s the son of
Oikleus, when the earth had swallowed him and his shining steeds. For
afterward, when on seven pyres dead men were burnt, the son[2] of
Talaos spake on this wise: 'I seek the eye of my host, him who was
alike a good seer and a good fighter with the spear.'

This praise also belongeth to the Syracusan who is lord of this
triumphal song. I who am no friend of strife or wrongful quarrel will
bear him this witness even with a solemn oath, and the sweet voice of
the Muses shall not say me nay.

O Phintis[3] yoke me now with all speed the strength of thy mules that
on the clear highway we may set our car, that I may go up to the far
beginning of this race. For those mules know well to lead the way in
this course as in others, who at Olympia have won crowns: it behoveth
them that we throw open to them the gates of song, for to Pitane by
Eurotas' stream must I begone betimes to-day.

Now Pitane[4], they say, lay with Poseidon the son of Kronos and
bare the child Euadne with tresses iris-dark. The fruit of her body
unwedded she hid by her robe's folds, and in the month of her delivery
she sent her handmaids and bade them give the child to the hero son[5]
of Elatos to rear, who was lord of the men of Arcady who dwelt at
Phaisane, and had for his lot Alpheos to dwell beside.

There was the child Euadne nurtured, and by Apollo's side she first
knew the joys of Aphrodite.

But she might not always hide from Aipytos the seed of the god within
her; and he in his heart struggling with bitter strain against a grief
too great for speech betook him to Pytho that he might ask of the
oracle concerning the intolerable woe.

But she beneath a thicket's shade put from her silver pitcher and her
girdle of scarlet web, and she brought forth a boy in whom was the
spirit of God. By her side the gold-haired god set kindly Eleutho and
the Fates, and from her womb in easy travail came forth Iamos to the
light. Him in her anguish she left upon the ground, but by the counsel
of gods two bright-eyed serpents nursed and fed him with the harmless
venom[6] of the bee.

But when the king came back from rocky Delphi in his chariot he asked
all who were in the house concerning the child whom Euadne had born;
for he said that the sire whereof he was begotten was Phoibos, and
that he should be a prophet unto the people of the land excelling all
mortal men, and that his seed should be for ever.

Such was his tale, but they answered that th