: Sculptured tombs of Hellas by Gardner Percy - Sculpture Greek; Sepulchral monuments Greece; Funeral rites and ceremonies Greece

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iry as to the name of the dead person, then goes on to narrate the history of her life, and ends with an appeal to Persephone, and a kindly greeting to survivors:--

O Maid of many names, Queen ruling wide, Her by the hand to pious places guide. On all who, passing, greet the soul below With kindly word, may God some good bestow.

I propose, however, to give in this place renderings of a few of these literary epitaphs, selecting such as belong to an earlier period, and such as have some interest in their matter, and not merely in their style. In some cases I give a version of my own; in other cases I use the elegant translations which Dr. James Williams, of Lincoln College, has kindly placed at my disposal.

We find not rarely on Greek tombs of all periods colloquies between the dead and wayfarers. The following is a literary version by Leonidas of such a dialogue, carried on in a style of stately courtesy:--

The following bears the name of Sappho:--

The dust of Timas: ere her bridal she Saw the dark chamber of Persephone. Their lovely hair her playmates offered here, Cut off to honour her who was so dear.

Saon the son of Dicon here doth lie In holy sleep: the good can never die.

Dear earth, receive Amyntichus to rest, Mindful of all his labour spent on thee; Thee with the boughs of Bacchus oft he dressed, And in thee planted oft the olive-tree, Filled thee with Deo's grain, and trenches led To make thee rich in herbs and autumn fruits. Lie thou then lightly on his hoary head, And busk his tomb with springtide's tender shoots.

Shepherds, who tend upon yon mountain steep Your herds of goats and flocks of fleecy sheep, A little gift Clitagoras to-day For sake of Queen Persephone doth pray; I would that sheep should bleat, and from a rock A shepherd pipe soft music to his flock; And let one hind cull fresh young meadow-bloom In early spring, and crown therewith my tomb; Another take and milk a mother ewe And with the stream this funeral stone bedew; The dead are reached by kindly acts of men, And e'en the dead can make return again.

This is a pastoral picture well worthy of Theocritus; the last two lines show how persistently there lingered among the Greek peasants that notion of the exchange of services between dead and living of which I have spoken above.

Sometimes not only human beings but also favourite animals had their tombs and epitaphs. Especially, we are told, was this the case at Agrigentum in Sicily, a city which paid dearly for its luxury and effeminacy at the time of the Carthaginian invasion of the end of the fifth century. The following, by Meleager, was for a hare:--

A long-eared hare was I and swift of feet, When Phaenium stole me from my mother's breast. She gave me young spring flowers to be my meat, And in her bosom oft I lay caressed. True mother she! but death soon came to me, Good living made me fat and overfed. Here lie I 'neath her chamber floor, that she In dreams may see my tomb beside her bed.

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