The readers of Lucian’s True History on finishing it feel that they have drunk with him more from his eternal springs of joy and laughter than from his irony, in fact that his irony gives only a few drops of angostura bitters to the heady cocktails of his wit. And at the end the readers of this romance are ready today to salute the shade of Lucian as Andrew Lang did:[354]
“In what bower, oh Lucian, of your rediscovered Islands Fortunate are you now reclining; the delight of the fair, the learned, the witty, and the brave?...
“There, among the vines that bear twelve times in the year, more excellent than all the vineyards of Touraine, while the song-birds bring you flowers from vales enchanted, and the shapes of the Blessed come and go, beautiful in wind-woven raiment of sunset hues; there, in a land that knows not age, nor winter, midnight, nor autumn, nor noon, where the silver twilight of summer-dawn is perennial, where youth does not wax spectre-pale and die; there, my Lucian, you are crowned the Prince of the Paradise of Mirth.”
It may seem anti-climax to turn from the True History to Lucian’s other romance, the Metamorphoses, for the second exists only in an epitome by another hand. Since however this epitome is included in all the best manuscripts and has been proved conclusively by B. E. Perry to be a condensation of an original Metamorphoses by Lucian on the basis of spirit, vocabulary, syntax and phraseology, we must try to form some idea of this other romance.[355]
As the True History is a satire of travellers’ tales, this epitome, Lucius or Ass, is primarily a satire of magic and magic rites. Just as in the True History not only epic poets and historians were parodied, but philosophers came in for their share of ironic comment, so in Lucius or Ass satire is directed not merely against magicians, but also against corrupt priests and frail women. The satire is of the earth, earthy, very near the folk-story from which it may have originated. Lucius or Ass is Everyman in his credulity, gullibility and bestiality. The only heroines in his murky world are a witch-woman and a corrupt maid. This epitome has two great values: it gives us some idea of Lucian’s lost Metamorphoses, and hence affords a basis for comparison with Apuleius’ great Latin novel Metamorphoses. It will prove convenient I hope, to have a rather full outline presented here in English for purposes of discussion and comparison. This Greek Lucius or Ass like the True History is written in the first person, but Lucius of Patrae, the hero, not the author, is the narrator. In my brief résumé, I have found it clearer to write Lucius’ account in the third person.
Once upon a time on a journey to Thessaly Lucius inquires of some fellow travellers whereabouts in the city of Hypata a man named Hipparchus lives, for he is carrying a letter of introduction to him. On his arrival he stays at Hipparchus’ house. Only his wife and a maid Palaestra lived with him. On his host’s inquiring the object of his travels, Lucius says he is on his way to Larissa. He conceals the fact that he is searching for women who deal in magic. While walking around the city, he meets an old friend of his mother named Abroea, who warns him against the wife of Hipparchus because she is a witch. Lucius, delighted with this news, returns to Hipparchus’ house and in the absence of his host and hostess makes love to Palaestra with the purpose of persuading the maid to acquaint him with her mistress’ magic powers. At the close of a night of revel, Lucius persuades Palaestra to show him her mistress at her magic rites.
A few nights later Palaestra fulfills her promise by leading Lucius at dead of night to the door of her lady’s bedroom where through a crack he can watch her proceedings. She mutters to her lamp. She strips. She rubs her naked body with ointment from a little box. Gradually she is transformed into an owl and flies away to her lover. Lucius then prevails upon Palaestra to let him attempt the same transformation. By ill luck the maid brings him the wrong box of ointment so that he is changed not into a bird, but into an ass. Palaestra soothingly assures him that the antidote is simple, just a meal of roses, and if her dearest will pass the night quietly in the stable, in the morning she will gather the flowers and recover her Lucius.
But this simple plan gangs a-gley, for in the night robbers raid the house, secure much booty and to carry it steal also the horse and the real ass of Hipparchus and Lucius. So the man-ass, heavily burdened, is driven to the robbers’ home. One old woman is their care-taker. Several days later the robbers return from one of their forays bringing in as booty a young woman whom they have kidnapped. Later on in the absence of the brigands the girl tries to escape riding on the ass, but both are captured by the robbers. On their return, they find that the old woman in terror has hanged herself.
The robbers plan a dreadful punishment for the culprits: to kill the ass, disembowel him and sew the girl up alive in his paunch to die by slow torture. But before they achieve this horror, a company of soldiers arrives, captures the whole band and carries them off to a magistrate. They had been conducted to the robbers’ den by the fiancé of the girl. He now escorts her home on the honored ass Lucius.
After the wedding of the happy pair, the bride persuades her father to reward the ass her benefactor so he is to be turned out into pasture with the she-asses. But the servant to whom the care of the ass is intrusted wickedly takes him home and makes him labor first in a mill, then carrying fagots on a steep mountain, where a cruel driver mistreats him. In the midst of his sufferings, news comes that the bride and groom have been drowned on the seashore. So since their new masters are dead, the servants all flee, taking the ass with them. They sell him in a city of Macedonia to a eunuch priest of a Syrian goddess. In his life with the priests, Lucius is so horrified by their impure practices that he brays loudly in protest. The noise brings up some passing peasants who go off to tell the village the obscenities they have witnessed. The priests have to flee for their lives, but first they nearly kill the ass by beating him for his braying.
Lucius is in danger of his life again at the house of a rich man where they stop. For the servants who have lost the meat of a wild ass which was to be the dinner (the dogs stole it), plot to kill Lucius and serve up his flesh. He saves himself only by running away from the cook. The priests are now arrested because they are found in possession of a golden phiale which they stole from a temple, and the ass is sold to a baker. In the mill Lucius is so worn down by the hard work that he is sold as worthless to an old gardener. On the way to town, this gardener has a quarrel with a soldier and nearly kills him so the gardener and the ass have to go into hiding. Stupid Lucius betrays their hiding place by putting his head out of an upper window to see what is going on. Captured he is given to the soldier, but he soon sells him to a cook. Now Lucius fattens on good food by surreptitious filching of choice portions which the cook and his brother had reserved for themselves. By a little detective work the brothers discover that the thief is the ass. They show him eating men’s food to their master, who promptly buys the ass, has a servant train him to act like a man (easy lessons for Lucius!) and exhibits him for admission fees. A woman buys a night with him and has intercourse with him.