Bulfinch's Mythology: the Age of Fable Part 14

NEPTUNE

Neptune was the chief of the water deities. The symbol of his power was the trident, or spear with three points, with which he used to shatter rocks, to call forth or subdue storms, to shake the sh.o.r.es, and the like. He created the horse, and was the patron of horse races. His own horses had brazen hoofs and golden manes. They drew his chariot over the sea, which became smooth before him, while the monsters of the deep gambolled about his path.

AMPHITRITE

Amphitrite was the wife of Neptune. She was the daughter of Nereus and Doris, and the mother of Triton. Neptune, to pay his court to Amphitrite, came riding on the dolphin. Having won her, he rewarded the dolphin by placing him among the stars.

NEREUS AND DORIS

Nereus and Doris were the parents of the Nereids, the most celebrated of whom were Amphitrite, Thetis, the mother of Achilles, and Galatea, who was loved by the Cyclops Polyphemus. Nereus was distinguished for his knowledge, and his love of truth and justice, and is described as the wise and unerring Old Man of the Sea. The gift of prophecy was also ascribed to him.

TRITON AND PROTEUS

Triton was the son of Neptune and Amphitrite, and the poets make him his father's trumpeter. Proteus was also a son of Neptune. He, like Nereus, is styled a sea-elder for his wisdom and knowledge of future events. His peculiar power was that of changing his shape at will.

THETIS

Thetis, the daughter of Nereus and Doris, was so beautiful that Jupiter himself sought her in marriage; but having learned from Prometheus the t.i.tan, that Thetis should bear a son who should be greater than his father, Jupiter desisted from his suit and decreed that Thetis should be the wife of a mortal. By the aid of Chiron the Centaur, Peleus succeeded in winning the G.o.ddess for his bride, and their son was the renowned Achilles. In our chapter on the Trojan war it will appear that Thetis was a faithful mother to him, aiding him in all difficulties, and watching over his interests from the first to the last.

LEUCOTHEA AND PALAEMON

Ino, the daughter of Cadmus and wife of Athamas, flying from her frantic husband, with her little son Melicertes in her arms, sprang from a cliff into the sea. The G.o.ds, out of compa.s.sion, made her a G.o.ddess of the sea, under the name of Leucothea, and him a G.o.d under that of Palaemon. Both were held powerful to save from s.h.i.+pwreck, and were invoked by sailors. Palaemon was usually represented riding on a dolphin. The Isthmian games were celebrated in his honor. He was called Portumnus by the Romans, and believed to have jurisdiction of the ports and sh.o.r.es.

Milton alludes to all these deities in the song at the conclusion of Comus.

"Sabrina fair, Listen and appear to us, In name of great Ocea.n.u.s; By the earth-shaking Neptune's mace, And Tethys' grave, majestic pace, By h.o.a.ry Nereus' wrinkled look, And the Carpathian wizard's hook (Proteus) By scaly Triton's winding sh.e.l.l, And old soothsaying Glaucus; spell, By Leucothea's lovely hands, And her son who rules the strands, By Thetis' tinsel-slippered feet, And the songs of Sirens sweet."

Armstrong, the poet of the Art of preserving Health, under the inspiration of Hygeia, the G.o.ddess of health, thus celebrates the Naiads. Paeon is a name both of Apollo and Aesculapius.

"Come, ye Naiads! To the fountains lead!

Propitious maids! The task remains to sing Your gifts (so Paeon, so the powers of health Command), to praise your crystal element.

Oh, comfortable streams! With eager lips And trembling hands the languid thirsty quaff New life in you; fresh vigor fills their veins.

No warmer cups the rural ages knew, None warmer sought the sires of humankind; Happy in temperate peace their equal days Felt not the alternate fits of feverish mirth And sick dejection; still serene and pleased, Blessed with divine immunity from ills, Long centuries they lived; their only fate Was ripe old age, and rather sleep than death."

THE CAMENAE

By this name the Latins designated the Muses, but included under it also some other deities, princ.i.p.ally nymphs of fountains. Egeria was one of them, whose fountain and grotto are still shown. It was said that Numa, the second king of Rome, was favored by this nymph with secret interviews, in which she taught him those lessons of wisdom and of law which he embodied in the inst.i.tutions of his rising nation. After the death of Numa the nymph pined away and was changed into a fountain.

Byron, in Childe Harold, Canto IV., thus alludes to Egeria and her grotto:

"Here didst thou dwell in this enchanted cover, Egeria! All thy heavenly bosom beating For the far footsteps of thy mortal lover; The purple midnight veiled that mystic meeting With her most starry canopy."

Tennyson, also, in his Palace of Art, gives us a glimpse of the royal lover expecting the interview.

"Holding one hand against his ear, To list a footfall ere he saw The wood-nymph, stayed the Tuscan king to hear Of wisdom and of law."

THE WINDS

When so many less active agencies were personified, it is not to be supposed that the winds failed to be so. They were Boreas or Aquilo, the north wind, Zephyrus or Favonius, the west, Notus or Auster, the south, and Eurus, the east. The first two have been chiefly celebrated by the poets, the former as the type of rudeness, the latter of gentleness. Boreas loved the nymph Orithyia, and tried to play the lover's part, but met with poor success. It was hard for him to breathe gently, and sighing was out of the question. Weary at last of fruitless endeavors, he acted out his true character, seized the maiden and carried her off. Their children were Zetes and Calais, winged warriors, who accompanied the Argonautic expedition, and did good service in an encounter with those monstrous birds the Harpies.

Zephyrus was the lover of Flora. Milton alludes to them in Paradise Lost, where he describes Adam waking and contemplating Eve still asleep: "He on his side Leaning half raised, with looks of cordial love Hung over her enamored, and beheld Beauty which, whether waking or asleep, Shot forth peculiar graces; then with voice, Mild as when Zephyrus on Flora breathes, Her hand soft touching, whispered thus, 'Awake!

My fairest, my espoused, my latest found, Heaven's last, best gift, my ever-new delight.'"

Dr. Young, the poet of the Night Thoughts, addressing the idle and luxurious, says:

"Ye delicate! Who nothing can support (Yourselves most insupportable), for whom The winter rose must blow, . .

... . And silky soft Favonious breathe still softer or be chid!"

Fortuna is the Latin name for Tyche, the G.o.ddess of Fortune. The wors.h.i.+p of Fortuna held a position of much higher importance at Rome than did the wors.h.i.+p of Tyche among the Greeks. She was regarded at Rome as the G.o.ddess of good fortune only, and was usually represented holding the cornucopia.

Victoria, the Latin form for the G.o.ddess Nike, was highly honored among the conquest-loving Romans, and many temples were dedicated to her at Rome. There was a celebrated temple at Athens to the Greek G.o.ddess Nike Apteros, or Wingless Victory, of which remains still exist.

Chapter XVI

Achelous and Hercules. Admetus and Alcestis. Antigone.

Penelope The river-G.o.d Achelous told the story of Erisichthon to Theseus and his companions, whom he was entertaining at his hospitable board, while they were delayed on their journey by the overflow of his waters. Having finished his story, he added, "But why should I tell of other persons' transformations, when I myself am an instance of the possession of this power. Sometimes I become a serpent, and sometimes a bull, with horns on my head. Or I should say, I once could do so; but now I have but one horn, having lost one." And here he groaned and was silent.

Theseus asked him the cause of his grief, and how he lost his horn. To which question the river-G.o.d replied as follows: "Who likes to tell of his defeats? Yet I will not hesitate to relate mine, comforting myself with the thought of the greatness of my conqueror, for it was Hercules. Perhaps you have heard of the fame of Dejanira, the fairest of maidens, whom a host of suitors strove to win. Hercules and myself were of the number, and the rest yielded to us two. He urged in his behalf his descent from Jove, and his labors by which he had exceeded the exactions of Juno, his step-mother. I, on the other hand, said to the father of the maiden, 'Behold me, the king of the waters that flow through your land. I am no stranger from a foreign sh.o.r.e, but belong to the country, a part of your realm. Let it not stand in my way that royal Juno owes me no enmity, nor punishes me with heavy tasks. As for this man, who boasts himself the son of Jove, it is either a false pretence, or disgraceful to him if true, for it cannot be true except by his mother's shame.' As I said this Hercules scowled upon me, and with difficulty restrained his rage. 'My hand will answer better than my tongue,' said he. 'I yield you the victory in words, but trust my cause to the strife of deeds. With that he advanced towards me, and I was ashamed, after what I had said, to yield. I threw off my green vesture, and presented myself for the struggle. He tried to throw me, now attacking my head, now my body. My bulk was my protection, and he a.s.sailed me in vain. For a time we stopped, then returned to the conflict. We each kept our position, determined not to yield, foot to foot, I bending over him, clinching his hands in mine, with my forehead almost touching his. Thrice Hercules tried to throw me off, and the fourth time he succeeded, brought me to the ground and himself upon my back. I tell you the truth, it was as if a mountain had fallen on me. I struggled to get my arms at liberty, panting and reeking with perspiration. He gave me no chance to recover, but seized my throat. My knees were on the earth and my mouth in the dust.

"Finding that I was no match for him in the warrior's art, I resorted to others, and glided away in the form of a serpent. I curled my body in a coil, and hissed at him with my forked tongue. He smiled scornfully at this, and said, 'It was the labor of my infancy to conquer snakes.' So saying he clasped my neck with his hands. I was almost choked, and struggled to get my neck out of his grasp. Vanquished in this form, I tried what alone remained to me, and a.s.sumed the form of a bull. He grasped my neck with his arm, and, dragging my head down to the ground, overthrew me on the sand. Nor was this enough. His ruthless hand rent my horn from my head. The Naiades took it, consecrated it, and filled it with fragrant flowers. Plenty adopted my horn, and made it her own, and called it Cornucopia.

The ancients were fond of finding a hidden meaning in their mythological tales. They explain this fight of Achelous with Hercules by saying Achelous was a river that in seasons of rain overflowed its banks. When the fable says that Achelous loved Dejanira, and sought a union with her, the meaning is, that the river in its windings flowed through part of Dejanira's kingdom. It was said to take the form of a snake because of its winding, and of a bull because it made a brawling or roaring in its course. When the river swelled, it made itself another channel. Thus its head was horned. Hercules prevented the return of these periodical overflows, by embankments and ca.n.a.ls; and therefore he was said to have vanquished the river-G.o.d and cut off his horn. Finally, the lands formerly subject to overflow, but now redeemed, became very fertile, and this is meant by the horn of plenty.

There is another account of the origin of the Cornucopia. Jupiter at his birth was committed by his mother Rhea to the care of the daughters of Melisseus, a Cretan king. They fed the infant deity with the milk of the goat Amalthea. Jupiter broke off one of the horns of the goat and gave it to his nurses, and endowed it with the wonderful power of becoming filled with whatever the possessor might wish.

The name of Amalthea is also given by some writers to the mother of Bacchus. It is thus used by Milton, Paradise Lost, Book IV.:

"That Nyseian isle, Girt with the river Triton, where old Cham, Whom Gentiles Ammon call, and Libyan Jove, Hid Amalthea and her florid son, Young Bacchus, from his stepdame Rhea's eye."

ADMETUS AND ALCESTIS

Aesculapius, the son of Apollo, was endowed by his father with such skill in the healing art that he even restored the dead to life. At this Pluto took alarm, and prevailed on Jupiter to launch a thunderbolt at Aesculapius. Apollo was indignant at the destruction of his son, and wreaked his vengeance on the innocent workmen who had made the thunderbolt. These were the Cyclopes, who have their workshop under Mount Aetna, from which the smoke and flames of their furnaces are constantly issuing. Apollo shot his arrows at the Cyclopes, which so incensed Jupiter that he condemned him as a punishment to become he servant of a mortal for the s.p.a.ce of one year. Accordingly Apollo went into the service of Admetus, king of Thessaly, and pastured his flocks for him on the verdant banks of the river Amphrysus.

Admetus was a suitor, with others, for the hand of Alcestis, the daughter of Pelias, who promised her to him who should come for her in a chariot drawn by lions and boars. This task Admetus performed by the a.s.sistance of his divine herdsman, and was made happy in the possession of Alcestis. But Admetus fell ill, and being near to death, Apollo prevailed on the Fates to spare him on condition that some one would consent to die in his stead. Admetus, in his joy at this reprieve, thought little of the ransom, and perhaps remembering the declarations of attachment which he had often heard from his courtiers and dependents, fancied that it would be easy to find a subst.i.tute. But it was not so. Brave warriors, who would willingly have perilled their lives for their prince, shrunk from the thought of dying for him on the bed of sickness; and old servants who had experienced his bounty and that of his house from their childhood up, were not willing to lay down the scanty remnant of their days to show their grat.i.tude. Men asked, "Why does not one of his parents do it? They cannot in the course of nature live much longer, and who can feel like them the call to rescue the life they gave from an untimely end?" But the parents, distressed though they were at the thought of losing him, shrunk from the call. Then Alcestis, with a generous self-devotion, proffered herself as the subst.i.tute. Admetus, fond as he was of life, would not have submitted to receive it at such a cost; but there was no remedy. The condition imposed by the Fates had been met, and the decree was irrevocable. Alcestis sickened as Admetus revived, and she was rapidly sinking to the grave.

Just at this time Hercules arrived at the palace of Admetus, and found all the inmates in great distress for the impending loss of the devoted wife and beloved mistress. Hercules, to whom no labor was too arduous, resolved to attempt her rescue. He went and lay in wait at the door of the chamber of the dying queen, and when Death came for his prey, he seized him and forced him to resign his victim. Alcestis recovered, and was restored to her husband.

Milton alludes to the story of Alcestis in his Sonnet on his deceased wife.

"Methought I saw my late espoused saint, Brought to me like Alcestis from the grave, Whom Jove's great son to her glad husband gave, Rescued from death by force, though pale and faint."

James Russell Lowell has chosen the "Shepherd of King Admetus" for the subject of a short poem. He makes that event the first introduction of poetry to men.

"Men called him but a s.h.i.+ftless youth, In whom no good they saw, And yet unwittingly, in truth, They made his careless words their law.

And day by day more holy grew Each spot where he had trod, Till after poets only knew Their first-born brother was a G.o.d."

In The Love of Alcestis, one of the poems in The Earthly Paradise, Mr. Morris thus tells the story of the taming of the lions:

"-- Rising up no more delay he made, But took the staff and gained the palace-door Where stood the beasts, whose mingled whine and roar Had wrought his dream; there two and two they stood, Thinking, it might be, of the tangled wood, And all the joys of the food-hiding trees.

But harmless as their painted images 'Neath some dread spell; then, leaping up, he took The reins in hand and the bossed leather shook, And no delay the conquered beasts durst make, But drew, not silent; and folk just awake, When he went by as though a G.o.d they saw, Fell on their knees, and maidens come to draw Fresh water from the fount, sank trembling down, And silence held the babbling, wakened town."

ANTIGONE

The poems and histories of legendary Greece often relate, as has been seen, to women and their lives. Antigone was as bright an example of filial and sisterly fidelity as was Alcestis of connubial devotion. She was the daughter of OEdipus and Jocasta, who, with all their descendants, were the victims of an unrelenting fate, dooming them to destruction. OEdipus in his madness had torn out his eyes, and was driven forth from his kingdom Thebes, dreaded and abandoned by all men, as an object of divine vengeance. Antigone, his daughter, alone shared his wanderings, and remained with him till he died, and then returned to Thebes.