13. At this news Clinias was struck with utter silence for a considerable period; then, as if suddenly awaked from a swoon of grief, he cried out very pitifully and hurried to run to meet the corpse, while I followed him, affording him such poor comfort as I was able. At that moment Charicles was brought in on a bier, a sight most pitiful and sad; he appeared to be all one wound, so that none of the standers-by were able to refrain from tears. His father led the chorus of lamentation, greatly disordered and crying out: “Look on this picture and on that — how you left me and how you come back to me; a curse on all riding of horses! A worse than common death is yours, which leaves you an unsightly corpse; when others die, at least the lineaments of their features are preserved, and even if the living bloom of beauty be gone, at least the face keeps a semblance of its former appearance and affords some comfort to the mourner by its mimicry of sleep; death may have snatched away the soul, but at least it leaves in the body the one we knew. But with you even this has been destroyed by fate — so you are doubly dead to me, soul and body too; even the very shadow of your likeness is gone — your soul is fled and I cannot find my Charicles in this corpse. When, my child, shall the day of your wedlock be? When shall I perform at your marriage the rites that religion demands, horseman and bridegroom — bridegroom that shall never wed, most unfortunate of horsemen? Your bridal chamber is the grave; your wedlock is with death; the dirge your bridal song; these wailings your marriage lays. A very different fire from this, my child, did I hope to kindle for you; but cruel fate has extinguished both it and you, and lit up in its place the torches of a funeral. A cruel illumination this! The tapers of your marriage rite have become the flambeaux of a requiem.”
[1] Ταῦτα μὲν οὖν οὕτως ἐκώκυεν ὁ πατήρ: ἑτέρωθεν δὲ καθ̓ αὑτὸν ὁ Κλεινίας: καὶ ἦν θρήνων ἅμιλλα, ἐραστοῦ καὶ πατρός. ‘Ἐγώ μου τὸν δεσπότην ἀπολώλεκα. Τί γὰρ αὐτῷ τοιοῦτον δῶρον ἐχαριζόμην; φιάλη γὰρ οὐκ ἦν χρυσῆ, ἵν̓ ἐσπένδετο πίνων καὶ ἐχρῆτό μου τῷ δώρῳ τρυφῶν; [2] Ἐγὼ δὲ ὁ κακοδαίμων ἐχαριζόμην θηρίον μειρακίῳ καλῷ, ἐκαλλώπιζον δὲ καὶ τὸ πονηρὸν θηρίον προστερνιδίοις, προμετωπιδίοις, φαλάροις ἀργυροῖς, χρυσαῖς ἡνίαις. Οἴμοι Χαρίκλεις: ἐκόσμησά σου τὸν φονέα χρυσῷ. Ἵππε πάντων θηρίων ἀγριώτατε, πονηρὲ καὶ ἀχάριστε καὶ ἀναίσθητε κάλλους. [3] Ὁ μὲν κατέψα σου τοὺς ἱδρῶτας καὶ τροφὰς ἐπηγγέλλετο πλείονας καὶ ἐπῄνει τὸν δρόμον, σὺ δὲ ἀπέκτεινας ἐπαινούμενος. Οὐχ ἥδου προσαπτομένου σου τοιούτου σώματος, οὐκ ἦν σοι τοιοῦτος ἱππεὺς τρυφή, ἀλλ̓ ἔρριψας, ἄστοργε, τὸ κάλλος χαμαί. Οἴμοι δυστυχής: ἐγώ σοι τὸν φονέα, τὸν ἀνδροφόνον ἐωνησάμην.’
14. So wailed his father, and on the other side of the body Clinias was reproaching himself: it was a very rivalry of laments, the loving friend and the father. “It is I,” said he, “that have destroyed him that was the master of my heart. Why did I give him such a gift as that? Why not rather a cup of gold for libations when he drank, to use and pride himself on my present? As it is, wretched fool that I was, I gave this fair lad a wild beast, and I decked out the cursed brute with martingales and frontlets, silver trappings and gold-embroidered reins; yes, alas, Charicles, I furbished up your murderer with gold. Vile horse, the most savage of all beasts, wicked, thankless brute, senseless of beauty, he was wiping away your sweat and promising you a fuller manger and praising your paces; and you killed him as you were being flattered — you took no pleasure in the touch of that beautiful body, that fair horseman was no source of pride in you; you entertained no feelings of affection for him, but dashed his beauty to the ground. Woe is me: it was I that bought for you the cause of your death, your murderer!”
[1] Μετὰ δὲ τὴν ταφὴν εὐθὺς ἔσπευδον ἐπὶ τὴν κόρην: ἡ δὲ ἦν ἐν τῷ παραδείσῳ τῆς οἰκίας. Ὁ δὲ παράδεισος ἄλσος ἦν, μέγα τι χρῆμα πρὸς ὀφθαλμῶν ἡδονήν: καὶ περὶ τὸ ἄλσος τειχίον ἦν αὔταρκες εἰς ὕψος καὶ ἑκάστη πλευρὰ τοῦ τειχίου ‘τέσσαρες δὲ ἦσαν πλευραὶ’ κατάστεγος ὑπὸ χορῷ κιόνων: ὑπὸ δὲ τοῖς κίοσιν ἔνδον ἦν ἡ τῶν δένδρων πανήγυρις. [2] Ἔθαλλον οἱ κλάδοι, συνέπιπτον ἀλλήλοις ἄλλος ἐπ̓ ἄλλον, ἐγίνοντο τῶν πετάλων περιπλοκαί, τῶν φύλλων περιβολαί, τῶν καρπῶν συμπλοκαί: τοιαύτη τις ἦν ὁμιλία τῶν φυτῶν. [3] Ἐνίοις δὲ τῶν δένδρων τῶν ἁδροτέρων κιττὸς καὶ σμῖλαξ περιεπεφύκει, ἡ μὲν ἐξηρτημένη πλατάνου καὶ περιπυκάζουσα ῥαδινῇ τῇ κόμῃ: ὁ δὲ κιττὸς περὶ πεύκην ἑλιχθεὶς ᾠκειοῦτο τὸ δένδρον ταῖς περιπλοκαῖς, καὶ ἐγίνετο τῷ κιττῷ ὄχημα τὸ φυτόν, στέφανος δὲ ὁ κιττὸς τοῦ φυτοῦ. [4] Ἄμπελοι δὲ ἑκατέρωθεν τοῦ δένδρου καλάμοις ἐποχούμεναι τοῖς φύλλοις ἔθαλλον, καὶ ὁ καρπὸς ὡραίαν εἶχε τὴν ἄνθην καὶ διὰ τῆς ὀπῆς τῶν καλάμων ἐξεκρέματο καὶ ἦν βόστρυχος τοῦ φυτοῦ: τῶν δὲ φύλλων ἄνωθεν αἰωρουμένων ὑφ̓ ἡλίῳ πρὸς ἄνεμον συμμιγεῖ ὠχρὰν ἐμάρμαιρεν ἡ γῆ τὴν σκιάν. [5] Τὰ δὲ ἄνθη ποικίλην ἔχοντα τὴν χρόαν ἐν μέρει συνεξέφαινε τὸ κάλλος, καὶ ἦν τοῦτο τῆς γῆς πορφύρα καὶ νάρκισσος καὶ ῥόδον. Μία μὲν τῷ ῥόδῳ καὶ τῷ ναρκίσσῳ ἡ κάλυξ ὅσον εἰς περιγραφήν, καὶ ἦν φιάλη τοῦ φυτοῦ: ἡ χρόα δὲ τῶν περὶ τὴν κάλυκα φύλλων ἐσχισμένων τῷ ῥόδῳ μὲν αἵματος ὁμοῦ καὶ γάλακτος, τὸ κάτω τοῦ φύλλου, καὶ ὁ νάρκισσος ἦν τὸ πᾶν ὅμοιος τῷ κάτω τοῦ ῥόδου. [6] Τῷ δὲ ἴῳ κάλυξ μὲν οὐδαμοῦ, χρόα δὲ οἵαν ἡ τῆς θαλάσσης ἀστράπτει γαλήνη. Ἐν μέσοις δὲ τοῖς ἄνθεσι πηγὴ ἀνέβλυζε καὶ περιεγέγραπτο τετράγωνος χαράδρα χειροποίητος τῷ ῥεύματι. Τὸ δὲ ὕδωρ τῶν ἀνθέων ἦν κάτοπτρον, ὡς δοκεῖν τὸ ἄλσος εἶναι διπλοῦν, τὸ μὲν τῆς ἀληθείας, τὸ δὲ τῆς σκιᾶς. [7] Ὄρνιθες δὲ οἱ μὲν χειροήθεις περὶ τὸ ἄλσος ἐνέμοντο καὶ οὓς ἐκολάκευον αἱ τῶν ἀνθρώπων τροφαί: οἱ δὲ ἐλεύθερον ἔχοντες τὸ πτερὸν περὶ τὰς τῶν δένδρων κορυφὰς ἔπαιζον: οἱ μὲν ᾄδοντες τὰ ὀρνίθων ᾄσματα, οἱ δὲ τῇ τῶν πτερῶν ἀγλαϊζόμενοι στολῇ. [8] Οἱ ᾠδοὶ δὲ τέττιγες καὶ χελιδόνες: οἱ μὲν τὴν Ἠοῦς ᾄδοντες εὐνήν, αἱ δὲ τὴν Τηρέως τράπεζαν: οἱ δὲ χειροήθεις ταῶς καὶ κύκνος καὶ ψιττακός: ὁ κύκνος περὶ τὰς τῶν ὑδάτων πίδακας νεμόμενος, ὁ ψιττακὸς ἐν οἰκίσκῳ περὶ δένδρον κρεμάμενος, ὁ ταῶ�
� τοῖς ἄνθεσιν ἐπισύρων τὸ πτερόν. Ἀντέλαμπε δὲ ἡ τῶν ἀνθέων θέα τῇ τῶν ὀρνίθων χρόᾳ καὶ ἦν ἄνθη πτερῶν.
15. When the entombment was over, I hurried to my sweetheart, who was in the garden of our house. This garden was a meadow, a very object of beauty to the eyes; round it ran a wall of sufficient height, and each of the four sides of the wall formed a portico standing on pillars, within which was a close plantation of trees. Their branches, which were in full foliage, intertwined with one another; their neighbouring flowers mingled with each other, their leaves overlapped, their fruits joined. Such was the way in which the trees grew together; to some of the larger of them were ivy and smilax attached, the smilax hanging from planes and filling all the interstices between the boughs with its soft foliage, the ivy twisting up the pines and embracing the trunks, so that the tree formed a support for the ivy, and the ivy a garland for the tree. On either side of each tree grew vines, creeping upon reed supports, with luxuriant foliage; these, now in full fruitage, hung from the joints of the reeds, and formed as it were the ringlets of the tree. The leaves higher up were in gentle motion, and the rays of the sun penetrating them as the wind moved them gave the effect of a pale, mottled shadow on the ground. Flowers too of many hues displayed each their own beauty, setting the ground aflame; the narcissus and the rose, with their blossoms — the cup of the flowers — alike in shape but different in colour, the rose being of the colour of blood above and milk below, whereas the narcissus was wholly of the colour of the lower part of the rose; there were violets too, whose cup-shaped blossoms you could not distinguish, but their colour was as that of a shining calm at sea. In the midst of all these flowers bubbled up a spring, the waters of which were confined in a square artificial basin; the water served as a mirror for the flowers, giving the impression of a double grove, one real and the other a reflexion. Birds there were too: some, tame, sought for food in the grove, pampered and domesticated by the rearing of men; others, wild and on the wing, sported around the summits of the trees; some chirping their birds’ songs, others brilliant in their gorgeous plumage.
The songsters were grasshoppers and swallows: the former sang of Aurora’s marriage-bed, the latter of the banquet of Tereus. The tame birds were peacocks, swans, and parrots; the swans fed round about the sources of the spring, the parrots were hung in cages from the branches of the trees, the peacocks spread their tails among the flowers, and there was a kind of rivalry between the brilliance of the flowers and the hues of the peacocks, whose plumage seemed itself to consist of very flowers.
[1] Βουλόμενος οὖν εὐάγωγον τὴν κόρην εἰς ἔρωτα παρασκευάσαι, λόγων πρὸς τὸν Σάτυρον ἠρχόμην, ἀπὸ τοῦ ὄρνιθος λαβὼν τὴν εὐκαιρίαν. Διαβαδίζουσα γὰρ ἔτυχεν ἅμα τῇ Κλειοῖ καὶ ἐπιστᾶσα τῷ ταῷ. [2] Ἔτυχε γὰρ τύχῃ τινὶ συμβὰν τότε τὸν ὄρνιν ἀναπτερῶσαι τὸ κάλλος καὶ τὸ θέατρον ἐπιδεικνύναι τῶν πτερῶν. ‘Τοῦτο μέντοι οὐκ ἄνευ τέχνης ὁ ὄρνις’ ἔφην ‘ποιεῖ: ἀλλ̓ ἔστι γὰρ ἐρωτικός. Ὅταν γὰρ ἐπαγαγέσθαι θέλῃ τὴν ἐρωμένην, τότε οὕτως καλλωπίζεται. [3] Ὁρᾷς ἐκείνην τὴν τῆς πλατάνου πλησίον;’ δείξας θήλειαν ταῶν ‘ταύτῃ νῦν οὗτος τὸ κάλλος ἐπιδείκνυται λειμῶνα πτερῶν. Ὁ δὲ τοῦ ταῶ λειμὼν εὐανθέστερος: πεφύτευται γὰρ αὐτῷ καὶ χρυσὸς ἐν τοῖς πτεροῖς, κύκλῳ δὲ τὸ ἁλουργὲς τὸν χρυσὸν περιθεῖ τὸν ἴσον κύκλον, καὶ ἔστιν ὀφθαλμὸς ἐν τῷ πτερῷ.’
16. Desiring to influence the thoughts of the maiden so as to make her amenable to love, I began to address myself to Satyrus, (Satyrus and Clio are rather inartistically introduced without further description. Satyrus was a male slave of the household, Clio Leucippe’s chambermaid: they form another pair of lovers.) taking the birds as my text. Now my sweetheart happened to be walking with Clio and had stopped opposite the peacock, who chanced at that moment to be making a display of all his finery and shewing off his tail to its best advantage. “This bird,” said I, “does not behave thus without intent: he is really an amorous creature; at least he shews off this gorgeous livery when he wishes to attract the object of his passion. Do you not see her (and as I spoke I pointed to the hen) near that plane tree? It is for her that he is shewing his beauties, his train which is a garden in itself — a garden which contains more beautiful flowers than a natural garden, for there is gold in the plumage, with an outer circle of purple running round the whole circle of gold, and on every feather an eye.”
[1] Καὶ ὁ Σάτυρος συνεὶς τοῦ λόγου μου τὴν ὑπόθεσιν, ἵνα μοι μᾶλλον εἴη περὶ τούτου λέγειν, （ἦ γὰρ ὁ ἔρως） ἔφη ‘τοσαύτην ἔχει τὴν ἰσχύν, ὡς καὶ μέχρις ὀρνίθων πέμπειν τὸ πῦρ;’ ‘οὐ μέχρις ὀρνίθων’ ἔφην, “τοῦτο γὰρ οὐ θαυμαστόν, ἐπεὶ καὶ αὐτὸς ἔχει πτερόν, ἀλλὰ καὶ ἑρπετῶν καὶ φυτῶν, ἐγὼ δὲ δοκῶ μοι, καὶ λίθων. [2] Ἐρᾷ γοῦν ἡ Μαγνησία λίθος τοῦ σιδήρου: κἂν μόνον ἴδῃ, πρὸς αὑτὴν εἵλκυσεν, ὥσπερ ἐρωτικόν τι ἔνδον ἔχουσα. Καὶ μή τι τοῦτό ἐστιν ἐρώσης λίθου καὶ ἐρωμένου σιδήρου φίλημα; [3] περὶ δὲ τῶν φυτῶν λέγουσι παῖδες σοφῶν: καὶ μῦθον ἔλεγον ἂν τὸν λόγον εἶναι, εἰ μὴ καὶ παῖδες ἔλεγον γεωργῶν. Ὁ δὲ λόγος: ἄλλο μὲν ἄλλου φυτὸν ἐρᾷν, τῷ δὲ φοίνικι τὸν ἔρωτα μᾶλλον ἐνοχλεῖν: λέγουσι δὲ τὸν μὲν ἄρρενα τῶν φοινίκων, τὸν δὲ θῆλυν. [4] Ὁ ἄρρην οὖν τοῦ θήλεος ἐρᾷ: κἂν ὁ θῆλυς ἀπῳκισμένος ᾖ τῇ τῆς φυτείας στάσει, ὁ ἐραστὴς αὐαίνεται. Συνίησιν οὖν ὁ γεωργὸς τὴν λύπην τοῦ φυτοῦ, καὶ εἰς τὴν τοῦ χωρίου περιωπὴν ἀνελθὼν ἐφορᾷ ποῖ νένευκε: κλίνεται γὰρ εἰς τὸ ἐρώμενον: [5] καὶ μαθὼν θεραπεύει τοῦ φυτοῦ τὴν νόσον: πτόρθον γὰρ τοῦ θήλεος φοίνικος λαβὼν εἰς τὴν τοῦ ἄρρενος καρδίαν ἐντίθησι. Καὶ ἀνέψυξε μὲν τὴν ψυχὴν τοῦ φυτοῦ, τὸ δὲ σῶμα ἀποθνῆσκον πάλιν ἀνεζωπύρησε καὶ ἐξανέστη, χαῖρον ἐπὶ τῇ τῆς ἐρωμένης συμπλοκῇ. Καὶ τοῦτό ἐστὶ γάμος φυτῶν.”
17. Satyrus, perceiving the trend and object of my discourse; was desirous of assisting me to enlarge further on the subject; and; “Has then Love,” said he, “such mighty power that he is able to inflame even birds?”
“Not birds only,” I answered; “that would be no marvel; for you too know that he is winged himself, but creeping snakes and plants too, and I believe even stones as well: at least the loadstone (The French call it l’aimant.) loves the iron, and if it may but see it and touch it; it attracts it towards itself as though possessed of the passion of love. May this not be the kiss of the loving stone and the beloved metal? As for plants; the children of wisdom have a tale to tell; one that I should deem a fable were it not that it was borne out by countrymen; and this it is. Plants; they say, fall in love with one another; and the palm is particularly susceptible to the passion: there are both male and female palms; the male falls in love with the fema
le; and if the female be planted at any considerable distance; the loving male begins to wither away. The gardener realises what is the cause of the tree’s grief; goes to some slight eminence in the ground; and observes in which direction it is drooping (for it always inclines towards the object of its passion); and when he has discovered this, he is soon able to heal its disease: for he takes a shoot of the female palm and grafts it into the very heart of the male. This refreshes the tree’s spirit, and the trunk, which seemed on the point of death, revives and gains new vigour in joy at the embrace of the beloved: it is a kind of vegetable marriage.
Complete Works of Achilles Tatius Page 49