found in various Museums like the British and the Vatican, and one having lately been introduced to the grounds of Harvard. He still earlier than Praxiteles had statues on the Acropolis, his Bronze Cow, as famous then as Paul Potter's painting of the Bull in Holland is now, this work of Myron stood there from the time of Pericles. It was transferred in the first century to Rome, and there cattle, passing the Roman Forum where it was located, are said to have lowed to get from it a sympathetic response, so natural did it seem. What a misfortune that is should have been lost in the sack of the eternal city by the barbarians!

Above all, there was Phidias, who has never been equalled. He not only had charge of the construction of the Parthenon, but he also made for it a colossal statue of Athena, of which people still talk. It was forty feet high, the flesh portions were of ivory, and the vesture and arms of pure gold. According to the Greek historian Thucydides, of the same age, the value of this precious metal alone was forty talents, which is variously figured, Harper's Dictionary of classical antiquities making the amount to be $470,000. As indicating the fickleness of the populace, the sculptor, so far from being properly appreciated, was charged with embezzlement with having put in too large a bill for the gold. This fortunately was so applied that it could be removed and weighed, and when this actually was done to establish his honesty, the agreement with what he had claimed was to the nicety of an ounce. This work was excelled only by the same artist's statue of Zeus at Olympia, which was a second of the seven wonders of antiquity, and which was located there where the Olympian Games occurred for nearly twelve hundred years.

Leaving the Acropolis with its unsurpassed adornments,

we go to its base where the theater of Dionysus or Bacchus has been uncovered. It had no roof except the sky, and it had seats in part hewn out of the native rock, but consisting mostly of slabs of Pentelic marble. Plato speaks of "more than 30,000 once being crowded into it, but its normal seating capacity was probably about half that number. Here the drama was really born, and here it attained the zenith of its glory. Here were acted tragedies, like the Prometheus Bound and Agamemnon, of Eschylus, who by the way seems to have died a natural death at an extreme old age, but who according to another account came to a singular end. An eagle mistaking his bald head for a stone dropped a tortoise upon it to break the shell so as to get at the meat within. The blow proved fatal to the poet, and we have in this a mingling of comedy and tragedy.

In this same theater were staged the tragedies of Sophocles, including that wonderful trio of Edipus the King, Edipus at Colonus, and Antigone. The complicated plot running through all these three plays is absolutely absorbing and soul-moving. It was storied Colonus, which beyond the Dipylum gate and adjoining the Academy not only marked the scene of the tragic end of the blind king, but which also was the home of this dramatist, who has left on record this charming description:

"Colonus, glistening bright,

Where evermore, in thickets freshly green,
The clear-voiced nightingale

Still haunts and pours her song,

By purpling ivy hid,

And the thick foliage sacred to the god."

Likewise within the theater of Dionysus were heard the

thrilling tragedies of Euripides, for instance, his Medea, with whose Greek we sometimes struggle in college. Our Professor occasionally thought that our translation of the stirring lines was tragic. You recollect the story, how Jason sailed away to a distant land to bring back the golden fleece guarded by the ever-watchful dragon. He went in the good ship Argo, and that gave the name of Argonauts to those California pioneers, who went thither in search of gold. He succeeded only by the assistance of the daughter of the King,' she having become infatuated with this first Argonaut. He married her, and returned to Hellas, and had by her two children. He finally discarded her for a more ambitious connection with the daughter of the King of Corinth. Medea by the hands of her children sent to the bride-to-be some fineries, which had been steeped with magic drugs and with poison, and which eagerly were donned. Let the dramatist himself tell what happened:

"Then from her seat she rose, and through the hall
Paced gaily to and fro with dainty steps,
Exulting in the rich attire, and oft

Casting a glance down at her shapely foot.
What follows was appalling to behold:

The wreath of gold with which her hair was twined
Poured forth a wondrous stream of ravening fire,
While the fine tissue which the children gave

Ate into the unhappy damsel's flesh.

Up from her seat she sprang, and wrapped in fire,
She flew, tossing her head from side to side
To throw the circlet from her, but the clasp
Tightened its fatal pressure, while the fire,

The more she shook her ringlets, blazed the more.'