Bacchus; for the vines, when cut, pour forth a great deal of moisture, and after their own nature weep." On which account Euripides says that one of the Horses of the Sun is
Æthops, who with his fervent heat doth ripen
Th' autumnal vines of sweetly flow'ring Bacchus,
From which men also call wine Æthops ([Greek: aithopa oinon]).
And Ulysses gave
Twelve large vessels of unmix'd red wine,
Mellifluous, undecaying, and divine,
Which now (some ages from his race conceal'd)
The hoary sire in gratitude reveal'd.
Such was the wine, to quench whose fervent steam
Scarce twenty measures from the living stream
To cool one cup sufficed; the goblet crown'd,
Breathed aromatic fragrancies around.[1]
And Timotheus, in his Cyclops, says—
He fill'd one cup, of well-turn'd iv'ry made,
With dark ambrosial drops of foaming wine;
And twenty measures of the sober stream
He poured in, and with the blood of Bacchus
Mingled fresh tears, shed by the weeping nymphs.
14. And I know, my messmates, of some men who were proud, not so much of their wealth in money as of the possession of many cups of silver and gold; one of whom is Pytheas the Arcadian, of the town of Phigalea, who, even when dying, did not hesitate to enjoin his servants to inscribe the following verses on his tomb:—
This is the tomb of Pytheas, a man
Both wise and good, the fortunate possessor
Of a most countless number of fine cups,
Of silver made, and gold, and brilliant amber.
These were his treasures, and of them he had
A store, surpassing all who lived before him.
And Harmodius the Lepreatian mentions this fact in his treatise on the Laws and Customs subsisting in Phigalea. And Xenophon, in the eighth book of his Cyropædia, speaking of the Persians, writes as follows—"And also they pride themselves exceedingly on the possession of as many goblets as possible; and even if they have acquired them by notorious malpractices, they are not at all ashamed of so doing; for injustice and covetousness are carried on to a great degree among them." But Œdipus cursed his sons on account of some drinking-cups (as the author of the Cyclic poem called
- ↑ Odyss. xi. 209.
