Cratylus

“ Cratippus, a Peripatetic philosopher of Mytilene, contemporary of Pompey and Cicero; soothed the sunken spirit of the former after the defeat at Pharsalia with the consolations of philosophy.
Cratylus, a dialogue of Plato's on the connection between language and thought.
Crawford, Marion, a novelist, born in Tuscany, of American origin, son of the succeeding; spent a good deal of his early years in India, and now lives partly in New York and partly in Italy; his works, which are numerous, are chiefly novels, his first "Mr. Isaacs" (1882) , original and striking; an able writer, and a scholarly ”

“ Atreus again, for his murder of Chrysippus, and his cruelty to Thyestes, is rightly named Atreus, which, to the eye of the etymologist, is ateros (destructive) , ateires (stubborn) , atreotos (fearless) ; and Pelops is o ta pelas oron (he who sees what is near only) , because in his eagerness to win Hippodamia, he was unconscious of the remoter consequences which the murder of Myrtilus would entail upon his race. The name Tantalus, if slightly changed, offers two etymologies ”

“ Then, again, a new name is frequently adopted by the discoverer of a new feature; and a number of American genera, minus a rattle altogether, are included among the Crotalidæ, an anomaly which will be presently explained. Here we have to do with only the rattlesnake proper, viz. the ‘Viper with the Bell,’ Vipera caudisona of Tyson, and the Crotalus of Linnæus.
This word Crotalus, simply a rattle, from the Greek word crotalon, and the Latin crotalia and crotalum, a kind of castanets, is as suitable as any that could possibly have been assigned to the snake ”

“ And now two smaller Cratchits, boy and girl, came tearing in, screaming that outside the baker’s they had smelt the goose, and known it for their own; and basking in luxurious thoughts of sage and onion, these young Cratchits danced about the table, and exalted Master Peter Cratchit to the skies, while he (not proud, although his collars nearly choked him) blew the fire, until the slow potatoes bubbling up, knocked loudly at the saucepan-lid to be let out and peeled. ”

“ But of this Craterus brings no written proof, neither the sentence of his condemnation, nor the decree of the people; though in general it is tolerably usual with him to set down such things and to cite his authors. Almost all others who have spoken of the misdeeds of the people towards their generals, collect them all together, and tell us of the banishment of Themistocles, Miltiades's bonds, Pericles's fine, and the death of Paches in the judgment hall, who, upon receiving sentence, killed himself on the hustings, with many things of the like nature. They add the banishment of Aristides ”

“ Cratesipolis gave way neither to grief nor despair. Rallying the broken forces, she assumed the command, and soon restored order and discipline. The Sicyonians, who never suspected that a woman could take the command of the army, rose in rebellion, and barred the city gates. Cratesipolis, enraged as much at the insult as at the treachery with which they had slain her husband, laid siege to Sicyon, routed the insurgents in a hotly-contested battle, and took the city by storm (B.C. 317) , when, by her command, thirty of the ringleaders were crucified. ”

“ Craterus was left with about a third of the army opposite to [309] Porus’s camp. He was to make a feint of crossing, and convert it into a real attempt if he saw a chance of making good his landing. You see the real difficulty was in the enemy’s elephants. Horses will not face elephants. If Porus moved his elephants away, then Craterus was to make the attempt in earnest. Some other troops were posted half way between the camp and the island. These were to make another feint. The king himself was going to force a passage at all hazards. ”

“ As the terrible Romans drew near Caractacus addressed his men, bidding them remember how their sires had driven back great Cæsar himself, and encouraging them to strike for home and freedom. The Britons, however, were again conquered. Roman discipline, Roman armour, and Roman swords were too much for them. Caractacus escaped, and fled to the court of his step-mother, Cartismandua, who to her eternal shame basely betrayed him to the foe against whom he had waged an unceasing struggle for nine years. Roman chains fettered the limbs of the British champion, and his capture was a triumph. ”

“ There came to me the knowledge that made my brain a frightful thing in which shapes of darkness would ever swirl and scream; the dreadful comprehension of when each Baron Kralitz was initiated into the brotherhood of blood. I knew—I knew—that no coffin had ever been placed unoccupied in the tombs, and I read upon the stone sarcophagus at my feet the inscription that made my doom known to me—my own name, "Franz, twenty-first Baron Kralitz." ”

“ Roused by the taunt, Cratinus put forth all his strength, and in 423 B.C. produced the Πυτίνη, or Bottle, which gained the first prize over the Clouds of Aristophanes. In this comedy, good-humouredly making fun of his own weakness, Cratinus represents the comic muse as the faithful wife of his youth. His guilty fondness for a rival—the bottle—has aroused her jealousy. She demands a divorce from the archon; but her husband’s love is not dead and he returns penitent to her side. ”

“ The Grecian army, also, in Thessaly, after Leonnatus and the Macedonians who came with him out of Asia, had arrived and joined Antipater, fought and beat them in a battle. Leonnatus was killed in the fight, Antiphilus commanding the foot, and Menon, the Thessalian, the horse. But not long after, Craterus crossed from Asia with numerous forces; a pitched battle was fought at Cranon; the Greeks were beaten; though not, indeed, in a signal defeat, nor with any great loss of men. ”

“ P. 32, ll. 354 ff.—The Hierophant's address is apparently a parody of some similar warning off of the impure at the Mysteries before the addresses to Korê (the Maiden) , Demêter, and Iacchus. As to the allusions: Cratînus is the celebrated comic poet, precursor and rival of Aristophanes. He was personally a burly and vigorous "Beef-eater," and the word is additionally suitable in this context because the ceremonial eating of an ox's flesh, being sacramentally the flesh of Dionysus, the Mystic Bull of Zeus, was an essential part of the Orphic Mysteries. ”

“ She reached her husband safely, and readily and cheerfully shared with him in all the inconveniences of a foreign residence. When the soldiers came to take Cratesiclea to the scaffold, she led her by the hand, assisted in bearing her robe, [1138] and desired her to exert all her courage, 398though she was far from being afraid of death, and desired no other favour than that she might die before her children. But when they arrived at the place of execution the children suffered before her eyes; and then Cratesiclea was despatched, uttering in her extreme distress only these words: ‘Oh! ”

“ It walks like the crane with long measured strides. When irritated or discomposed, or influenced by affection to its mate, it makes with its bill a repeated clattering, which the ancients express by the significant words crepitat and glotterat, [424] and which Petronius accurately marks by the epithet crotalistria, [425] formed from crotalum, the castanet or rattle. In this state of agitation it bends its head back, so that the lower mandible appears uppermost, the bill lies almost parallel on the back, and the two mandibles strike violently against each other ”

“ The Carthaginians returned no answer to these insolent demands; but it is probable their silence must soon have been construed into consent, had it not been for the valour of a Spartan of the name of Xanthippus. This individual was a mere mercenary, who put other people to death for his own living; but he was, at all events, a working man, and infused his own spirit of energy into the Carthaginian army. He personally superintended the training, not only of the men, but of the elephants, and taught the soldiers how to wield as a power those hitherto unwieldy animals. ”

“ Hence the Crater is indeed essentially vivific, since souls also are certain lives, but it is the first-effective cause of souls, according to the peculiarity of hyparxis, and is the uniform and all-perfect monad, not of every life, but of that which is psychical. For from this Crater the soul of the universe subsists, and likewise the second and third genera of partible souls, and of those souls that are allotted a progression between these. ”

“ So rapid are the movements communicated by the Crotalus to its tail that they can scarcely be distinguished. So long as the Crotalus believes itself menaced it remains in the position that we have just described, and continues to sound its rattle. If one withdraws from the irritated snake, the sound gradually lessens and ceases, to begin again more vigorously when the reptile is once more approached. ”

“ The great plain between the hills and the sea grows very impressive; so silent it is, so mournfully desolate, so haunted with memories of vanished glory. I looked at the Crathis—the Crati of Cosenza—here beginning to spread into a sea-marsh; the waters which used to flow over golden sands, which made white the oxen, and sunny-haired the children, that bathed in them, are now lost amid a wilderness poisoned by their own vapours.
The railway station, like all in this region, was set about with eucalyptus. ”

“ When the Carthaginians saw, in his exercising of their forces near the city, the manner in which he drew them up in order of battle, made them advance or retreat on the first signal, file off with order and expedition; in a word, perform all the evolutions and movements of the military art; they were struck with astonishment, and owned, that the ablest generals which Carthage had hitherto produced, knew nothing in comparison of Xanthippus. ”

“ It is no uncommon thing for a flock to contain all of the four species of tit just described, a number of white-eyes, some nuthatches, warblers, tree-creepers, a woodpecker or two, and possibly some sibias and laughing-thrushes.
THE CRATEROPODIDÆ OR BABBLER FAMILY
The Crateropodidæ form a most heterogeneous collection of birds, including, as they do, such divers fowls as babblers, whistling-thrushes, bulbuls, and white-eyes. Whenever a systematist comes across an Asiatic bird of which he can make nothing, he classes it among the Crateropodidæ. ”

“ I was one with the rest of those dark warders, and I joined them in the saturnalia of horror until the scarred man spoke to us again.
"Our time grows short," he said, his scarred and bearded white face like a gargoyle's in the half-light. "We must depart soon. But you are a true Kralitz, Franz, and we shall meet again, and feast again, and make merry for longer than you think. One last pledge!"
I gave it to him. "To the House of Kralitz! May it never fall!"
And with an exultant shout we drained the pungent dregs of the liquor. ”

“ Finding Carthage, not (as the Romans thought) low and in an ill condition, but well manned, full of riches and all sorts of arms and ammunition, and perceiving the Carthaginians carry it high, he conceived that it was not a time for the Romans to adjust affairs between them and Masinissa; but rather that they themselves would fall into danger, unless they should find means to check this rapid new growth of Rome's ancient irreconcilable enemy. ”

“ Hephaestus.
Would that it were another's craft, not mine!
Kratos.
Why, all things are a burden save to rule
Over the Gods; for none is free but Zeus.
Hephaestus.
To that I answer not, knowing it true.
Kratos.
Why, then, make haste to cast the chains about him,
Lest glancing down on thee the Father's eye
Behold a laggard and a loiterer.
Hephaestus.
Here are the iron bracelets for his arms.
Kratos.
Fasten them round his arms with all thy strength!
Strike with thy hammer! Nail him to the rocks!
Hephaestus.
'Tis done! and would that it were done less well!
Kratos. ”

“ Kratos.
Now take thine iron spike and drive it in,
Until it gnaw clean through the rebel's breast.
Hephaestus.
Woe's me, Prometheus, for thy weight of woe!
Kratos.
Still shirking? still a-groaning for the foes
Of Zeus? Anon thou'lt wail thine own mishap.
Hephaestus.
Thou seest what eyes scarce bear to look upon!
Kratos.
I see this fellow getting his deserts!
But strap him with a belt about his ribs.
Hephaestus.
I do what I must do: for thee—less words!
Kratos.
'Words,' quotha? Aye, and shout 'em if need be. ”

“ Kreutz and Crawley were in communication.
'There is more than chance in that frightful appearance,' I heard Crawley say. 'And this calm too—it will never end. God have mercy on us! Is there no man that will undertake to sink the body? I cannot stand the gaze of these white balls. See! the face is directed towards me; and yet I did not do the deed, though I authorized it. Will no one save me from the glare of the grim avenger? I will give twenty gold pieces to the man who will remove it to the deep. ”

“ Had it not been better, says he further,527 for the Carthaginians to have had originally a Critias, or a Diagoras, who were open and undisguised atheists, for their lawgivers, than to have established so frantic and wicked a religion? Could the Typhons and the giants, (the avowed enemies of the gods,) had they gained a victory over them, have established more abominable sacrifices?
Such were the sentiments which a heathen entertained of this part of the Carthaginian worship. One would indeed scarce believe that mankind were capable of such madness and frenzy. ”