ORPHEUS.

MUSIC took very high rank among the arts most loved and cultivated by the ancient Greeks; their poets have rendered the fame of Orpheus, as a musician, second only to that of his father, Apollo.

Frequent allusions to this myth are made by the greatest of our English poets. Milton closes both "L'Allégro" and "Il Penseroso" with some fine lines relating to Orpheus, which we quote:

"And ever against eating cares, Lap me in soft Lydian airs,

Married to immortal verse

Such as the meeting soul may pierce,

In notes, with many a winding bout
Of linked sweetness long drawn out,
With wanton heed and giddy cunning;
The melting voice through mazes running,
Untwisting all the chains that tie

The hidden soul of harmony;

That Orpheus' self may heave his head.
From golden slumber on a bed

Of heap'd Elysian flowers, and hear
Such strains, as would have won the ear
Of Pluto, to have quite set free

His half-regained Eurydice." - L'Allegro.

"But, O sad Virgin, that thy power
Might raise Museus from his bower!
Or bid the soul of Orpheus sing
Such notes, as, warbled to the string,

Drew iron tears down Pluto's cheek,

And made hell grant what love did seek.". - Il Penseroso.

Shakspeare also shows his appreciation of the old story in two of his plays.

In "Henry VIII.," Act III., Scene I., one of Katharine's waiting-women, at her request, sings to enliven their sadness. This is the song:

Orpheus, with his lute, made trees,
And the mountain-tops that freeze,
Bow themselves when he did sing;
To his music, plants and flowers
Ever sprung; as sun and showers
There had made a lasting spring.

Everything that heard him play,
Even the billows of the sea,

Hung their heads, and then lay by.

In sweet music is such art,

Killing care and grief of heart

Fall asleep, or, hearing, die."

In "Merchant of Venice," Act V., Scene I., Lorenzo and Jessica are talking about the effect of music; after an eloquent rhapsody on the subject by Lorenzo, Jessica says, "I am never merry when I hear sweet music."

Lorenzo attempts to explain why this is so, and cites the effect of music upon a herd, or race of unhandled colts, saying:

"If they but hear perchance a trumpet sound,

Or any air of music touch their ears,

You shall perceive them make a mutual stand,
Their savage eyes turn'd to a modest gaze,.

By the sweet power of music. Therefore the poet
Did feign that Orpheus drew trees, stones, and floods;
Since nought so stockish, hard, and full of rage,
But music for the time doth change his nature."

That the myth is capable of humorous treatment will be seen in the following poem by J. G. Saxe.

ORPHEUS AND EURYDICE.

JOHN G. SAXE.

Sir Orpheus, whom the poets have sung
In every metre and every tongue,
Was, you may remember, a famous musician,
At least for a youth in his pagan condition,
For historians tell he played on his shell
From morning till night, so remarkably well
That his music created a regular spell
On trees and stones in forest and dell!
What sort of an instrument his could be
Is really more than is known to me,
For none of the books have told, d'ye see!
It's very certain those heathen "swells
Knew nothing at all of oyster-shells,

And it's clear Sir Orpheus never could own a
Shell like those they make in Cremona ;

But whatever it

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was, to move the stones,"
It must have shelled out some powerful tones,

But alas for the joys of this mutable life!
Sir Orpheus lost his beautiful wife
Eurydice - who vanished one day
From Earth in a very unpleasant way!
It chanced as near as I can determine,
Through one of those vertebrated vermin
That lie in the grass so prettily curled,
Waiting to "snake" you out of the world!
And the poets tell she went to — well-
A place where Greeks and Romans dwell