Meanwhile best friend of friends, do thou,
If this the cruel fates allow,
By death’s dark river,
Among those shadowy people, drink
No drop for me on Lethe’s brink:
Forget me never!’”
The Greek Poets, vol. 2, p. 298.
Theocritus, though coming late in the Greek age (about 300 B.C.) when Athens had yielded place to Alexandria, still carried on the Greek tradition in a remarkable way. A native of Syracuse, he caught and echoed in a finer form the life and songs of the country folk of that region—themselves descendants of Dorian settlers. Songs and ballads full of similar notes linger among the Greek peasants, shepherds and fisher-folk, even down to the present day.