PART I.—THE KING AND QUEEN OF THE DEAD.
“Not far from Enna’s walls there lies a lake,
Pergus by name: than which not Cayster’s stream
Is fuller of the songs of gliding swans.
A woodland girds it with a veil of leaves
To shelter from the heat; where the fresh soil
Bears purple flowers, and keeps perpetual spring.”
SO the poet Ovid describes the pleasant place where the nymph Proserpine, the beautiful daughter of Ceres, goddess of the fruits of the earth, was one day with her companions, gathering violets and lilies. All were trying who should gather the most, and were very happy and merry. In her search for flowers, Proserpine wandered out of sight of her companions, who went on gathering and singing and laughing: till suddenly their merriment was stopped by a piercing scream for help; and then by another and another; till the cries grew fainter and fainter, and were at last heard no more.
Where was Proserpine? They were sure it was her cries they had heard: and, though they searched through the whole wood, they could not find her anywhere. All they could do was to go to Ceres, and tell her that her daughter had disappeared, and could not be found for all their seeking.
Ceres, who is the best and kindest of all the goddesses, loved her daughter dearly, and was disconsolate at the news. Though always so busy with seed-time and harvest, fields and orchards, she set out to seek for her lost Proserpine; or at least to find out what had become of her. “Mother!” had been Proserpine’s last cry. Ceres wandered, in her search, over the whole world,—nay, she explored the very depths of the sea,—but all in vain. She questioned gods, goddesses, nymphs, fauns, and satyrs, men and women; but none could give her any news of Proserpine. She never slept, but set fire to the pine-trees on the top of Mount Ætna to serve as torches, so that she might see to search by night as well as by day. She forgot to eat and drink, and, though the goddess of Corn and Plenty, she would have perished of hunger and thirst had not an old woman named Baubo, though ignorant who she was, taken pity on her, and given her some hot porridge, which Ceres drank eagerly—so eagerly that a boy who saw her drinking jeered at her for a glutton. This was too much for the goddess, in her despair, to bear. She for once lost her temper, and threw the rest of the hot porridge over the grinning boy, whom it turned into a spotted lizard for laughing at a stranger’s needs and an old woman’s charity.
At length, worn out and desperate, the poor mother wandered back to Sicily, so changed that nobody knew her. Nor could she say who she was, for grief had made her dumb. In this state she arrived at a place called Cyane, near to where Proserpine had been lost. And here one day, while looking at a pool (for she never ceased to look everywhere) she saw her daughter’s girdle lying at the bottom of the water. Then, giving up her last spark of hope, she found her voice again, and mourned aloud. Her grief was terrible to hear and see. She cursed the earth, so that it no longer brought forth corn: she broke the ploughs: the seeds perished in the fields, and the cattle in their stalls.
But one day Ceres, roaming along the banks of the river Alpheus, plainly heard its waters say:—
“We have seen Proserpine! She is unhappy; but she is a great queen: she is the wife of Pluto, the King of the Underworld.”
Then Ceres knew that Proserpine had been carried off by the great and dreadful god Pluto, to whom, when Jupiter divided the world, had been given Hades—the underground kingdom of ghosts and of the souls of the dead: the greatest kingdom of all. It was true:—Pluto had seen Proserpine while she was gathering flowers in the wood, had snatched her up into his chariot with black horses, and, in spite of her struggles and cries for help, had driven off with her to his underground palace through a cavern which he opened with a touch of his two-pronged scepter: the cavern then filled up with water, and became the lake of Cyane, at the bottom of which Ceres had found the girdle. As soon as she could recover her senses, Ceres flew up to heaven, threw herself before Jupiter, and passionately demanded that her daughter should be given back to her.
It was a difficult question for Jupiter to settle. He pitied Ceres with all his heart, and wished to help her. But high reasons of state made him unwilling to offend Pluto: and then, who had ever heard of anybody coming back from Hades? That would be against all the laws of gods and men.
But there were three mysterious beings, of whom I have not yet told you, called the Fates—three sisters who rule over life and death, and whose will even the gods of heaven, even Jupiter himself, must obey. Somewhere or other they sit and spin with their distaffs the histories of nations and the lives and deaths of men. Nothing can happen without their leave; and nobody can prevent from coming to pass whatever the Fates decree. So Jupiter inquired of the Fates if it was their will that Proserpine should return from the kingdom of the grave.
“She may return,” said they. “But not if she has eaten or drunk in the kingdom of Pluto. If she has tasted the food of death, then she may not return.”
When Pluto received this message he was greatly troubled; for, though he had carried off Proserpine in that cruel way, he very deeply loved her, and hoped that, if he could keep her with him, he should at last conquer her sorrow and get her to love him in return. He had made her his wife and queen, and could not bear the thought of losing her. He anxiously inquired of every ghost and spirit in Hades if Queen Proserpine had tasted food, if ever so little; but not one had seen her touch even bread or water since she had been brought below. It was Pluto’s turn to lose Proserpine. Ceres was already rejoicing in the thought of seeing her long-lost daughter. Proserpine was just about to return to earth, when there stepped forth one of Pluto’s courtiers, named Asculaphus, and accused Proserpine of having tasted the juice of seven pomegranate seeds. And the Fates knew that it was true.
And Proserpine also knew it, and cried aloud for sorrow that she should never see her mother again; and her cry turned the treacherous, tale-bearing Asculaphus into a hooting owl. But this did not undo the work of those seven fatal pomegranate seeds. Even the Fates were filled with pity; even the heart of Pluto was touched by the mother’s and the daughter’s despair. The Fates could not change their decree. But it was settled that, though Proserpine must continue to be the wife of Pluto and the Queen of Hades, she should be allowed to spend six months out of every year on earth with Ceres. And that is the reason of summer and winter. It is summer when Ceres is happy with her daughter, and makes the earth rejoice with flowers and fruit and corn. It is winter when she is left alone, and Proserpine goes back to Pluto until next spring. Proserpine is the beauty and joy of the earth, which seems to die in winter, but only to come to life again. And she is the beauty of death besides. You will remember what you read in the story of Psyche about the beauty of Proserpine.
It was Ceres who taught men to plow, harrow, sow, and reap; and they were very grateful to her everywhere. The worship of Ceres, under many names, was the chief part of the religion of ancient times. You will know her, from pictures and statues, as a noble and stately goddess, crowned with a garland of corn, holding a lighted torch, sometimes standing in a chariot drawn by flying dragons. I have said she had many names, one of the most famous being Demeter, which means “Mother Earth”; and “Bona Dea,” that is to say, “the Good Goddess,” was another.
Proserpine, as Queen of Hades, became a very strange and mysterious goddess indeed. One of her names is Hecate, and under that name she rules over magic. She often wears a veil, and a crown of stars; and, like Pluto, carries the scepter with two prongs, differing from Neptune’s trident, which has three.
Pluto was a dark and gloomy god. No temples were ever built to him, and only black animals were sacrificed upon his altars. But he was just, although pitiless and stern. He sits upon a throne of sulphur in his underground palace, from which flow the four rivers of Hades—Cocytus, the river of Lamentation; Acheron, the river of Sorrow; Lethe, the river of Forgetfulness; and Phlegethon, the river of Fire. On his left hand sits Proserpine, near to whom stand the Furies, three fiends with snakes instead of hair; on his right stand the Fates spinning; at his feet lies the three-headed dog, Cerberus; and the Harpies hover over him, waiting for orders.
On the whole, it is not strange that Proserpine should be glad when the time for her six months’ visit to her mother comes round.
HADES,” the name of the kingdom of Pluto and Proserpine, means “invisible,” because it is unseen by living eyes. It is surrounded by the river Styx by which the gods swore their sacred oath, and which flows round and round it in nine circles before springing up into the living world. Even when the Styx rises out of the ground in the land of Arcadia, it still remains a cold black river, whose waters are poisonous to drink; but if anybody was bold enough to bathe in them, and lucky enough to come out alive, no weapon afterwards would have power to wound him. Some people say that Thetis (the goddess who saved Jupiter from the great plot) dipped her child Achilles into the Styx as soon as he was born, head foremost, holding him by the left heel between her finger and thumb. But she forgot that her thumb and finger prevented the water from touching the skin just where she held him. And so, when he grew up, though no weapon could hurt him anywhere else, yet, when he was hit by an arrow in the left heel, he died of the wound.
When anybody died, his body was buried or burned by his friends, and his soul left him and went down to Hades, till it reached the banks of the Styx. Here it waited for Charon’s ferry-boat, about which you read in the story of Psyche. If its friends had buried its body properly, they had given it a small silver coin to pay the ferryman, who took the money and at once rowed it across the river. But if the soul had no money to pay for its passage, it had to wait for a hundred years, shivering and cold. Arrived on the other side, the soul was taken before the three judges of Hades—Minos, Æacus, and Rhadamanthus. All three had been kings on earth, so famous for wisdom and justice that, when they died, Pluto made them the judges of the dead. These decided what was to be done with the soul. If it had been virtuous during its life upon earth, it was allowed to enter Elysium, or the region of happiness; if it had been wicked, it was condemned to the horrible prison of Tartarus, there to be punished by torture.
Elysium, which is also called “the Elysian fields,” or “the Islands of the Blest,” was a very delightful place, like the most beautiful country in the finest weather, never too hot or too cold, and full of sweet scents and sounds. There the souls of the happy enjoyed forever, without ever getting tired, whatever had given them the most pleasure upon earth—hunting, or war, or learning, or music, or whatever it might be: only all their pleasures became innocent and noble, and even if they fought, it was all in friendship and without harm. Nothing was quite real there: it was more like a beautiful and happy dream, lasting forever. Some of the very best and greatest human souls were taken up into Olympus and made “Demi-gods,” that is to say “Half-gods”; but of course this was a very rare honor. The dream of Elysium was thought to be reward enough for the souls which, in their lives, had done more good than evil.
Tartarus, the place of torment, was a very different place, as I need not say. It was farther below the earth than the earth is below the sky, and was surrounded by three brazen walls, and by Phlegethon, the river of Fire. The only entrance was through a high tower, with gates which not even the gods could open, and guarded by the three-headed dog Cerberus, which never slept; and the air was three times darker than the darkest midnight, lighted only by the terrible flames of Phlegethon. The jailers were Nemesis and the Furies. Nemesis is the great stern power who never allows the guilty to escape from their just punishment, nor the good to lose their just reward. If people are happier or more fortunate than they deserve to be, she always, either in this life or in Hades, gives them enough misery at last, until they are just as happy or unhappy as they deserve to be, and neither less nor more; and if they seem less happy or less fortunate than they deserve, she makes it up to them in the end. She is often so strangely slow in coming, that she has been called lame. But she always comes at last: if she is slow, she is sure.
There was once a king of the island of Samos, named Polycrates, who was famous for his marvelous good fortune. Nothing ever went wrong with him; he did not seem able to fail in anything, even if he tried; he knew neither misfortune nor sorrow. Though only the prince of a little island, he became, by one stroke of good luck after another, the most powerful monarch of his time, so that the kings of the greatest nations came to his court to do him homage and admire his glory. Among these was Amasis, King of Egypt, who was frightened at the sight of such prosperity, and thought, “This is surely more than any mortal deserves—Nemesis must surely be near at hand!” So he advised Polycrates to bring some misfortune upon himself, to keep Nemesis away. At first Polycrates laughed at such counsel; but, to remove the friendly fears of Amasis, he threw into the sea a ring with a magnificent seal, which he prized the most of all his jewels, and the loss of which made him really unhappy—so you may guess how little unhappiness he had ever known before. A few days afterwards, however, while at dinner with Amasis, he happened to cut open a large fish; and behold, inside the fish he found the ring, which thus came back to him from the bottom of the sea. Instantly Amasis rose from the table and hurried back to Egypt, exclaiming, “I dare not have anything more to do with so fortunate a man—Nemesis must be at the door!” And he was right; and when she came, she came indeed! From the hour when the ring was found in the fish, all the prosperity of Polycrates departed from him; he sank lower and lower; until at last he was treacherously captured by the governor of one of his own cities, and put to a shameful death by torture. You will often hear people speak of “the Ring of Polycrates.” When they do, they mean (or ought to mean) that a life of mixed joy and sorrow, such as most of us have, is what most of us deserve; and that this is the happiest as well as the best for us in the long-run. It is not good for us to know nothing of sorrow or pain. And if we ever feel that we suffer unjustly—well, Nemesis, the slow but the sure, will make it up to us in the end.
However, I must go back to Tartarus, in spite of its unpleasantness. I was speaking of the Furies, who served under Nemesis as its jailers. These were three creatures like women, with hissing and writhing snakes instead of hair, holding a torch in one hand, and a whip made of live scorpions in the other. These whips were the whips of Conscience, with which they scourged and stung the souls both of the dead and the living. They were the chief servants of Nemesis, because the stings of Conscience are the most terrible of all her punishments. The Furies were the most dreadful creatures in or out of Hades. People had such awe and horror of them that they dared not even name them. The real name of the Furies was the “Erinyes,” which means the desperate madness of those whom the gods or fates have cursed. But people who wanted to speak of them always called them the “Eumenides”—that is to say, “the Gracious Ladies”—just as timid people in England used to say “the Good Folk” instead of “the Fairies,” for fear of making them angry by naming their real name.
The tortures of Tartarus were of all sorts and kinds. Among the evil souls which suffered there, the most famous were the three wicked kings, Ixion, Sisyphus, and Tantalus. Ixion was tied by his arms and legs to the spokes of a wheel, which whirled round and round at full speed without ever giving him one moment’s rest. Sisyphus had to carry up to the top of a high and steep hill a huge stone, which, as soon as he got it up, instantly rolled to the bottom again, so that his labor had no end. The torment of Tantalus was perhaps the worst of all. Maddened with hunger and thirst, he was chained to a rock in such a manner that he could not seize one of the delicious fruits that hung close to his eyes, or one of the cups of cool and fragrant drink which unseen hands put to his lips, and then, just as he was about to taste, snatched away again. Being “tantalized” means being treated like Tantalus. Then there were the Danaides, or the forty-nine daughters of King Dananus, who had all murdered their husbands, and were condemned to fill sieves with water, which of course ran out through the holes as soon as they poured it in. There had been fifty Danaides; but the fiftieth had taken no part in her sisters’ crime. There was also the wicked giant Tityus, who was so huge that his body covered nine acres of ground, and whose punishment was, to be perpetually devoured by vultures.
Souls not good enough for Elysium, but not bad enough for Tartarus, were treated in another way. Some were sent to wander about the world as Lemures, or homeless ghosts; others were given to drink of the waters of the Lethe, the river of Forgetfulness, which threw them into a dreamless sleep forever.
PART III.—ORPHEUS AND EURYDICE.
UPON the heights of Mount Helicon, by the spring of water called Hippocrene, and upon the peak of Parnassus, whence flows forth the fountain of Castalia, dwelt the Muses—the nine gracious goddesses whose gifts to men are music, poetry, painting, eloquence, and all the pleasures of the mind. The Muse who had the sweetest voice was named Calliope; and she had a son named Orpheus, who grew up to be the most wonderful musician that ever was known. When he sang and played, it was as if his mother’s voice were singing to Apollo’s lyre, so that he charmed gods as well as men.
But though he thus charmed all, he cared for nothing in the whole world but his art, until he met with a girl named Eurydice, with whom he fell passionately in love, and who loved him with her whole heart in return. They married, and for a long time were perfectly happy. But one unlucky day Eurydice, while running through some long grass, was stung by a poisonous snake in the foot; and she died.
To Orpheus it was like losing his own soul; and it was indeed bitterly cruel to have lost Eurydice in the midst of their happiness together. Nothing could comfort him. He could only wander out among the hills and streams with his lyre, lamenting Eurydice, and imploring her to come back to him, in such heartbroken passionate music that the very rivers and mountains and winds seemed to find a voice, and to join with him in his ceaseless prayer of “Eurydice! come back to me, even from the grave.” And so for days and nights he wandered, singing the same song to his lyre, with all his heart and soul, till it seemed impossible that Death itself should be deaf to such a prayer.
At last a very strange thing befell. So desperately sweet did his music grow that the earth could bear it no longer, but opened; so that he saw before him the black waters of the Styx, and Charon’s boat filled with its freight of souls. His wonderful music, made more wonderful still by love and sorrow, had opened to him the very gate of Hades, where Eurydice had gone. Hope rose in his heart. Still playing, he stepped into the boat and crossed the Styx, none hindering him, or even asking him for his fee. Minos, Æacus, and Rhadamanthus, the three stern judges of the dead, let him pass unquestioned—even they forgot their duty in the music of his voice and lyre. As he played and sang there floated round him, drawn by his music, thousands of souls like flocks of birds. The sound of his lyre reached into Tartarus itself. Cerberus crouched harmless; the Furies felt a thrill of pity; for one whole instant Tantalus forgot his thirst, the wheel of Ixion ceased whirling, and the stone of Sisyphus stopped rolling down-hill.
Thus Orpheus played his way into the very presence of Pluto and Proserpine. Pluto pitied him; but it was Proserpine who, no doubt remembering her own mother’s sorrows and wanderings, thought of a way to help him.
“You may have back your wife,” said she; “but on one condition. You have conquered Death; but that is not enough. You must conquer even Love, for her sake. Go back to earth, playing and singing as you came, and Eurydice shall follow behind you. But if, until you pass the gate of Hades, you turn your head to look at her; if you give even a single glance behind you to see if she is there, then you shall never see her again.”
You may think that Eurydice might have been given to him back without any conditions. But Hades was ruled by strict laws, which not even the king and queen could break; and nobody could be allowed to conquer death without showing that he could conquer temptation. Orpheus was overjoyed. Singing a hymn of thanks, he went back the way he came; and presently he could hear a faint sound behind him, as if the whisper of a footfall were keeping pace with him. Was it indeed Eurydice? He longed to look round and see; but he remembered Proserpine’s condition, and he did not let his eyes wander from the chink of daylight which presently began to gleam before him. As he came nearer and nearer to the upper world of light, and life, and day, the footfall behind him grew more and more distinct, until he knew it to be Eurydice’s: it was as if a silent phantom were gradually putting on its body again as it followed him. If he could but once look round—not to look was almost more than he could bear. But he might listen; and now he heard her breathe, deeply and gladly, as the breath of life came back to her. His music was indeed bringing her back from the grave!
At last he saw, full in sight, the sunlit hills of the upper world. Forgetting that the gate of Hades had not yet been passed, he, in his impatience, turned round to clasp Eurydice to his heart—only to see her change back again into a pale, cold ghost, which, with a wail of love and sorrow, faded away forever.
So Orpheus came back again from Hades heartbroken and alone. Once more, doubly hopeless, and hating himself for his own weakness, he wandered among the mountains and forests with his lyre. But while he was broken-hearted, his music became more wonderful than ever; for had he not seen with his eyes all the marvels of the under-world? Lions and tigers followed him as he sang, and became as gentle as lambs. The strongest oaks bent down to listen—nay, even the very mountains bowed their heads, and the swiftest rivers stood still to hear. He sang of Love and Death and Sorrow, and of all the mysteries of the world above, and of the world below, so that men looked upon him as a prophet, and came to him to learn wisdom.
But his own heart remained broken and dead within him. He had no more love left to give to any human being. The noblest and fairest women in the land sought to win his love, but he was deaf and blind to them all. So their love turned to hate; and at last a number of them, enraged by his coldness, fell upon him and slew him, and threw his head into the river Hebrus. And, as his head floated away, the dead lips were heard to murmur:—
“Eurydice! Eurydice!”
PART IV.—THE MAN WHO NEVER DIED.
THERE was just one mortal who kept clear of Hades altogether. But whether he was really lucky in that or not, I must leave you to settle when you have heard his story.
If you have ever seen the sun rise, you have seen the wings of Aurora. Aurora is the dawn; and as she opens her wings you see all their colors—first pale-grey; then a delicate amber, which deepens into saffron; then the tint of a pink-rose, which grows fuller and fuller till it becomes crimson and purple, which turns to gold when the chariot of the Sun appears. It is she who throws open the gates of the sky for Phœbus Apollo to start upon his daily journey, just as it is Thetis who shuts them, and brings the twilight, when his journey is done.
Aurora is always glad and beautiful and young; always full of hope, because she closes her splendid wings and goes to sleep before the troubles of the day begin; and her only work is to feed the flowers with dew. But once upon a time she fell in love with a mortal named Tithonus; and she promised to grant him whatever boon he most desired.
I suppose almost everybody has tried to think of what he would wish for if a goddess or fairy gave him such a chance. Tithonus thought hard for a minute, and then said:—
“Great and beautiful goddess, my wish is that I may never die, so that I may see you every morning forever.”
Now of course it was against all the laws of Hades that a mortal should never die—unless, of course, he was allowed to taste the Ambrosia, the food of the gods, which was very seldom allowed. How Aurora managed it, I cannot tell, because I have never been told. But she kept her word somehow, and Tithonus got leave to live forever.
And so long as he was young and strong, and could get up early in the morning to look at the color of Aurora’s wings, that was all very well. It did just as well as if he were to die in time, like other men. But it happened at last that, while Aurora remained as young as ever, Tithonus began to get old. The promise of endless life did not prevent him from growing bald, and toothless, and liable to catch cold if he went out into the keen morning air. By the time that he was a hundred years old, he became tired of getting up to see the sun rise day after day. At two hundred he felt like a bundle of aches and pains, and he liked a doze in the sun better than a thousand Auroras. At three hundred he became tired of living, and wanted to be able to creep into some quiet corner of Hades, drink a cup of Lethe, and go to sleep and think of nothing. But he could not; for though racked with pain and weary of life, he could not die!
He could only shrink and shrivel till, after many hundreds of years, he was less than two inches long. His skin turned dry and brown. His voice became cracked, and thin, and shrill. He lost his senses, and kept on chirping the same thing over and over again. He never stirred from the warmth of the chimney-corner, night or day. His legs grew as thin as threads of cotton. He dwindled into a dry, wooden-like insect.
In short, a Cricket.
And such he remains to this day. But Aurora is as young and as beautiful and as fresh as ever, and has clean forgotten him; while he spends his life in trying to be merry, and in chirping:—
“Oh, how I want to die!”