at Rome and at Constantinople, as being too much for the shaky morals of the time. One must not over-estimate the compliments of gallantry which Sappho had in plenty: she was 'the Poetess' as Homer was 'the Poet'; she was 'the Tenth Muse,' 'the Pierian Bee'; the wise Solon wished to "learn a song of Sappho's and then die." Still Sappho was known and admired all over Greece soon after her death; and a dispassionate judgment must see that her love-poetry, if narrow in scope, has unrivalled splendour of expression for the longing that is too intense to have any joy in it, too serious to allow room for metaphor and imaginative ornament. Unfortunately, the dispassionate judgment is scarcely to be had. Later antiquity could not get over its curiosity at the woman who was not a 'Hetaira' and yet published passionate love-poetry. She had to be made a heroine of romance. For instance, she once mentioned the Rock of Leucas. That was enough! It was the rock from which certain saga-heroes had leaped to their death, and she must have done the same, doubtless from unrequited passion! Then came the deference of gallantry, the reckless merriment of the Attic comedy, and the defiling imagination of Rome. It is a little futile to discuss the private character of a woman who lived two thousand five hundred years ago in a society of which we have almost no records. It is clear that Sappho was a 'respectable person' in Lesbos; and there is no good early evidence to show that the Lesbian standard was low. Her extant poems address her women friends with a passionate intensity; but there are dozens of questions to be solved before these poems can be used as evidence: Is a given word-form correct? is Sappho speaking in her own person, or dramatically? what occasion are the
