that had overwhelmed his contemporaries, and who, by casting stones behind him in obedience to the directions of an oracle, had peopled Locris with a new race called Laians, from the Greek word Laas, "a stone."
"Where led of Zeus, that hurls the lightnings bright,
Down from Parnassian heights Deucalion came
With Pyrrha, Man's primeval home to frame,
And there, sans travail, won
Descendants sprung from stone,
'Laians' thence named. Let these inspire your voice;
And of old wine, but new-blown song make choice!
For earth, 'tis told in story, sank
Whelmed 'neath a dark and raging main,
But sudden, cleft of Zeus, she drank—
The swollen surge was pent again!"
Then follows the tale of Opus's birth, and of the heroes who flocked to his court, foremost among whom was Menœtius, the famous father of a yet more famous son—Patroclus, the friend of Achilles.
"Him that went
With Atreus' sons to Troy, sole faithful found
To wronged Achilles, when the fleet around
'Mid rout of valiant Greeks
Raged Telephus. Still speaks
His fame, and wise men know Patroclus' might
Thenceforth, amid the crash of furious fight
The son of Thetis bade him stand
The nearest ever to his side,
Sheltered of his victorious brand."
The poet professes himself willing to linger for ever on such themes; but the immediate occasion of the Ode must not be forgotten, and so he proceeds to enumerate the athletic successes of Epharmostus and liis
