Part 14 (2/2)
Nature resists, and suffers her not to begin; but what {Nature} does permit, that she is ready for; to await his voice, to which to return her own words.
By chance, the youth, being separated from the trusty company of his attendants, cries out, ”Is there any one here?” and Echo answers ”Here!”
He is amazed; and when he has cast his eyes on every side, he cries out with a loud voice, ”Come!” {Whereon} she calls {the youth} who calls. He looks back; and again, as no one comes, he says, ”Why dost thou avoid me?” and just as many words as he spoke, he receives. He persists; and being deceived by the imitation of an alternate voice, he says, ”Let us come together here;” and Echo, that could never more willingly answer any sound whatever, replies, ”Let us come together here!” and she follows up her own words, and rus.h.i.+ng from the woods,[73] is going to throw her arms around the neck she has {so} longed for. He flies; and as he flies, he exclaims, ”Remove thy hands from thus embracing me; I will die first, before thou shalt have the enjoyment of me.” She answers nothing but ”Have the enjoyment of me.” {Thus} rejected, she lies hid in the woods, and hides her blus.h.i.+ng face with green leaves, and from that time lives in lonely caves; but yet her love remains, and increases from the mortification of her refusal. Watchful cares waste away her miserable body; leanness shrivels her skin, and all the juices of her body fly off in air. Her voice and her bones alone are left.
Her voice {still} continues, {but} they say that her bones received the form of stones. Since then, she lies concealed in the woods, and is never seen on the mountains: {but} is heard in all {of them}. It is her voice {alone} which remains alive in her.
[Footnote 67: _Aonia._--Ver. 339. Aonia was a mountainous district of Botia, so called from Aon, the son of Neptune, who reigned there. The name is often used to signify the whole of Botia.]
[Footnote 68: _Liriope._--Ver. 342. She was the daughter of Ocea.n.u.s and Tethys, and was the mother of the youth Narcissus, by the river Cephisus. Her name is derived from the Greek ?e?????, 'a lily.']
[Footnote 69: _Many a youth._--Ver. 353. Clarke translates 'multi juvenes,' 'many young fellows.']
[Footnote 70: _Used to detain._--Ver. 364. Clarke translates 'Illa Deam longo prudens sermone tenebat Dum fugerent Nymphae,' 'She designedly detained the G.o.ddess with some long-winded discourse or other till the Nymphs ran away.' He translates 'garrula,' in line 360, 'the prattling hussy.']
[Footnote 71: _Narcissus._--Ver. 370. This name is from the Greek word ?a????, 'to fade away,' which was characteristic of the youth's career, and of the duration of the flower.]
[Footnote 72: _Sulphur spread around._--Ver. 372. These lines show, that it was the custom of the ancients to place sulphur on the ends of their torches, to make them ignite the more readily, in the same manner as the matches of the present day are tipped with that mineral.]
[Footnote 73: _Rus.h.i.+ng from the woods._--Ver. 388. 'Egressaque sylvis.' Clarke renders, 'and bouncing out of the wood.']
EXPLANATION.
It appears much more reasonable to attempt the explanation of this story on the grounds of natural philosophy than of history. The poets, in their fondness for basing every subject upon fiction, probably invented the fable, to explain what to them appeared an extraordinary phenomenon. By way of embellis.h.i.+ng their story, they tell us that Echo was the daughter of the Air and the Tongue, and that the G.o.d Pan fell in love with her; by which, probably, the simple fact is meant, that some person, represented under the name of that G.o.d, endeavored to trace the cause of this phenomenon.
If, however, we should endeavor to base the story upon purely historical grounds, we may suppose that it took its rise from some Nymph, who wandered so far into the woods as to be unable to find her way out again; and from the fact that those who went to seek her, hearing nothing but the echo of their own voices, brought back the strange but unsatisfactory intelligence that the Nymph had been changed into a voice.
FABLE VII. [III.402-510]
Narcissus falls in love with his own shadow, which he sees in a fountain; and, pining to death, the G.o.ds change him into a flower, which still bears his name.
Thus had he deceived her, thus, too, other Nymphs that sprung from the water or the mountains, thus the throng of youths before {them}.
Some one, therefore, who had been despised {by him}, lifting up his hands towards heaven, said, ”Thus, though he should love, let him not enjoy what he loves!” Rhamnusia[74] a.s.sented to a prayer so reasonable.
There was a clear spring, like silver, with its unsullied waters, which neither shepherds, nor she-goats feeding on the mountains, nor any other cattle, had touched; which neither bird nor wild beast had disturbed, nor bough falling from a tree. There was gra.s.s around it, which the neighboring water nourished, and a wood, that suffered the stream to become warm with no {rays of the} sun. Here the youth, fatigued both with the labor of hunting and the heat, lay down, attracted by the appearance of the spot, and the spring; and, while he was endeavoring to quench his thirst, another thirst grew {upon him}.
While he is drinking, being attracted with the reflection of his own form, seen {in the water}, he falls in love with a thing that has no substance; {and} he thinks that to be a body, which is {but} a shadow.
He is astonished at himself, and remains unmoved with the same countenance, like a statue formed of Parian marble.[75] Lying on the ground, he gazes on his eyes {like} two stars, and fingers worthy of Bacchus, and hair worthy of Apollo, and his youthful cheeks and ivory neck, and the comeliness of his mouth, and his blus.h.i.+ng complexion mingled with the whiteness of snow; and everything he admires, for which he himself is worthy to be admired. In his ignorance, he covets himself; and he that approves, is himself {the thing} approved. While he pursues he is pursued, and at the same moment he inflames and burns. How often does he give vain kisses to the deceitful spring; how often does he thrust his arms, catching at the neck he sees, into the middle of the water, and yet he does not catch himself in them. He knows not what he sees, but what he sees, by it is he inflamed; and the same mistake that deceives his eyes, provokes them. Why, credulous {youth}, dost thou vainly catch at the flying image? What thou art seeking is nowhere; what thou art in love with, turn but away {and} thou shalt lose it; what thou seest, the same is {but} the shadow of a reflected form; it has nothing of its own. It comes and stays with thee; with thee it will depart, if thou canst {but} depart thence.
No regard for food,[76] no regard for repose, can draw him away thence; but, lying along upon the overshadowed gra.s.s, he gazes upon the fallacious image with unsatiated eyes, and by his own sight he himself is undone. Raising himself a little {while}, extending his arms to the woods that stand around him, he says, ”Was ever, O, ye woods! any one more fatally in love? For {this} ye know, and have been a convenient shelter for many a one. And do you remember any one, who {ever} thus pined away, during so long a time, though so many ages of your life has been spent? It both pleases me and I see it; but what I see, and what pleases me, yet I cannot obtain; so great a mistake possesses one in love; and to make me grieve the more, neither a vast sea separates us, nor a {long} way, nor mountains, nor a city with its gates closed; we are kept asunder by a little water. He himself wishes to be embraced; for as often as I extend my lips to the limpid stream, so often does he struggle towards me with his face held up; you would think he might be touched. It is a very little that stands in the way of lovers. Whoever thou art, come up hither. Why, {dear} boy, the choice one, dost thou deceive me? or whither dost thou retire, when pursued? Surely, neither my form nor my age is such as thou shouldst shun; the Nymphs, too, have courted me. Thou encouragest I know not what hopes in me with that friendly look, and when I extend my arms to thee, thou willingly extendest thine; when I smile, thou smilest in return; often, too, have I observed thy tears, when I was weeping; my signs, too, thou returnest by thy nods, and, as I guess by the motion of thy beauteous mouth, thou returnest words that come not to my ears. In thee 'tis I, I {now} perceive; nor does my form deceive me. I burn with the love of myself, and both raise the flames and endure them. What shall I do? Should I be entreated, or should I entreat? What, then, shall I entreat? What I desire is in my power; plenty has made me poor. Oh! would that I could depart from my own body! a new wish, {indeed}, in a lover; I could wish that what I am in love with was away. And now grief is taking away my strength, and no long period of my life remains; and in my early days am I cut off; nor is death grievous to me, now about to get rid of my sorrows by death. I wish that he who is beloved could enjoy a longer life. Now we two, of one mind, shall die in {the extinction of} one life.”
{Thus} he said, and, with his mind {but} ill at ease, he returned to the same reflection, and disturbed the water with his tears; and the form was rendered defaced by the moving of the stream; when he saw it {beginning} to disappear, he cried aloud, ”Whither dost thou fly? Stay, I beseech thee! and do not in thy cruelty abandon thy lover; let it be allowed me to behold that which I may not touch, and to give nourishment to my wretched frenzy.” And, while he was grieving, he tore his garment from the upper border, and beat his naked breast with his palms, white as marble. His breast, when struck, received a little redness, no otherwise than as apples are wont, which are partly white {and} partly red; or as a grape, not yet ripe, in the parti-colored cl.u.s.ters, is wont to a.s.sume a purple tint. Soon as he beheld this again in the water, when clear, he could not endure it any longer; but, as yellow wax with the fire, or the h.o.a.r frost of the morning, is wont to waste away with the warmth of the sun, so he, consumed by love, pined away, and wasted by degrees with a hidden flame. And now, no longer was his complexion of white mixed with red; neither his vigor nor his strength, nor {the points} which had charmed when seen so lately, nor {even} his body, which formerly Echo had been in love with, now remained. Yet, when she saw these things, although angry, and mindful {of his usage of her}, she was grieved, and, as often as the unhappy youth said, ”Alas!” she repeated, ”Alas!” with re-echoing voice; and when he struck his arms with his hands, she, too, returned the like sound of a blow.
His last accents, as he looked into the water, as usual, were these: ”Ah, youth, beloved in vain!” and the spot returned just as many words; and after he had said, ”Farewell!” Echo, too, said, ”Farewell!” He laid down his wearied head upon the green gra.s.s, {when} night closed the eyes that admired the beauty of their master; and even then, after he had been received into the infernal abodes, he used to look at himself in the Stygian waters. His Naiad sisters lamented him, and laid their hair,[77] cut off, over their brother; the Dryads, too, lamented him, {and} Echo resounded to their lamentations. And now they were preparing the funeral pile, and the shaken torches, and the bier. The body was nowhere {to be found}. Instead of his body, they found a yellow flower, with white leaves encompa.s.sing it in the middle.
[Footnote 74: _Rhamnusia._--Ver. 406. Nemesis, the G.o.ddess of Retribution, and the avenger of crime, was the daughter of Jupiter. She had a famous temple at Rhamnus, one of the 'pagi,' or boroughs of Athens. Her statue was there, carved by Phidias out of the marble which the Persians brought into Greece for the purpose of making a statue of Victory out of it, and which was thus appropriately devoted to the G.o.ddess of Retribution. This statue wore a crown, and had wings, and holding a spear of ash in the right hand, it was seated on a stag.]
[Footnote 75: _Parian marble._--Ver. 419. Paros was an island in the aegean sea, one of the Cyclades; it was famous for the valuable quality of its marble, which was especially used for the purpose of making statues of the G.o.ds.]
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