Hermes. By heaven, rather, probably, of an intrigue of goats for how could you be mine, with your horns, and such a snub nose, and shaggy beard, and cloven feet, and goatish legs, and tail upon your rump?

Pan. Whatever sneers you aim at me, it is your own son you render an object of reproach, my dear father, but yourself still more, for begetting and making such offspring. I am innocent of it all.

Hermes. And whom do you call your mother? Have I perchance had an intrigue with a goat without knowing it?

Pan. You have not committed adultery with a goat: but recollect yourself, if you have never offered violence to a girl of gentle birth in Arcadia. Why do you bite your thumb to find an answer, and remain in doubt so long? I allude to Penelope, the daughter of Ikarius.1

Hermes. Then under what circumstances did she bring you into the world, resembling a goat instead of myself?

Pan. I will give you her very own story. Well, when she despatched me to Arcadia, "My child," said she, "I am your mother, Penelope, of Sparta, and know you have a God, Hermes, the son of Maia and Zeus, for your father. And if you wear horns, and have the legs of a goat, let not that circumstance distress you; for, when your father visited me, he gave himself the form of a he-goat, to avoid notice, and for that reason you have turned out very like that animal.

Hermes. In truth, I remember to have done something of the kind. Shall I, however, who pride myself so greatly on my good looks, and am still without a beard, have the reputation of being your father, and incur ridicule at the hands of all on account of my lovely offspring?

Pan. Yet I shall not disgrace you, father, for I am a musician, and play the pipe with remarkable sweetness; and Bacchus can do nothing without me, but has made me his companion and thyrsus-bearer for himself, and I lead the dance for him. And if you could see my flocks too, what a large number I possess in the neighbourhood of Tegea

1 King of Sparta. See Hyginus, ccxxiv. The later authorities, deviating from the Homeric epos, represent the wife of Odysseus as by no means the paragon of immaculateness of the earlier tradition. Some allege magic.

and all over Parthenius,1 you would be greatly delighted. And I rule over all Arcadia; and, but lately, having fought on the side of the Athenians, I distinguished myself so much at Marathon, that even a prize of valour was awarded me, the cave under the Acropolis. In fact, if you go to Athens, you will know how great is the name of Pan there.

2

Hermes. But tell me, have you already married, Pan ?— for that, I believe, is what they call you.

Pan. Certainly not, father; for I am of an amorous turn, and could never be content to live with one wife. Hermes. Then, no doubt, you make love to your shegoats.

3

Pan. You are indulging in sarcasm. I keep company with Echo and with Pitys, and with all the Mænads of Bacchus, and am made much of by them.

Hermes. Do you know, however, how you could gratify me, my dear son, who ask a favour of you for the first time? Pan. Lay your commands upon me, father, and let us know them.

Hermes. Come to me, then, and affectionately embrace me: but see that you don't call me father, at least in the hearing of anybody else.

XXIII.

APOLLO REMARKS TO BACCHUS ON THE HETEROGENEOUSNESS OF APHRODITE'S CHILDREN; WHILE BACCHUS EXPOSES THE CHARACTER OF PRIAPUS.

Apollo and Dionysus.

Apollo. What should we say that Eros, Hermaphroditus, and Priapus are brothers by the same mother, very unlike

4

1 Tegea, a town of Arcadia; Parthenius, a border-mountain of Arcadia and Argolis, some 4,000 feet in height. Arcadia was the home and especial haunt of the Shepherd divinity. Herod. vi. 105.

2 Cf. Pausanias, i. 32.

3 For the Story of Echo see Ov. Metam. iii. 6. Pitys, one of the many Nymphs loved by Pan, had been metamorphosed into a Pine-tree. 4 Eros claimed as his parents Aphrodite and Ares, or, according to some authorities, Zeus or Hermes; Hermaphroditus, as his name im

though they are in external form, and in their pursuits? For the one is altogether handsome, and an archer, and, invested with no small amount of power, rules over all; while the second is womanish, and only half a man, and of ambiguous appearance-you could not plainly distinguish whether he is a young man1 or a virgin. As for the third, he is masculine beyond the bounds of all decency-Priapus, I mean.

Dionysus. There is nothing to be surprised at, Apollo; for Aphrodite is not the cause of it, but the different fathers. Often, in fact, where the children are by the same father, of the same mother, they are, like yourselves, the one a male, the other a female.

Apollo. Yes, but we are alike, and follow the same pursuits—for we are archers, both of us.

Dionysus. As far as the bow is concerned, your occupation is the same, Apollo: but those other things are not exactly similar-that Artemis murders strangers among the Scythians, and you act the prophet, and set up for a doctor.

Apollo. Why, do you imagine that my sister is happy with the Scythians, seeing she is quite prepared, if any Greek should ever happen to touch at the Tauric peninsula, to sail away with him, loathing her sacrificial butchery ?2

Dionysus. And she does well to do so. As for Priapus, however for I will tell you something highly ridiculousbeing lately at Lampsacus, I was travelling by the city,

ports, Hermes and Aphrodite; Priapus, Aphrodite and Dionysus. Priapus, the personification of natural fertility, was, as regards his character and worship, like so many other divinities in the Hellenic theology, a strange amalgam of Eastern and Western fancy. He was pre-eminent by his ugliness as well as obscenity. As frequently represented in Art, Hermaphroditus was half male, half female. Diodorus, iv. 1.

1

See

"Epnßos. The ephebus was the Athenian youth who had reached the age of eighteen, when he was enrolled on the public Register as a citizen: although he did not acquire the full rights of citizenship until the age of twenty. Before taking his place among the ephebi, he underwent strict scrutiny and was initiated by public ceremonies of a martial character, analogously to the prevalent custom in barbarous countries at this day.

2 See the 'Ipiyevɛia év Tavp. of Euripides and the Iphigeneia of Göthe. Cf. e. A. xvi.

and he received me hospitably, and gave me lodgings in his house. When we had retired to rest, after having sufficiently moistened ourselves at the dinner, somewhere about midnight my excellent host got up—but I blush to tell you. Apollo. Did he make an attempt on your virtue, Dionysus ? Dionysus. Something of the sort.

Apollo. And you, what did you do thereupon ?
Dionysus. Why, what else but laugh?

Apollo. Well done! that was acting in no unkind or uncivil manner. He was to be excused, indeed, considering his attempt was directed against so good-looking a personage as yourself.

Dionysus. For that same reason, my dear Apollo, he might direct his attention to you, too; for you are a goodlooking youth, and adorned with long flowing tresses, so that Priapus might well attempt your virtue even in his sober moments.

Apollo. He will not do so, however, Dionysus; for, with my flowing hair, I have my bows and arrows, also.

XXIV.

HERMES COMPLAINS TO HIS MOTHER OF THE MULTIPLICITY OF HIS EMPLOYMENTS.

Hermes and Maia.

Hermes. (crying). Why, mother, is any God in Heaven more thoroughly wretched than I?

am

Maia. Pray, don't talk in that way, my dear Hermes. Hermes. Why should not I talk so, who have such a number of duties to attend to; toiling as I do all alone, and distracted to so many services? For, as soon as I up at daybreak, I have to sweep out our banqueting-hall, and after carefully arranging the couches,' and putting each particular thing in order, I have to take my place at the side of Zeus, and carry about in all directions the messages I receive from him, running up and down the

1 Tv Koiav. The reclining-couch, on which the guests took their places at the triclinium. Hemsterhuis and the older editors read EKKλσlav," the Council-Chamber."

3

whole day like a courier.1 And, as soon as I have returned up here again, while still covered with dust, I must hand him the ambrosia. Before, too, this lately-purchased cupbearer 2 arrived, it was my business to pour in the nectar, also. But, what is most dreadful of all, is, that I alone of all the Gods, get no sleep even at night: but I must needs, also, be then conducting souls to Pluto, and acting as marshal of dead men, and dance attendance in his Court of Justice. For my employments by day are not enoughto take my place in the Palæstra, and even to act as herald in the representative assemblies, and to train orators-but, parcelled out as I am already, for all these services, I must, also, take part in the affairs of the dead. And yet the sons of Leda take their places, each in turn, every other day in Heaven and in Hades: but I must perforce, be about my duties here and there. The sons of Alkmena and Semele," too, born of wretched women, though they be, feast without care; whereas I, the son of Maia, the daughter of Atlas, wait upon them. And now, having but just come from Sidon, from the daughter of Kadmus, to whom he has sent me to see what the girl is about; and, before even I have had time to get my breath, he packs me off again to Argos to look after Danae. "Then go from thence," says he, "into Boeotia, and have a look at Antiope by the way."

4

6

1 'Нμεрodpoμovvτа. The nuɛpodpoμoí (" day-runners") were an important class of State employés in the Hellenic cities. Extraordinary feats of speed and powers of endurance have been recorded of many of them. Ingens die uno cursu emetiens spatium, is the observation of Livy (An. xxxi. 24).

2 Ganymedes. Said to have been vɛwvŋrov, because Zeus had compounded with Tros, the Phrygian king, for the rape of his son, by a present of horses.

3

Ψυχαγωγός and νεκροπομπός. One of the most important, if least agreeable, of the multiform offices of the son of Maia. For the most memorable occasion on which he filled this arduous post see 'Od. xxiv., where he conducts to Hades the reluctant souls of the wicked suitors of

Penelope. Cf. Æn. iv. 242. Hor. Car. i. 10. Hermes figures especially in this character in the Dialogues. See, particularly, Xápwv.

↑ Kastor and Polydeukes. See Apollod. iii. 11.

5 Heraklês and Bacchus.

6 It has been pointed out that Lucian has here made a slip. Europa was the daughter of Agenor, and the sister of Kadmus.

7 One of the numerous mortal paramours of Zeus. See Apollod. iii. 5.