ORIGINAL VERSES.

HOW THE TWINS PAID THEIR

РОЕТ.

Literary World, June 1851.

PRINCE Scopas the Thessalian
Is holding festival,

And subject guests and stranger guests
Throng endlessly his hall.

His coursers in the chariot-race

Have gained the victory.

Great Creon's son the prize hath won;
A happy man is he!

Break out in jocund shout and song!
Let all the world be gay!

For Scopas of a noble line

Holds noble feast to-day!

The odor of the banquet

Is scented miles about;

The plumage of the slaughtered birds
Has paved the street without;*

The cement of the oldest jars

Is loosened to supply

The wine that cheers the drooping heart,

And lifts the spirits high;

No fish that swims in sea or stream

But helps to grace the board.

The King can show no richer cheer,
Rich Persia's potent lord.

There is many a famous jester
To aid the mirth to-day,
And many a ready piping-girl

Who Lydian airs can play,

*Fish and game were the staples of an aesthetic Greek banquet, and it was customary to scatter the feathers of all the birds killed before the door, in ostentation of the good things within.

Vol. II.

1

And many a wondrous dancer
Whose feet in endless maze,
Gliding through labyrinthine steps,
Elude the keenest gaze,
And who in witching pantomime
Can every legend show,
And type the love of Gods above
To mortals here below.
The lovely Ariadne now

Shall her presentment find,
And draw another Bacchus down
To mix with human kind.

The four victorious coursers
Are led in triumph round;
Their headbands are all golden,
Their manes with ribands bound.
Four coursers they of snowy white,
And sprung (so poets told)

From those famed horses Harpy-born,
Achilles drove of old;

And had they uttered mortal speech,
As Xanthus did of yore,
The crowd had scarcely marvelled,
Or scarce revered them more.

But what are feasts and horses,
And dancing-girls and wine,
To the poet loved of gods and men,
The stranger-bard divine?
On him fix every ear and eye,

The lord of lyric lay,

Who comes to crown the festival

With glorious song to-day.

His stately limbs are richly clad

In purple and in gold;

His robe is flowing to his feet

In many a graceful fold.

His head with fragrant garlands twined,

His long locks floating free,

He stands amid the list'ning guests,

A goodly sight to see!

E'en such his garb and ornament

As once Arion wore

Whom from the wave a fish did save,

And home to Corinth bore.

But he is with no savage crew,

No peril hath to fear;

For in his patron's hall he stands,
And none but friends are near.

Simonides the Coan!

His fingers touch the string,
His flashing eyes are lifted up
As he begins to sing.

"I will not waste my life," he sang,
"A perfect man to seek*
Upon this earth wide-habited,
Who but is sometimes weak?
Th' immortal gods have this alone,
To live from censure free.

Men are the sport of circumstance,
And blameless cannot be,
Enough for me the man to find
Whose soul abhors the vile;
Who, honoring the gods above,
Doth on their poets smile.
So shall he leave a good report
E'en when to Hades gone,
Nor mourn unhonored and unsung
By chilly Acheron."+

And next he sang of Scopas' might,
His old and glorious race,
And his stormy-footed coursers
Of unconquerable pace.

There is many a prince of Thessaly
That owns high-stepping steeds,
There is many a wealthy foreigner
That in the course succeeds;
But vain were all their efforts,
And humbled all their pride,

See Plato's Protagoras, where the prelude of Simonides's ode is given. It appears probable that Scopas did not bear the best of characters, and the poet could not have praised him for his virtues without gross hypocrisy.

See Theocritus, Idyl xvi.

When Scopas, son of Creon,

In the race his fortune tried.
The snowy coursers to the goal
Devoured th' astonished way,
And shrank in shame the rival house,
The proud Aleuada!

For this be thanks to Castor due,

Who all unseen was there,

And touched their feet with strength divine, The prize away to bear.

His theme inspired the singer then,

And in a louder strain

He praised the Dioscuri,

The Dorian brothers twain.

Castor, who first taught mortals

To guide the steed aright,

And his brother, Polydeuces,
Aye best in fistic fight.

How young they went a-field to hunt
The Calydonian boar,

And in the good ship Argo tried

The dragon-haunted shore.

And how they checked huge Amycus,
And hushed his foul abuse;
And how upon those warriors bold,
The sons of Aphareus -
On Lynceus and stout Idas
They like a tempest fell,

And bore away their brides so gay,
And took their lives as well.
And how, in starry semblance

On springing masts they light,

And save the praying mariners
When seas with foam are white;
And how they watch the traveller,
Alone, or in the throng,
And punish the unholy host

That does the stranger wrong;
And where a loyal worshipper
In risk and strife they see, ́
Or racing steed, or fighting chief,
The yguide to victory.

Then all would give the singer
Applause and honor meet;

But the Prince looked cold and gloomy,
He was chafed in his conceit.
And will he grudge a largess rare
To a bard of rarest fame?
Whose poet-praise to after days
Shall waft his patron's name.
He breaketh out in bitter jest
"Methinks it doth belong

To those to pay who bear away
The honors of the song:
For every word I had therein,
The Twins have still their three;
Simonides has sung the Twins,
The Twins may pay his fee."

-

The singer answered nothing;
He moved not in his place;
There stirred no wrinkle of his robe,
No muscle of his face.

Till a slave has touched his shoulder

"There are two young men that wait,

And ask to see the Coan bard,

Beyond the outer gate:

Two youths of goodly bearing
Alike in form and face;

In garments white, with foreheads bright,
Like men of godlike race.

Like Dorians wear they flowing hair;

Their speech thereto agrees;

And now, beyond the outer gate,

They seek Simonides."

Then slowly turned the singer,
And slowly stepped away:
The revellers resumed their cups;
But little heeded they.

Their only care the present good,
Their law their host's behest;
They jeered the unrewarded bard,
And praised the scurvy jest.
And now he stands without the gate,
But no young men are there;