Page:The Odyssey of Homer, with the Hymns, Epigrams, and Battle of the Frogs and Mice (Buckley 1853).djvu/23

This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.

THE LIFE OF HOMER.

xix

The fishermen, all being ready, at length departed, but being driven about by adverse winds, were forced to return. They found Homer still seated on the strand. Hearing the noise of their return, he addressed them thus: "The winds are contrary; receive me on board, and they will change."

The fishermen, regretting their inhospitality, promised not to desert him, if he would come on board.

XX. He enters the vessel, they leave the shore, and now they approach the opposite coast. They begin to fish. Homer passed the night on the sea-shore, but, at the dawn of day, he departed. Wandering about, he came to a hamlet called Pithys,^[1] where he lay down to rest. During his sleep, the fruit of a pine-tree fell on him. Some call this fruit by the name of strobilus, others call them pine-cones.^[2] The following verses were made by Homer on this occasion:

"On the summit of Mount Ida there are pine-trees continually agitated by the winds, whose fruit is more agreeable than that of these. From the bosom of that mountain, iron shall come, sacred to the god of battles, when it shall be occupied by the Cebrenians."

For about this time the Cumæans were building Cebrene, on the heights of Mount Ida, near the place were the iron-mines are.

XXI. Homer, having set out from Pithys, went towards a troop of goats, being attracted by their cries. The dogs,

↑ Pithys signifies a cone. The island was probably very woody, as Salamis, celebrated for its woods, bore that name in very ancient times.
↑ Galen (De Alimentorum facultate, tom. iv. p. 325) says, "The cone, or fruit of the pine, gives a juice of good quality, thick, and nourishing, but not easy of digestion. The Greeks of the present time do not call them cones, but strobili." The occurrence of the word strobilus upsets, in Wesseling's opinion, the probability of this having been a work of so early an age as Herodotus. May not, as Larcher plausibly conjectures, a word have been drawn into the text, through the ignorance of copyists, which had originally been placed in the margin as explanatory. See his note.

[1] Pithys signifies a cone. The island was probably very woody, as Salamis, celebrated for its woods, bore that name in very ancient times.

[2] Galen (De Alimentorum facultate, tom. iv. p. 325) says, "The cone, or fruit of the pine, gives a juice of good quality, thick, and nourishing, but not easy of digestion. The Greeks of the present time do not call them cones, but strobili." The occurrence of the word strobilus upsets, in Wesseling's opinion, the probability of this having been a work of so early an age as Herodotus. May not, as Larcher plausibly conjectures, a word have been drawn into the text, through the ignorance of copyists, which had originally been placed in the margin as explanatory. See his note.

[1]

[2]