Another,[1] which we will quote entire, from a Hyporchema performed to appease the Sun-god on the occasion of a solar eclipse, gives a vivid picture of Greek superstition, and is alluded to (though not quoted) by the Roman Pliny.[2] The original poem is in a light and rapid metre, illustrating the close connection between the Hyporchema and the Dithyramb.
"Why, all-seeing light of the Sun, to mine eyes dispensing sight,—
Why hast thou stolen in daytime thy soaring orb from view—
And all to nothing hast brought the wings of human might,
And wisdom's paths—and speedest along a darksome way,
To bring to pass some marvel new?
Nay, in Zeus' name, I pray thee, bid that thy flying steeds
Turn to the weal of Thebes this portent in all men's sight!
Yet oh, if thou tellest of wars, or blight, or of whelming snow,
Or faction fell, or seas outpouring to drown our meads,
Or freezing of fields, or a summer bedrenched with furious rain,
Or if Earth thou'lt drown, and store it with new-made folk again,
'Mid my wailing fellows I'll bide the blow!"
As to the Scolia, or drinking-songs, we have seen that a choral treatment of them was the exception and not the rule. And probably, even when so treated, they made less use of the stores of mythology than the more serious classes of Choral poetry. Their usual themes would naturally be the praise of Love and
- ↑ Fr. 74 (Boeckh).
- ↑ Nat. Hist. ii. 12.
