Eponine

“ The gamin Gavroche puts in a strong plea for mercy, and his sister Eponine, if Hugo had chosen to take more trouble with her, might have been a great, and is actually the most interesting, character. But Cosette—the cosseted Cosette—Hugo did not know our word or he would have seen the danger—is merely a pretty and rather selfish little doll, and her precious lover Marius is almost ineffable. ”

“ Who does not know that the poets are prophets, and that nothing is hidden from them? Being a poet myself, and crowned with Apollo’s laurel, I will make known to all the last incarnation of Eunoia. The eternal Helen is close to us; she is looking at us, and we are looking at her. You see that woman reclining on the cushions of her couch—so beautiful and so contemplative—whose eyes shed tears, and whose lips abound with kisses! It is she! Lovely as in the time of Priam and the halcyon days of Asia, Eunoia is now called Thais. ”

“ But in truth I could never have paused to ask what in such a case oath or law permitted, "Listen, Eunané," I said, "and be calm. Not only Eveena, not only I, but hundreds, thousands, of the best and kindliest men and women of your world hold this faith as fast as we do. You feel what Eveena is. What she is and what others are not, she owes to this trust:—to the assurance of a Power unseen, that rules our lives and fortunes and watches our conduct, that will exact an account thereof, that holds us as His children, and will never part with us. ”

“ Nitager’s scar-covered officers listened with astonishment to the ready speech of Eunana, and thought, “He will be raised above others!”
“Eunana,” said the minister, “thou art not only diligent, but pious; not only pious, but watchful as an ibis over water. The gods have poured out on thee every virtue: they have given thee serpent cunning, with the eye of a falcon.”
“Pure truth flows from thy lips, worthiness,” added Eunana. “Were it not for my wonderful sight, I should not have seen the two scarabs.” ”

“ Yea, and two other sons of Poseidon came; one Erginus, who left the citadel of glorious Miletus, the other proud Ancaeus, who left Parthenia, the seat of Imbrasion Hera; both boasted their skill in sea-craft and in war.
After them from Calydon came the son of Oeneus, strong Meleagrus, and Laocoon—Laocoon the brother of Oeneus, though not by the same mother, for a serving-woman bare him; him, now growing old, Oeneus sent to guard his son: thus Meleagrus, still a youth, entered the bold band of heroes. ”

“ Here are light, graceful creations of Hellenic, yonder heavy, sombre ones of Egyptian art, and in the background the exquisite azure of the eternal sea, which the marvellous structure of the heptastadium unites to the land; while on the island of Pharos the lighthouse of Sostratus towers aloft almost to the sky, and with a flood of light points out the way to mariners who approach the great harbour at night. Countless vessels are also at anchor in the Eunostus. The riches of the whole earth flow into both havens. ”

“ In the first place, let us take the word Enon. The river Liane, which runs into the sea at Boulogne, was known to the Romans as the Fluvius Enna. It is so marked on the most ancient maps of northern Gaul. It is so written in Latin by Malbrancq. Near Desvres—once called Desurennes, or Desvres-sur-Ennes—there is marked a little village of the same name, called also Enna. I will not be said to strain language, which has survived so many centuries, very severely when I venture to identify St. Patrick's Enon with this undoubtedly Roman Enon. ”

“ Sorest tries the household band.
Closer favourite's kisses cling,
Favourite's fingers sharper sting.'"
"Very likely," replied Eunané. "I cannot understand any more than you can why Eveena screens instead of punishing us; why she endures what a word to him would put down under her sandal; but she does. Does she cast no shadow because it never darkens his presence to us? And after all, her mind is not a deeper darkness to me than his. He enjoys life as no man here does; but what he enjoys most is a good chance of losing it; while those who find it so tedious guard it like watch-dragons. ”

“ There was little to be seen here now of native Egyptian life; it looked as though some magician had transported a part of Medina itself to the shores of the Nile. Men and beasts, dwellings and shops, though they had adopted much of what they had found in this ancient land of culture, still bore the stamp of their origin; and wherever Orion’s eye fell on one of his fellow-countrymen, he was a laborer or a scribe in the service of the conquerors who had so quickly made themselves at home. ”

“ ANEMONE.—The origin of the Anemone, according to Ovid, is to be found in the death of Adonis, the favourite of Venus. Desperately wounded by a boar to which he had given chase, the ill-fated youth lay expiring on the blood-stained grass, when he was found by Venus, who, overcome with grief, determined that her fallen lover should hereafter live as a flower. ”

“ The only quality which Enna has not lost is the impregnable nature of its cliffs. A few poplars and thorns are all that remain of its forests. Did we not know that the myth of Demeter and Persephone was a poem of seed-time and harvest, we might be tempted, while sitting on the crags of Castro Giovanni and looking toward the lake, to fancy that in old days a village dependent upon Enna, and therefore called her daughter, might have occupied the site of the lake, and that this village might have been withdrawn into the earth by the volcanic action which produced the cavity. ”

“ Some judges, however, consider that the real Ebony-tree is the Diospyrus Ebenus, a native of Jamaica.——In ancient times it was much more in use and esteem. Pluto, the sovereign of the infernal regions, is represented as seated on a throne of Ebony; the statues of the Egyptian gods were wrought in Ebony. According to Pausanias, the statue of the Pythian Apollo was formed of this wood; and that writer recounts that a Cyprian, well versed in plant lore, had told him that the true and veritable Ebony was a plant that produced neither leaf, flower, nor fruit ”

“ This is interrupted by the entrance of Oceanus and a train of Nereids. The presence of all these immortals is too much for Endymion’s human senses: he swoons; a ring of Nereids lift and carry him tenderly away; he is aware of a message of hope and cheer from his goddess, written in starlight on the dark; and when he comes to himself, finds that he is restored to earth, lying on the grass beside a forest pool in his native Caria. ”

“ But Harpax quick rejoined,
"I, for myself, would have this Merope,
And force Œnopion render up his crown,
If ye will aid me." "We will give our aid,"
Autarces cried—"and yet methinks this love
Affecting doubly, as by the self-same blow,
Might from some spells in the orgie-fumes arise?
Ye marked, wise Akinetos would not move."
"Doubtless 't was wise," Encolyon said, "More care
Befits our steps." They rose and strode away.
⁠There is a voice that floats upon the breeze
From a heathed mountain ”

“ But Eunané's agitation was so violent and persistent, despite all Eveena's soothing, that I was at last seriously apprehensive of its effect upon the latter. The moment we were alone Eveena said—
"I have never seen illness, but if Eunané is not ill, and very ill, all I have gathered in my father's household from such books as he has allowed me, and from his own conversation, deceives me wholly; and yet no illness of which I have ever heard in the slightest degree resembles this."
"I take it to be," I said, "what on Earth women call hysteria and men temper." ”

“ Among the Greeks, it would seem that the Onion was considered symbolic of generation, since we find that at the nuptials of Iphicrates with the daughter of King Cotys, he received, among other presents, a jar of snow, a jar of Lentils, and a jar of Onions.——It is thought that, as with the Egyptians, or with the English Druids, the Onion was an emblem of the deity, and to this day it is a custom in some parts of England for girls to divine by it. ”

“ Thither, in search of high adventure, went all the heroes of Greece, just as they joined the quest of the Golden Fleece, and, in a later day, went to the rescue of Fair Helen in the Trojan War.
For Oeneus, king of Calydon, had neglected the temples of Diana, and she had sent a monstrous boar to lay waste all the fields and farms in the country. The people had never seen so terrible a beast, and they soon wished that they had never offended the goddess who keeps the woods clear of such monsters. ”

“ King Œnopion ruled this land of ease and plenty, and his daughter Merope was famed through all Ionia for her beauty.
Hardly had Orion beheld this princess when he found his heart burn within him at the sight or thought of her. Boldly he demanded her in marriage.
But King Œnopion, proud of his lineage as son of Dionysus and Ariadne, thought it far from fitting that his daughter should wed this wandering woodsman, [34] superhuman as his strength might be. ”

“ That portion of the entrails, with which the Dankalli, in common with the other savage inhabitants of this part of Africa, are said to adorn themselves, is the omentum, or peritoneal covering of the bowels, and which corresponds with what, in our butchers’ shops, is called the leaf, and from which lard is rendered. This omentum abounds with fat, easily melted by the sun. It is taken and twisted by the hands into a kind of rope, which is tied around the neck, the ends hanging low behind the back. ”

“ I said, "for ages had no such diseases as those which we on Earth most dread; those which, communicated through water, air, or solid particles, spread from one person to another, endangering especially those who come nearest to the sufferers. Whoever approaches Eunané risks all that I fear for her, and that 'all' means very probably speedy death. To leave her alone is impossible; and if I cannot report that she is fully cared for in other hands, no command, nothing short of actual compulsion, will keep Eveena away from her." ”

“ Last, in the extreme north angle of the pediment, in the evening, is seen the gentle Selene, the goddess of the moon, the goddess of the evening, guiding her tired steeds, so different from those seen coming out of the sea in the morning, down into the cool, quiet waters of the deep, typifying not alone the close of the day but the close of the reign of Athena and the end of time.
The gods of the Greeks are no more. ”

“ He dropped from his horse and ran so quickly that on his breast the images of the gods or the tablets with their names rattled loudly. This was Eunana in great excitement.
All turned to him, and this gave him pleasure apparently.
"Erpatr, the loftiest lips," cried Eunana, bending before Ramses. "When, in accordance with thy divine command, I rode at the head of a detachment, looking carefully at all things, I noticed on the highroad two beautiful scarabs. Each of these sacred beetles was rolling an earth ball toward the sands near the roadside." ”

“ He married Helice, by whom he had a daughter called Hero, or Merope, of whom the giant Orion became enamoured. The father, unwilling to give his daughter to such a lover, and afraid of provoking him by an open refusal, evaded his applications, and at last put out his eyes when he was intoxicated. Some suppose that this violence was offered to Orion after he had dishonoured Merope. Œnopion received the island of Chios from Rhadamanthus, who had conquered most of the islands of the Ægean sea, and his tomb was still seen there in the age of Pausanias. ”

“ Beautiful on the hills is the light of starry Selené,
Beautiful, cruel, and cold is the glance of starry Selene;
Chilled to the heart by her kiss, Endymion slumbers on Latmos,
Never again to awake, ah, me! to the glory of living.
⁠Ai, that the gifts of the gods should be so fatal to mortals!
Year follows year, and race follows race, but Endymion wakes not.
⁠Maids in the Latmian valleys bewailed for the beautiful shepherd,
Wept for his golden hair, and his ready foot in the Choros,
Wept for the summer eves when they wandered with him on the hillside. ”

“ This is a canal."
"But how darest Thou use evil words against the warriors of his holiness?" asked Eunana, who stood there.
"Thou must be an Egyptian and a great person, I see that," said the slave; "so I answer thee that this canal belongs to a mighty lord; he is the manager and secretary of one who bears the fan for his worthiness the nomarch of Memphis. Be on thy guard or misfortune will strike thee!"
"Do your work," said Eunana, with a patronizing tone, to the Greek soldiers who began to look at the slave. ”

“ Œneus, king of Kalydôn, in the vintage sacrifices which he offered to the gods, omitted to include Artemis: the misguided man either forgot her or cared not for her; [332] and the goddess, provoked by such an insult, sent against the vineyards of Œneus a wild boar, of vast size and strength, who tore up the trees by the root and laid prostrate all their fruit. ”

“ The elevated tracts near the Euxine appear to have been the most wooded,—especially Kytôrus: the Parthenius, the Sangarius, the Halys, and the Iris, are all considerable streams flowing northward towards that sea. Nevertheless, the plain land interspersed through these numerous elevations was often of the greatest fertility; and as a whole, the peninsula of Asia Minor was considered as highly productive by the ancients, in grain, wine, fruit, cattle, and in many parts, oil; though the cold central plain did not carry the olive. ”

“ CHAPTER XIX - A COMPLETE ESTABLISHMENT. Before I slept Eveena had convinced me, much to my own discomfiture, how very limited must be any authority that could be delegated to her. In such a household there could be no second head or deputy, and an attempt to devolve any effective charge on her would only involve her in trouble and odium. Even at the breakfast, spread as usual in the centre of the peristyle, she entreated that we should present ourselves separately. Eunané appeared to have performed very dexterously the novel duty assigned to her. ”