ALCMAN OR ALCMEON. [About 680 B. C.1 ALCMAN is said to have been born at Sardis, | him the title of Fauxus-the sweet. Nothing and numbered amongst the fathers of lyric poetry. but a few scattered sentences, and disjointed His Parthenia, composed in praise of women, lines-affording the most inadequate materials and sung by chorusses of virgins, were very for any judgment of his merits-have come popular amongst the Spartans, and procured for down to us. was the inventor of the fable of “the Horse and the Stag," which has been imitated by Horace and other poets, and which he wrote in order to prevent his countrymen from making an alliance with the tyrant, Phalaris. His poems have been highly extolled by ancient writers, and there are few who will not join in the regret expressed by a modern one for the loss of them. "Utinam profecto (says Lowth,) Stesichorum non invidisset nobis vetustas, cujus gravitatem et magnificentiam omnes prædicant; quem præ cæteris laudat Dionysius quod et argumenta sumeret grandia imprimis et splendide, et in iis tractandis mores et personarum dignitatem egregiè A NATIVE of Himera in Sicily, and contem-ments, are all that have descended to us. He porary with Sappho and Alcæus. It is said that his original name was Tisias, and that he acquired the more expressive one by which he is known, from having first established, and generally arranged the movements of the Chorus, or from having first introduced the episode or stationary union of the two parts or divisions. Whatever may be thought of this (says Mr. Coleridge,) certain it is, that the Strophe, Antistrophe, and Epode of the Chorus, became associated throughout Greece, with the name of Stesichorus. His principal poems were the "Destruction of Troy," the "Orestea,"-the "Rhadine," the "Scylla,"-and the "Geryoneis,' of which the titles, with a few scattered frag- servaret." wwwww FROM "THE GERYONEIS." VOYAGE OF THE SUN. BUT now the sun, great Hyperion's child, The Geryonëis was a poem on the story of the expedition of Hercules against the Spanish monster Geryon, who lived in Cadiz; in the fragment which remains of it, is the earlist mention of that ancient mystic legend of the And westward steered where, far o'er ocean wild, Sleeps the dim Night in solitary valleys, Where dwell his mother and his consort mild, And infant sons, in his sequestered palace; sun's passing over the sea in a golden cup, which was lent to Hercules for his voyage through the Mediterranean, and which has given occasion to more learned criticism, than any other cup, heathen or Christian, glass, metal, or wood, ever fabricated or dreamed of. A PHRYGIAN and of servile origin.-After communicate that knowledge to others. The having passed by sale from master to master, he at length fell into the hands of Iadmon of Samos, who, in admiration of his genius and acquirements, gave him his freedom. Esop now turned his attention to foreign travel, partly to extend the sphere of his own knowledge, and partly to latter he did by means of those Fables for which he is so celebrated, and which have associated his name with that pleasing branch of composition through all succeeding ages. The following is the only elegiac strain of his that has come down to us. JUSTICE. SHORT are the triumphs to injustice given,- THE CONSTITUTION OF ATHENS. * Sudden, as when the wings of Spring H. N. Coleridge. Thence the loud thunders roar, and lightnings glare And oft a people, once secure and free, To reverence justice, and abhor disgrace; REMEMBRANCE AFTER DEATH. A FRAGMENT. THE man that boasts of golden stores, ALCEUS. [About 620 B. C.] subjects,-now celebrating the praises of Bacchus and Venus; now inveighing against tyrants; now deploring the evils of exile and war, "Dura navis, ALCEUS was a native of Mitylene, and a con- metre which bears his name, and sung of various temporary and lover of Sappho. Having bitterly satirized Pittacus for his apostasy in usurping the very powers, from which, in conjunction with himself, he had deposed a former tyrant, Alcaus was driven into exile. He endeavoured to return by force of arms, but was unsuccessful, and fell into the hands of his former friend, but now exasperated conqueror, who, however, granted him his liberty, observing that forgiveness was better than revenge. Alcæus was the inventor of the Dura fugæ mala, dura belli.” Antiquity is full of his praises; but a few fragments only of his poetry remain, though its echo may be sometimes heard in the strains of his successful imitator and admirer, Horace. SAPPHO. [About 620 B. C.] THIS "tenth Muse" was a native of Mitylene and sweetness, her concentrated force, passion, in the island of Lesbos. The name of her father and beauty of expression, are unsurpassed in the is said to have been Scamandronomus, and that Greek tongue, and can be transfused into no other. of her mother, Cleis. She was married to Cer- There seems to be but little doubt of the tender colas, a wealthy inhabitant of the isle of Andros, | reverence and admiration wherein she was held by whom she was left early a widow, with an by the poet Alcæus, who, in a sweet, though unonly child called Cleis. Out of nine books of connected line, (found in one of his few remainlyric verse, besides numerous epigrams, epitha-ing fragments,) addresses her as his 'Ioññòx”, ȧyvà, lamia, and other kinds of poetry, very little re-μeiλozóμeida Zanpo-his violet-wreathed, pure, mains to us except the Hymn to Venus, and her sweetly-smiling Sappho.-As to the tales about Ode to the Beloved; but these alone suffice to her loves and death,-about Phaon and the Leujustify the high praises so universally awarded cadian rock,-they seem to have been utterly desto her by all Greece, and to place her in the very titute of all foundation.-See Welcker's "Sappho first rank of lyric poets. Her unaffected grace | von einem herrschenden Vorurtheil befreyt.” HYMN TO VENUS. O VENUS, beauty of the skies! Yea, come thyself!-If e'er, benign, With bright wings cleaving. Soon were they sped-and thou, most blest, What end my frenzied thoughts pursue- What though he fly, he'll soon return- |