th
close-cropped manes, and to all the great feasts in the temples of
Attica; in the morning he composed verses in her honor, and he awoke her
by reciting them, while he flung a shower of rose petals upon her couch.
He gave banquets to his artist friends that he might revel in their envy
and admiration, when, at their conclusion, he had her exhibit herself
nude upon the table, in all the magnificence of that perfect beauty
which aroused a religious emotion in the Greeks.

Faithful to Simalion from gratitude at first, and finally enamored of
the poet and of his works, Myrrhina adored him as teacher as well as
lover. In a short time she learned to play the lyre, to recite verses in
all the known styles, she read in her lover's library so diligently that
she was able to hold her own among the guests at the banquets of
artists, and was invited out among the most brilliant hetaerae of Athens.

Simalion, constantly growing more enthusiastic over his beloved,
dissipated his fortune and his life. He ordered for her from Asia
transparent mantles embroidered with fantastic flowers, through which
shone her pearly flesh; gold dust to sprinkle upon her hair, making her
like the goddesses, which the poets and artists of Greece always painted
blonde; he charged the navigators to buy roses in Egypt of marvelous
freshness. He was steadily growing more emaciated, his skin more pallid,
and his gaze glowing with fever, coughing and lying in the arms of his
mistress, his strength slipping away.

Thus two years passed, until one autumn afternoon, stretched on the lawn
in his garden, his head resting on the knees of his beautiful inamorata,
he heard his verses sung for the last time by the clear voice of
Myrrhina, accompanied by the fluttering of her white fingers over the
chords of the lyre. The setting sun caused Minerva's lance aloft by the
Parthenon, dominating the city, to glow like a coal of fire; his boyish
hand could scarce sustain the golden cup of honey and wine. He made an
effort to kiss his mistress; the roses which crowned him fell apart,
covering Myrrhina's breast with a shower of petals, and, uttering a
plaint like that of a woman, he closed his eyes, falling upon that
breast where he had lavished the last strength of his life.

The young girl wept for him with the desperation of a widow. She cut her
splendid hair to lay it as an offering upon his tomb. She put aside her
dazzling costumes, she dressed in dark wool like the A