96 HIGHWAYS AlTD BYWAYS. 



the Deoian oak that stood in the grove sacred to Ceres. 

 It is said of this famous oak that it towered above the 

 other trees as loftily as the other trees towered above 

 the grass, and that it was a woods in itself. When the 

 Dryads remonstrated with Erisicthon, he boasted that he 

 would fell the tree even if it were the goddess herself. 

 While the old oak shuddered at the last stroke given it, 

 a voice issued from the trunk, saying : '' I, a nymph 

 most pleasing to Ceres, am beneath this wood and dying, 

 rejoice at the punishment which will be meted out to 

 thee." The goddess destined him to be tortuTed by 

 famine, famine so dire and terrible that he w^as finally 

 compelled to eat portions of his own miserable body 

 trying to appease his hunger. In that olden time of 

 myths people and nymphs were transformed to trees, 

 sometimes at their own requests, but oftener for in some 

 manner offending other deities. The Ileliads, children 

 of the sun, were changed to poplars ; Altis to a pine ; 

 the mother of Adonis to a myrrh tree; an Apulion 

 shepherd, who mocked the nymphs, was transformed to 

 an olive tree, and his tears became bitter berries. The 

 fair virgin Daphne, at her own request became a laurel, 

 that she might escape from her lover god, Apollo, who 

 was in pursuit of her. The beautiful Dry ope was trans- 

 formed to a lotus tree for unwittingly plucking a blos- 

 som from a shrub in which was enshrined the nymph 

 Lotus. A juster doom met the Eonian women, who, 

 turning to flee after murdering Orpheus, found their 

 flight checked by the rapid lengthening of their toes. 

 Soon their feet became rooted to the ground, their flesh 



