? I may say, without vanity, that I venture fifty times more than you do; and yet I am almost ready to perish with hunger." The Dog answered very bluntly, "Why, you may live as well, if you will do the same for it that I do."—"Indeed? what is that?" says he.—"Why," says the Dog, "only to guard the house a-nights, and keep it from thieves."—"With all my heart," replies the Wolf, "for at present I have but a sorry time of it; and I think to change my hard lodging in the woods, where I endure rain, frost, and snow, for a warm roof over my head, and a bellyful of good victuals, will be no bad bargain."—"True," says the Dog; "therefore you have nothing more to do but to follow me." Now, as they were jogging on together, the Wolf spied a crease in the Dog's neck, and having a strange curiosity, could not forbear asking him what it meant. "Pooh! nothing," says the Dog.—"Nay, but pray—" says the Wolf.—"Why," says the Dog, "if you must know, I am tied up in the daytime, because I am a little fierce, for fear I should bite people, and am only let loose a-nights. But this is done with design to make me sleep a-days, more than anything else, and that I may watch the better in the night-time; for as soon as ever the twilight appears, out I am turned, and may go where I please. Then my master brings me plates of bones from the table with his own hands, and whatever scraps are left by any of the family, all fall to my share; for you must know I am a favorite with everybody. So you see how you are to live. Come, come along: what is the matter with you?"—"No," replied the Wolf, "I beg your pardon: keep your happiness all to yourself. Liberty is the word with me; and I would not be a king upon the terms you mention."



JEAN LOUIS RODOLPHE AGASSIZ

(1807-1873)

"At first, when a mere boy, twelve years of age," writes the great Swiss naturalist, "I did what most beginners do. I picked up whatever I could lay my hands on, and tried, by such books and authorities as I had at my command, to find the names of these objects. My highest ambition at that time, was to be able to designate the plants and animals of my native country correctly by a Latin name, and to extend gradually a similar knowledge in its application to the productions of other countries. This seemed to me, in those days, the legitimate aim and proper work of a naturalist. I still possess manuscript volumes in which I entered the names of all the animals and plants with which I became acquainted, and I well remember that I then ardently hoped to acquire the same superficial familiarity with the whole creation. I did not then know how much more important it is to the naturalist to understand the structure of a few animals than to command the whole field of scientific nomenclature. Since I have become a teacher, and have watched the progress of students, I have seen that they all begin in the same way. But how many have grown old in the pursuit, without ever rising to any higher conception of the study of nature, spending their life in the determination of species, and in extending scientific terminology! Long before I went to the university, and before I began to study natural history under the guidance of men who were masters in the science during the early part of this century, I perceived that though nomenclature and classification, as then understood, formed an important part of the study, being, in fact, its technical language, the study of living beings in their natural element was of infinitely greater value. At that age—namely, about fifteen—I spent most of the time I could spare from classical and mathematical studies in hunting the neighboring woods and meadows for birds, insects, and land and fresh-water shells. My room became a little menagerie, while the stone basin under the fountain in our yard was my reservoir for all the fishes I could catch. Indeed, collecting, fishing, and raising caterpillars, from which I reared fresh, beautiful butterflies, were then my chief pastimes. What I know of the habits of the fresh-water fishes of Central Europe I mostly learned at that time; and I may add, that when afterward I obtained access to a large library and could consult the works of Bloch and Lacepede, the only extensive works on fishes then in existence. I wondered that they contained so little about their habits, natural attitudes, and mode of action, with which I was so familiar."



It is this way of looking at things that gives to Agassiz's writings their literary and popular interest. He was born in Mortier, Canton Fribourg, May 28th, 1807, the son of a clergyman, who sent his gifted son to the Universities of Zuerich, Heidelberg, and Munich, where he acquired reputation for his brilliant powers, and entered into the enthusiastic, intellectual, and merry student-life, taking his place in the formal duels, and becoming known as a champion fencer. Agassiz was an influence in every centre that he touched; and in Munich, his room and his laboratory, thick with clouds of smoke from the long-stemmed German pipes, was a gathering-place for the young scientific aspirants, who affectionately called it "The Little Academy." At the age of twenty-two, he had published his 'Fishes of Brazil,' a folio that brought him into immediate recognition. Cuvier, the greatest ichthyologist of his time, to whom the first volume was dedicated, received him as a pupil, and gave to him all the material that he had been collecting during fifteen years for a contemplated work on Fossil Fishes. In Paris Agassiz also won the friendship of Humboldt, who, learning that he stood in need of money, presented him with so generous a sum as to enable the ambitious young naturalist to work with a free and buoyant spirit.

His practical career began in 1832, when he was installed at Neufchatel, from which point he easily studied the Alps. Two years later, after the 'Poissons fossiles' (Fossil Fishes) appeared, he visited England to lecture. Then returning to his picturesque home, he applied himself to original investigation, and through his lectures and publications won honors and degrees. His daring opinions, however, sometimes provoked ardent discussion and angry comment.

Agassiz's passion for investigation frequently led him into dangers that imperiled both life and limb. In the summer of 1841, for example, he was lowered into a deep crevasse bristling with huge stalactites of ice, to reach the heart of a glacier moving at the rate of forty feet a day. While he was observing the blue bands on the glittering ice, he suddenly touched a well of water, and only after great difficulty made his companions understand his signal for rescue. These Alpine experiences are well described by Mrs. Elizabeth Gary Agassiz, and also by Edouard Desors in his 'Sejours dans les Glaciers' (Sojourn among the Glaciers: Neufchatel, 1844). Interesting particulars of these glacial studies ('Etudes des Glaciers') were soon issued, and Agassiz received many gifts from lovers of science, among whom was numbered the King of Prussia. His zooelogical and geological investigations were continued, and important works on 'Fossil Mollusks,' 'Tertiary Shells,' and 'Living and Fossil Echinoderms' date from this period.

He had long desired to visit America, when he realized this wish in 1846 by an arrangement with the Lowell Institute of Boston, where he gave a series of lectures, afterwards repeated in various cities. So attractive did he find the fauna and flora of America, and so vast a field did he perceive here for his individual studies and instruction, that he returned the following year. In 1848 the Prussian government, which had borne the expenses of his scientific mission,—a cruise along our Atlantic coast to study its marine life,—released him from further obligation that he might accept the chair of geology in the Lawrence Scientific School of Harvard University. His cruises, his explorations, and his methods, combined with his attractive personality, gave him unique power as a teacher; and many of his biographers think that of all his gifts, the ability to instruct was the most conspicuous. He needed no text-books, for he went directly to Nature, and did not believe in those technical, dry-as-dust terms which lead to nothing and which are swept away by the next generation. Many noted American men of science remember the awakening influence of his laboratories in Charleston and Cambridge, his museum at Harvard, and his summer school at Penikese Island in Buzzard's Bay, Massachusetts, where natural history was studied under ideal conditions. It was here that he said to his class:—"A laboratory of natural history is a sanctuary where nothing profane should be tolerated." Whittier has left a poem called "The Prayer of Agassiz," describing

"The isle of Penikese Ranged about by sapphire seas."

Just as he was realizing two of his ambitions, the establishment of a great museum and a practical school of zooelogy, he died, December 14th, 1873, at his home in Cambridge, and was buried at Mount Auburn beneath pine-trees sent from Switzerland, while a bowlder from the glacier of the Aar was selected to mark his resting-place.

Agassiz was greatly beloved by his pupils and associates, and was identified with the brilliant group—Emerson, Longfellow, Holmes, and Lowell,—each of whom has written of him. Lowell considered his 'Elegy on Agassiz,' written in Florence in 1874, among his best verses; Longfellow wrote a poem for 'The Fiftieth Birthday of Agassiz,' and Holmes 'A Farewell to Agassiz' on his departure for the Andes, whose affectionate and humorous strain thus closes:—

"Till their glorious raid is o'er, And they touch our ransomed shore! Then the welcome of a nation, With its shout of exultation, Shall awake the dumb creation, And the shapes of buried aeons Join the living creatures' paeans, While the mighty megalosaurus Leads the palaeozoic chorus,— God bless the great Professor, And the land its proud possessor,— Bless them now and evermore!"

Numerous biographies and monographs of Agassiz exist in many languages, a complete list of which is given in the last published 'Life of Agassiz,' by Jules Marcou (New York and London, 1896), and also in the 'Life of Agassiz,' by Charles F. Holder (New York, 1893). Complete lists of Agassiz's works are also given in these biographies, and these titles show how versatile was his taste and how deep and wide his research. His principal contributions to science are in French and Latin, but his most popular books appeared in English. These include 'The Structure of Animal Life,' 'Methods of Study,' 'Geological Sketches,' and 'Journey in Brazil,' the latter written with Mrs. Agassiz. His 'Contributions to the Natural History of the United States,' planned to be in ten large books, only reached four volumes.

In his 'Researches concerning Fossil Fishes,' Agassiz expressed the views that made him a lifelong opponent of the Darwinian theories, although he was a warm friend of Darwin. Considering the demands upon his time as teacher, lecturer, and investigator, the excellence not less than the amount of the great naturalist's work is remarkable, and won such admiration that he was made a member of nearly every scientific society in the world. One of his favorite pastimes was deep-sea dredging, which embraced the excitement of finding strange specimens and studying their singular habits.

Of his love and gift for instructing, Mrs. Agassiz says in her 'Life' (Boston, 1885):—

"Teaching was a passion with him, and his power over his pupils might be measured by his own enthusiasm. He was, intellectually as well as socially, a democrat in the best sense. He delighted to scatter broadcast the highest results of thought and research, and to adapt them even to the youngest and most uninformed minds. In his later American travels he would talk of glacial phenomena to the driver of a country stage-coach among the mountains, or to some workman splitting rock at the roadside, with as much earnestness as if he had been discussing problems with a brother geologist; he would take the common fisherman into his scientific confidence, telling him the intimate secrets of fish-culture or fish-embryology, till the man in his turn grew enthusiastic and began to pour out information from the stores of his own rough and untaught habits of observation. Agassiz's general faith in the susceptibility of the popular intelligence, however untaught, to the highest truths of nature, was contagious, and he created or developed that in which he believed."

The following citations exhibit his powers of observation, and that happy method of stating scientific facts which interests the specialist and general reader alike.

THE SILURIAN BEACH

From 'Geological Sketches'

With what interest do we look upon any relic of early human history! The monument that tells of a civilization whose hieroglyphic records we cannot even decipher, the slightest trace of a nation that vanished and left no sign of its life except the rough tools and utensils buried in the old site of its towns or villages, arouses our imagination and excites our curiosity. Men gaze with awe at the inscription on an ancient Egyptian or Assyrian stone; they hold with reverential touch the yellow parchment-roll whose dim, defaced characters record the meagre learning of a buried nationality; and the announcement that for centuries the tropical forests of Central America have hidden within their tangled growth the ruined homes and temples of a past race, stirs the civilized world with a strange, deep wonder.

To me it seems, that to look on the first land that was ever lifted above the wasted waters, to follow the shore where the earliest animals and plants were created when the thought of God first expressed itself in organic forms, to hold in one's hand a bit of stone from an old sea-beach, hardened into rock thousands of centuries ago, and studded with the beings that once crept upon its surface or were stranded there by some retreating wave, is even of deeper interest to men than the relics of their own race, for these things tell more directly of the thoughts and creative acts of God.

The statement that different sets of animals and plants have characterized the successive epochs is often understood as indicating a difference of another kind than that which distinguishes animals now living in different parts of the world. This is a mistake. They are so-called representative types all over the globe, united to each other by structural relations and separated by specific differences of the same kind as those that unite and separate animals of different geological periods. Take, for instance, mud-flats or sandy shores in the same latitudes of Europe and America: we find living on each, animals of the same structural character and of the same general appearance, but with certain specific differences, as of color, size, external appendages, etc. They represent each other on the two continents. The American wolves, foxes, bears, rabbits, are not the same as the European. but those of one continent are as true to their respective types as those of the other; under a somewhat different aspect they represent the same groups of animals. In certain latitudes, or under conditions of nearer proximity, these differences may be less marked. It is well known that there is a great monotony of type, not only among animals and plants but in the human races also, throughout the Arctic regions; and some animals characteristic of the high North reappear under such identical forms in the neighborhood of the snow-fields in lofty mountains, that to trace the difference between the ptarmigans, rabbits, and other gnawing animals of the Alps, for instance, and those of the Arctics, is among the most difficult problems of modern science.