A modern poet would have sought to spiritualize the situation: in the hands of the Greek artist it remains quite natural; it is the beauty of Leander that persuades and subdues Hero to love, and the agitations of her soul are expressed in language which suggests a power that comes upon her from without. At the same time there is no suspicion of levity or sensuality. Hero cannot be mistaken for a light of love. When the time comes, she will break her heart upon the dead body of the youth who wins her by his passion and his beauty. Leander has hitherto been only anxious to possess her for his own. Hero, as soon as she perceives that he has won the fight, bethinks her with a woman's wisdom of ways and means. Who is the strange man to whom she must abandon herself in wedlock; and what does he know about her; and how can they meet? Therefore she tells him her name and describes her dwelling:
πύργος δ' ἀμφιβόητος ἐμὸς δόμος οὐρανομήκης
ᾧ ἔνι ναιετάουσα σὺν ἀμφιπόλῳ τινὶ μούνῃ
Σηστιάδος πρὸ πόληος ὑπὲρ βαθυκύμονας ὄχθας
γείτονα πόντον ἔχω στυγεραῖς βουλῇσι τοκήων.
οὐδέ μοι ἐγγὺς ἔασιν ὁμήλικες, οὐδὲ χορεῖαι
ἠϊθέων παρέασιν· ἀεὶ δ' ἀνὰ νύκτα καὶ ἠῶ
ἐξ ἁλὸς ἠνεμοέντος ἐπιβρέμει οὔασιν ἠχή.[264]
Having said so much, shame overtakes her; she hides her face, and blames her over-hasty tongue. But Leander, pondering how he shall win the stakes of love proposed to him—πῶς κεν ἔρωτος ἀεθλεύσειεν ἀγῶνα—is helped at last by Love himself, the wounder and the healer of the heart in one. He bursts into a passionate protestation: "Maiden, for the love of thee I will cross the stormy waves; yea, though the waters blaze with fire, and the sea be unsailed by ships. Only do thou light a lamp upon thy tower to guide me through the gloom:
ὄφρα νοήσας
ἔσσομαι ὁλκὰς Ἔρωτος ἔχων σέθεν ἀστέρα λύχνον.[265]
Seeing its spark, I shall not need the north star or Orion. And now, if thou wouldst have my name, know that I am Leander, husband of the fair-crowned Hero."
Nothing now remains for the lovers but to arrange the signs and seasons of their future meeting. Then Hero retires to her tower, and Leander returns to Abydos by the Hellespont:
παννυχίων δ' ὀάρων κρυφίους ποθέοντες ἀέθλους
πολλάκις ἠρήσαντο μολεῖν θαλαμηπόλον ὄρφνην.[266]
It may be said in passing that this parting scene, though briefly narrated, is no less well conducted, wohl motivirt, as Goethe would have phrased it, than are all the other incidents of the poem (lines 221-231). The interpretation of the passage turns upon the word παννυχίδας, in line 225, which must here be taken to mean the vigil before marriage.
At this point the action turns. Musæus, having to work within a narrow space, has made the meeting and the dialogue between the lovers disproportionate to the length of the whole piece. In this way he secures our sympathy for the youth and maid, whom we learn to know as living persons. He can now afford to drop superfluous links, and to compress the tale within strict limits. The cunning of his art is shown by the boldness of the transition to the next important incident. The night and the day are supposed to have passed. We hear nothing of the impatience of Leander or of Hero's flux and reflux of contending feelings. The narrative is resumed just as though the old thread had been broken and another had been spun; and yet there is no sense of interruption:
ἤδη κυανόπεπλος ἀνέδραμε νυκτὸς ὀμίχλη
ἀνδράσιν ὕπνον ἄγουσα καὶ οὐ ποθέοντι Λεάνδρῳ.[267]