Thus spake his father, and Polydeukes doubted not which counsel he should choose. So Zeus unsealed the eye, and presently the tongue also, of Kastor of the brazen mail.
[Footnote 3: Or perhaps: 'Neither were Hypermnestra's story misplaced here, how she, &c.']
[Footnote 5: Disgust at hearing anything profusely praised.]
[Footnote 6: At Corinth, in the Isthmian games.]
[Footnote 10: The Athenian prize seems to have been an olive-bough in a vase of burnt clay.]
[Footnote 12: I. e. with prizes of cloaks.]
[Footnote 13: An ancestor of Theaios. Probably he had given Theoxenia. See Ol. III.]
[Footnote 18: Either of the thunderbolt, or of a funeral-pile.]
[Footnote 19: Both brothers were nominally sons of Tyndareus, but really only Kastor was: Polydeukes was a son of Zeus.]
ON HIS ELECTION TO THE PRESIDENCY OF THE SENATE.
This ode again was written neither for a Nemean nor for any other athletic victory, but for the [Greek: eisitaeria] or initiatory ceremonies at the election of a new [Greek: prytanis] of Tenedos. The Prytanis would seem to have been a kind of President of the Senate. The date is unknown.
Daughter of Rhea, who hast in thy keeping the city halls[1], O Hestia! sister of highest Zeus and of Hera sharer of his throne, with good-will welcome Aristagoras to thy sanctuary, with good-will also his fellows[2] who draw nigh to thy glorious sceptre, for they in paying honour unto thee keep Tenedos in her place erect, by drink-offerings glorifying thee many times before the other gods, and many times by the savour of burnt sacrifice; and the sound of their lutes is loud, and of their songs: and at their tables never-failing are celebrated the rites of Zeus, the stranger's friend.
So with fair fame and unvexed heart may Aristagoras fulfil his twelve-month term.
Blessed among men I count his father Arkesilas, and himself for his splendid body and his heritage of a dauntless heart.
But if any man shall possess wealth, and withal surpass his fellows in comely form, and in games have shown his strength to be the best, let such an one remember that his raiment is upon mortal limbs, and that the earth shall be his vesture at the end.
Yet in good words of his fellow-citizens is it meet that his praise be told, and that we make his name comely with notes of honey-sounding song.