gh I faint while I listen. Father, why do I hear the things
others hear not--voices calling to unknown hunters of wide fields, or to
herdsmen, shepherds of the starry flocks?"

Apollo answered the shepherd: "Damon, a song stole from the silence
while the gods were not yet, and a thousand ages passed ere they came,
called forth by the music; and a thousand ages they listened, and then
joined in the song. Then began the worlds to glimmer shadowy about them,
and bright beings to bow before them. These, their children, began in
their turn to sing the song that calls forth and awakens life. He is
master of all things who has learned their music. Damon, heed not the
shadows, but the voices. The voices have a message to thee from beyond
the gods. Learn their song and sing it over again to the people until
their hearts, too, grow sick with longing, and they can hear the song
within themselves. Oh, my son, I see far off how the nations shall join
in it as in a chorus, and, hearing it, the rushing planets shall cease
from their speed and be steadfast. Men shall hold starry sway."

The face of the god shone through the face of the old man, and it was
so full of secretness that, filled with awe, Damon, the herdsman, passed
from the presence, and a strange fire was kindled in his heart. The
songs that he sang thereafter caused childhood and peace to pass from
the dwellers in the woods.

Then the two lovers, Dion and Nemra, came in and stood before Apollo,
and Dion spake: "Father, you who are so wise can tell us what love is,
so that we shall never miss it. Old Tithonus nods his gray head at us as
we pass. He says only with the changeless gods has love endurance, and
for men the loving time is short, and its sweetness is soon over."

Neaera added: "But it is not true, father, for his drowsy eyes light
when he remembers the old days, when he was happy and proud in love as
we are."

Apollo answered: "My children, I will tell you the legend how love came
into the world, and how it may endure. On high Olympus the gods held
council at the making of man, and each had brought a gift, and each
gave to man something of their own nature. Aphrodite, the loveliest and
sweetest, paused, and was about to add a new grace to his person; but
Eros cried: 'Let them not be so lovely without; let them be lovelier
within. Put your own soul in, O mother.' The mighty mother smiled, and
so it was. And now, whenever love is like hers, which asks not retur