Part 9 (1/2)
Charmides ran ahead and was sitting thrumming a lyre when his father and Creon came up. He struck a long, ringing chord and raised his clear voice in a dancing song:
When Creon, son of Menon, bore off the Olympic olive, Mount Kronion shook with shouting of h.e.l.las' hosts a.s.sembled.
They praised his manly beauty, his grace and strength of body.
They praised his eyes' alertness, the smoothness of his muscles.
They blessed his happy father and wished themselves his brothers.
Sweet rang the glorious praises in ears of Creon's lovers.
But I, when upward gazing, beheld a sight more wondrous.
The gates of high Olympos were open wide and clanging, Deserted ev'ry palace, the golden city empty.
And all the G.o.ds were gathered above Olympia's race-course, They smiled upon my Creon and gifts upon him showered.
From golden Aphrodite dropped half a hundred graces.
Athene made him skillful. Boon Hermes gave him litheness.
Fierce Ares added courage, Queen Hera happy marriage.
Diana's blessed fingers into his soul shed quiet.
Lord Bacchus gave him friends.h.i.+p and graces of the banquet, Poseidon luck in travel, and Zeus decreed him victor.
Apollo, smiling, watched him and saw his thousand blessings.
”Enough,” he said, ”for Creon. I'll bless the empty-handed.”
He turned to where I trembled, and stepping downward crowned me.
”To thee my gift,” he whispered, ”to sing thy brother's glory.”
”Well done, little poet!” cried Menon.
”A happy man am I. One son is beloved by Hermes, the other by Apollo.
Bring wax tablets, Glaucon, and write down the song. I will prepare a messenger to hurry with it to Athens.”
So it happened that a lame boy won a crown. And when Creon stepped ash.o.r.e at Pirseus, and all Athens stood shouting his name, a chorus of boys came dancing toward him singing his brother's song. Creon was led home wearing Zeus' wreath upon his head, and Charmides with Apollo's crown in his heart. [Ill.u.s.tration: _A Coin of Alexander the Great_. It shows Zeus sitting on his throne.]
HOW A CITY WAS LOST
Such was Olympia long ago. Every four years such games took place. Then the plain was crowded and busy and gay. Year after year new statues were set up, new gifts were brought, new buildings were made. Olympia was one of the richest places in the world. Its fame flew to every land. At every festival new people came to see its beauties. It was the meeting place of the world.
But meantime the bad fortune of Greece began. Her cities quarreled and fought among themselves. A king came down from the north and conquered her. After that the Romans sailed over from Italy and conquered her again. Often Roman emperors carried off some of her statues to make Rome beautiful. s.h.i.+pload after s.h.i.+pload they took. The new country was filled with Greek statues. The old one was left almost empty. Later, after Christ was born, and the Romans and the Greeks had become Christian, the emperor said,
”It is not fitting for Christians to hold a festival in honor of a heathen G.o.d.” And he stopped the games. He took away the gold and silver gifts from the treasure houses. He carried away the gold and ivory statues. Where Phidias' wonderful Zeus went n.o.body knows. Perhaps the gold was melted to make money. Olympia sat lonely and deserted by her river banks. Summer winds whirled dust under her porches. Rabbits made burrows in Zeus' altar. Doors rusted off their hinges. Foxes made their dens in Hera's temple. Men came now and then to melt up a bronze statue for swords or to haul away the stones of her temples for building.
The Alpheios kept eating away its banks and cutting under statues and monuments. Many a beautiful thing crumbled and fell into the river and was rolled on down to the sea. Men sometimes found a bronze helmet or a marble head in the bed of the stream.
After a long time people came and lived among the ruins. On an old temple floor they built a little church. Men lived in the temple of Zeus, and women spun and gossiped where the golden statue had sat. In the temple of Hera people set up a wine press. Did they know that the little marble baby in the statue near them was the G.o.d of the vineyard and had taught men to make wine? Out of broken statues and columns and temple stones they built a wall around the little town to keep out their enemies. Sometimes when they found a bronze warrior or a marble G.o.d they must have made strange stories about it, for they had half forgotten those wonderful old Greeks. But the marble statues they put into a kiln to make lime to plaster their houses. The bronze ones they melted up for tools. Sometimes they found a piece of gold. They thought themselves lucky then and melted it over into money.
But an earthquake shook down the buildings and toppled over the statues.
The columns and walls of the grand old temple of Zeus fell in a heap.
The marble statues in its pediments dropped to the ground and broke.
Victory fell from her high pillar and shattered into a hundred pieces.