554 Pericles A Tale of Greece. [MAY, 



great, as even to overcome his resolute determinations,, and to induce him 

 to yield his willing consent to the marriage of his daughter Callirrhoe to 

 the illustrious and patriotic Anticles. 



The celebration of the nuptials was deferred considerably beyond the 

 usual season of the year,* by the pressing business which devolved on Peri- 

 cles as one of the generals appointed to conduct the Peloponnesian war, which 

 was then beginning to ferment. A day however was at length fixed at a 

 banquet given at the house of Pericles to the whole family. But scarcely 

 had they determined on the day, when the arrival of the far-famed Hippo- 

 crates was announced. So illustrious an individual was of course honoured 

 with a seat at the right hand of the statesman j he immediately began to 

 speak of a subject, which he said " had only this day come under his notice, 

 and which was one of vital importance to the state." Every eye was fixed 

 on the Physician, and every ear attentive to hear the news he had to com- 

 municate, when he uttered the word " Aipos (Plague !), a plague has invaded 

 Athens, and if it be not stayed either by the immediate interposition of the 

 gods, or by the exertions of the citizens, Athens will ere many weeks 

 become a city of desolate and desolating abodes, the seat of ruin and the 

 sepulchre of the dead." The consternation which the terrible announce- 

 ment caused in the assembly, where Bacchus was swaying undisputed rule, 

 and joviality and joy reigned in every countenance, it is impossible to 

 describe. It would defy the pencil of Apelles himself to depict the horror 

 and forlornness, which everywhere took the place of conviviality and 

 delight. By the next day the pestilence had spread to an incredible extent j 

 nine hundred were reported to have died already, and even the physicians 

 themselves could administer no relief. The symptoms of the disease it 

 would be unnecessary to repeat here, being so well known to every 

 Grecian, that it would only be raking up the ashes of the dead to recall the 

 different stages of that tempest, which proved fatal to their fathers, and 

 spread ruin and devastation through their sad domains. 



It was not many days ere it spread into the Upper City, where the house 

 of Pericles was situate, and where it was attended with more fatality than 

 before. The day on which the marriage ceremony was to be performed 

 at last arrived j and though no one else thought any business sufficiently 

 urgent to induce him to leave his home, Anticles could not be prevented even 

 by the devastations of the pestilence from proceeding to the Upper City. 

 But he had not arrived far before he heard a report that it had at last reached 

 the house of Pericles, and that Hippocrates was there in constant attend- 

 ance. On arriving himself at the mansion, he found that the whole family, 

 with the exception of Pericles himself, had been attacked by the strange 

 disease, on which all were speculating, but of which none was able to 

 discover the cause. 



The scene of lamentation and distress in every part of the city was 

 unequalled in the annals of Athenian history. All, all was ruin and death, 

 disease and despair. The whole city was filled with hillocks of the dead, 

 and every house became a vault. 



Some however survived the desolation a few among the sturdiest of the 

 shepherds, the hardiest of the soldiers, and the most skilful of the physi- 

 cians among whom was Anticles. But when Anticles heard of the death 

 of Callirrhoe among the other children of Pericles announced, he burst out 



t The Greeks generally married in some of the winter months January being a com- 

 mon month, was called marrying-time, Tawyiwv. See Eustath in Iliad, 2. 



