A Book of Myths
flight, and dare him to race for a wager from the AEgean Sea to where
the sun-god's horses took their nightly rest by the trackless seas of
the unknown West.
In terror his father watched him, and as he called to him in a voice
of anguished warning that was drowned by the whistling rush of the air
currents through the wings of Icarus and the moist whisper of the
clouds as through them he cleft a way for himself, there befell the
dreaded thing. It seemed as though the strong wings had begun to lose
their power. Like a wounded bird Icarus fluttered, lunged sidewise
from the straight, clean line of his flight, recovered himself, and
fluttered again. And then, like the bird into whose soft breast the
sure hand of a mighty archer has driven an arrow, downwards he fell,
turning over and yet turning again, downwards, ever downwards, until
he fell with a plunge into the sea that still was radiant in shining
emerald and translucent blue.
Then did the car of Apollo drive on. His rays had slain one who was
too greatly daring, and now they fondled the little white feathers
that had fallen from the broken wings and floated on the water like
the petals of a torn flower.
On the dead, still face of Icarus they shone, and they spangled as if
with diamonds the wet plumage that still, widespread, bore him up on
the waves.
Stricken at heart was Daedalus, but there was no time to lament his
son's untimely end, for even now the black-prowed ships of Minos might
be in pursuit. Onward he flew to safety, and in Sicily built a temple
to Apollo, and there hung up his wings as a propitiatory offering to
the god who had slain his son.
And when grey night came down on that part of the sea that bears the
name of Icarus to this day, still there floated the body of the boy
whose dreams had come true. For only a little while had he known the
exquisite realisation of dreamed-of potentialities, for only a few
hours tasted the sweetness of perfect pleasure, and then, by an
over-daring flight, had lost it all for ever.
The sorrowing Nereids sang a dirge over him as he was swayed gently
hither and thither by the tide, and when the silver stars came out
from the dark firmament of heaven and were reflected in the blackness
of the sea at night, it was as though a velvet pall, silver-decked in
his honour, was spread around the slim white body with its
outstretched snowy wings.
So much had he dared--so little accomplished.
Is it not the oft-told tale of those who have followed Icarus? Yet who
can say that gallant youth has lived in vain when, as Icarus did, he
has breasted the very skies, has flown with fearless heart and soul to
the provinces of the deathless gods?--when, even for the space of a
few of the heart-beats of Time, he has tasted supreme power--the
ecstasy of illimitable happiness?
CLYTIE
The sunbeams are basking on the high walls of the old garden--smiling
on the fruit that grows red and golden in their warmth. The bees are
humming round the bed of purple heliotrope, and drowsily murmuring in
the shelter of the soft petals of the blush roses whose sweetness
brings back the fragrance of days that are gone. On the old grey
sundial the white-winged pigeons sleepily croon as they preen their
snowy plumage, and the Madonna lilies hang their heads like a
procession of white-robed nuns who dare not look up from telling their
beads until the triumphal procession of an all-conquering warrior has
gone by. What can they think of that long line of tall yellow flowers
by the garden wall, who turn their faces sunwards with an arrogant
assurance, and give stare for stare to golden-haired Apollo as he
drives his blazing car triumphant through the high heavens?
"Sunflowers" is the name by which we know those flamboyant blossoms
which somehow fail so wholly to suggest the story of Clytie, the nymph
whose destruction came from a faithful, unrequited love. She was a
water-nymph, a timid, gentle being who frequented lonely streams, and
bathed where the blue dragon-flies dart across the white water-lilies
in pellucid lakes. In the shade of the tall poplar trees and the
silvery willows she took her midday rest, and feared the hours when
the flowers drooped their heads and the rippling water lost its
coolness before the fierce glare of the sun.
But there came a day when, into the dark pool by which she sat, Apollo
the Conqueror looked down and mirrored his face. And nevermore did she
hide from the golden-haired god who, from the moment when she had seen
in the water the picture of his radiant beauty, became the lord and
master of her heart and soul. All night she awaited his coming, and
the Dawn saw her looking eastward for the first golden gleams from the
wheels of his chariot. All day she followed him with her longing gaze,
nor did she ever cease to feast her eyes upon his beauty until the
last reflection of his radiance had faded from the western sky.
Such devotion might have touched the heart of the sun-god, but he had
no wish to own a love for which he had not sought. The nymph's
adoration irked him, nor did pity come as Love's pale substitute when
he marked how, day by day, her face grew whiter and more white, and
her lovely form wasted away. For nine days, without food or drink, she
kept her shamed vigil. Only one word of love did she crave. Unexacting
in the humility of her devotion, she would gratefully have nourished
her hungry heart upon one kindly glance. But Apollo, full of scorn and
anger, lashed up his fiery steeds as he each day drove past her, nor
deigned for her a glance more gentle than that which he threw on the
satyrs as they hid in the dense green foliage of the shadowy woods.
Half-mocking, Diana said, "In truth the fair nymph who throws her
heart's treasures at the feet of my golden-locked brother that he may
trample on them, is coming to look like a faded flower!" And, as she
spoke, the hearts of the other immortal dwellers in Olympus were
stirred with pity.
"A flower she shall be!" they said, "and for all time shall she live,
in life that is renewed each year when the earth stirs with the
quickening of spring. The long summer days shall she spend forever in
fearless worship of the god of her love!"
And, as they willed, the nymph passed out of her human form, and took
the form of a flower, and evermore--the emblem of constancy--does she
gaze with fearless ardour on the face of her love.
"The heart that has truly loved never forgets,
But as truly loves on to the close;
As the sunflower turns on her god when he sets
The same look that she turned when he rose."
Some there are who say that not into the bold-faced sunflower did her
metamorphosis take place, but into that purple heliotrope that gives
an exquisite offering of fragrance to the sun-god when his warm rays
touch it. And in the old walled garden, while the bees drowsily hum,
and the white pigeons croon, and the dashing sunflower gives Apollo
gaze for gaze, and the scent of the mignonette mingles with that of
clove pinks and blush roses, the fragrance of the heliotrope is, above
all, worthy incense to be offered upon his altar by the devout lover
of a god.
THE CRANES OF IBYCUS
"For murder, though it have no tongue, will speak
With most miraculous organ."
Shakespeare.
Ibycus, the poet friend of Apollo, was a happy man as he journeyed on
foot through the country where the wild flowers grew thick and the
trees were laden with blossom towards the city of Corinth. His tuneful
voice sang snatches of song of his own making, and ever and again he
would try how his words and music sounded on his lyre. He was light of
heart, because ever had he thought of good, and not evil, and had
always sung only of great and noble deeds and of those things that
helped his fellow-men. And now he went to Corinth for the great
chariot-races, and for the great contest of musicians where every true
poet and musician in Greece was sure to be found.
It was the time of the return to earth of Adonis and of Proserpine,
and as he was reverently about to enter the sacred grove of Poseidon,
where the trees grew thick, and saw, crowning the height before him,
the glittering towers of Corinth, he heard, overhead, the harsh cries
of some other returned exiles. Ibycus smiled, as he looked up and
beheld the great flock of grey birds, with their long legs and strong,
outstretched wings, come back from their winter sojourn on the golden
sands of Egypt, to dance and beck and bow to each other by the marshes
of his homeland.
"Welcome back, little brothers!" he cried. "May you and I both meet
with naught but kindness from the people of this land!"
And when the cranes again harshly cried, as if in answer to his
greeting, the poet walked gaily on, further into the shadow of that
dark wood out of which he was never to pass as living man. Joyous, and
fearing no evil, he had been struck and cast to the ground by cruel
and murderous hands ere ever he knew that two robbers were hidden in a
narrow pass where the brushwood grew thick. With all his strength he
fought, but his arms were those of a musician and not of a warrior,
and very soon he was overpowered by those who assailed him. He cried
in vain to gods and to men for help, and in his final agony he heard
once more the harsh voices of the migratory birds and the rush of
their speeding wings. From the ground, where he bled to death, he
looked up to them.
"Take up my cause, dear cranes!" he said, "since no voice but yours
answers my cry!"
And the cranes screamed hoarsely and mournfully as if in farewell, as
they flapped their way towards Corinth and left the poet lying dead.
When his body was found, robbed and terribly wounded, from all over
Greece, where he was known and loved, there uprose a great clamour of
lamentation.
"Is it thus I find you restored to me?" said he who had expected him
in Corinth as his honoured guest; "I who hoped to place the victor's
laurels on your head when you triumphed in the temple of song!"
And all those whom the loving personality of Ibycus and the charm of
his music had made his friends were alert and eager to avenge so foul
a murder. But none knew how the wicked deed had come to pass--none,
save the cranes.
Then came the day to which Ibycus had looked forward with such joy,
when thousands upon thousands of his countrymen sat in the theatre at
Cyprus and watched a play that stirred their hearts within them.
The theatre had for roof the blue vault of heaven; the sun served for
footlights and for the lights above the heads of those who acted. The
three Furies--the Eumenides--with their hard and cruel faces and snaky
locks, and with blood dripping from their eyes, were represented by
actors so great that the hearts of their beholders trembled within
them. In their dread hands lay the punishment of murder, of
inhospitality, of ingratitude, and of all the cruellest and basest of
crimes. Theirs was the duty of hurrying the doomed spirits entrusted
to their merciless care over the Phlegethon, the river of fire that
flows round Hades, and through the brazen gates that led to Torment,
and their robes were robes worn
"With all the pomp of horror, dy'd in gore."
Virgil.
In solemn cadence, while the thousands of beholders watched and
listened enthralled, the Furies walked round the theatre and sang
their song of terror:
"Woe! woe! to him whose hands are soiled with blood! The darkness
shall not hide him, nor shall his dread secret lie hidden even in the
bowels of the earth! He shall not seek by flight to escape us, for
vengeance is ours, and swifter than a hawk that strikes its quarry
shall we strike. Unwearying we pursue, nor are our swift feet and our