in what he judged the noblest principles.
Love, at the same time, except in its more sensual moments, he describes
as bitter-sweet and subject to anxiety. That perturbation of the
emotions, which is inseparable from any of the deeper forms of personal
attachment, and which the necessary conditions of boy-love exasperated,
was irksome to the Greek. It is not a little curious to observe how all
the poets of the despotic age resent and fret against the force of their
own feeling, differing herein from the singers of chivalry, who
idealised the very pains of passion.

Of Ibycus, who was celebrated among the ancients as the lyrist of
paiderastia,[69] very little has been preserved to us, but that little
is sufficient to indicate the fervid and voluptuous style of his art.
His imagery resembles that of Anacreon. The onset of love, for instance,
in one fragment is compared to the down-swooping of a Thracian
whirlwind; in another the poet trembles at the approach of Eros like an
old racehorse who is dragged forth to prove his speed once more.

Of the genuine Anacreon we possess more numerous and longer fragments,
and the names of his favourites, Cleobulus, Smerdies, Leucaspis, are
famous. The general tone of his love-poems is relaxed and Oriental, and
his language abounds in phrases indicative of sensuality. The following
may be selected:--

"Cleobulus I love, for Cleobulus I am mad, Cleobulus I watch and
worship with my gaze."[70]

Again:--

"O boy, with the maiden's eyes, I seek and follow thee, but thou
heedest not, nor knowest that thou art my soul's charioteer."

In another place he speaks of[71]--

"Love, the virginal, gleaming and radiant with desire."

_Syneban_ (to pass the time of youth with friends) is a word which
Anacreon may be said to have made current in Greek. It occurs twice in
his fragments,[72] and exactly expresses the luxurious enjoyment of
youthful grace and beauty which appear to have been his ideal of love.
We are very far here from the Achilleian friendship of the _Iliad_. Yet,
occasionally, Anacreon uses images of great force to describe the attack
of passion, as when he says that love has smitten him with a huge axe,
and plunged him in a wintry torrent.[73]

It must be remembered that both Anacreon and Ibycus were court poets,
singing in the palaces of Polycrates and Hippias. The youths they
celebrated were probably little better than the _exoleti_ of a Roman
Emper