“Do you know,” cried the young man with delight, “this letter is from Aeschylus! Will you not seat yourself and hear it?”
“Not now,” replied Pasicles, “I came only to deliver the letter into your hands and to tell you that the writing of an ode for the recent victor of the Nemean games, takes me immediately to Argolis and I can not possibly be back until the day of yours and Eumetis’ marriage.”
“Oh,” cried Zopyrus with unconcealed dismay, “can you not come the day before, as I wish to put the date one day ahead.”
Pasicles attributed Zopyrus’ disappointment to impatience for the approaching marriage to take place, and laying a fatherly hand on his shoulder smiled as he said: “One day is short compared to eternity, my boy, and I shall have to hasten back to get here on the third night of the full moon. Farewell and give my regards to my brother poet when you write.”
“One day!” thought Zopyrus, “yes, it is short compared to eternity, but sometimes one day will determine how we spend eternity!”
He fingered absent-mindedly the parchment which Pasicles had brought him, then broke the seal and read:
“To Zopyrus at the house of the poet Pasicles in Athens, greetings from Aeschylus at the court of Hiero at Syracuse:
“You have been in my thoughts much of the time since I left our fair land. I have wondered how you fared at the Mysteries and if in the joys and sorrows of Ceres and Persephone, you recognized life’s pleasures and tragedies. Happy is he who has seen these things and then goes beneath the earth, for he knows the end of life and its God-given beginning. Remember, my son, that death is no ill for mortals, but rather a good. Ceres, Persephone, Ares, Athena, Aphrodite, Hera, Hermes and all the others are merely personifications of the various aspects of divine truth and goodness which are in reality embodied in one supreme Being of whom every star of heaven, every wave of ocean, every leaf of the forest, every blade in the meadow, every rock on the shore, every grain of sand in the desert, is a manifestation. But I will not bore you with a rehearsal of my beliefs, for we shall have glorious opportunities when I return to Greece to discuss these things at length.
“In company with the most noble Pindar whose lofty and dignified odes have won him considerable fame, and the venerable poet, Phrynichus and Simonides, whose poem exalting the battle of Marathon took first place over mine, and the nephew of Simonides, Bacchylides and others, I crossed the Isthmus of Corinth where a merchant vessel awaited us in the gulf. There was little to break the monotony of our trip through the gulf of Corinth. We skirted the northern coast of Achaia, stopping at Patræ[6] for more food. At noon of the third day we passed between the islands of Cephallenia and Zacynthus, and from then on for many days only the vault of the heavens and the blue expanse of the Ionian Sea met our gaze. Imagine then with what delight we first beheld the misty contours of land! It was not Sicily which lay before us, but the Southern end of the Italian peninsula. We got no nearer than to behold it as a long line of purple clouds, but bore on to the southward until in the glow of a magnificent sunset, Mt. Ætna like a giant clad in crimson and gold seemed to guard the glorious panorama before us. Never, my friend, have I been so impressed with the grandeur of nature, and so it was with my friends! We stood in awe together and watched the volcano grow gradually larger and more distinct till we could discern the little homes clustered about its sloping base, each with its patchwork of vegetable gardens about it. Above these, groves of olive trees, their grotesque trunks entwined with grape-vines, flourished to add their supply of olives, oil and wine to the rich exports of this island. Lifting our eyes still higher we beheld another zone of vegetation, as beautiful in its way as the lower ones. This wooded belt was densely covered with evergreen pines, birchwoods, oaks, red beeches and chestnuts, and was a veritable forest primeval. As the forest ascended the hillside it grew thinner and more stunted in appearance till only low shrubs marked its upper boundary, beyond which was barren rock, and then as if Ætna hoped to leave a favorable lasting impression, its snow-crowned summit stood out in dazzling relief against the roseate sky which marked a dying day.
“This was truly a wonderful first impression of Sicily, but it was with no less degree of delight that we passed around the little island of Ortygia the next day, and saw for the first time the gleaming white buildings and green parkways of Syracuse. Pindar called it the fairest of mortal cities.