Part 4

The boy did not answer. He only looked up at his father with deep eyes and said nothing. But in a moment he was racing off to see some rope dancers.

"Glaucon," said the master to the slave, "take care of the boy. Give him a good time. Buy him what he wants. Take him back to camp when he is tired. I have business to do."

Then he turned to talk with a friend, who had come up, and Glaucon followed his little master.

What a good time the boy had! The rope dancers, the sword swallowers, the Egyptian with his painted scroll, a trained bear that wrestled with a wild-looking man dressed in skins, a cooking tent where whole sheep were roasting and turning over a fire, another where tiny fish were boiling in a great pot of oil and jumping as if alive--he saw them all. He stood under the sculptors' awning and gazed at the marble people more beautiful than life. And when he came upon Apollo striking his lyre, his heart leaped into his mouth. He stood quiet for a long time gazing at this god of song. Then he walked out of the tent with shining eyes.

At last it grew dark, and torches began to blaze in front of the booths.

"Shall we go home, Charmides?" said Glaucon.

"Oh, no!" cried the boy. "I haven't seen it all. I am not tired. It is gayer now than ever with the torches. See all those shining flames."

And he ran to a booth where a hundred little bronze lamps hung, each with its tongue of clear light. It was an imagemaker's booth. The table stood full of little clay statues of the gods. Charmides took up one. It was a young man leaning against a tree trunk. On his arm he held a baby.

"It is a model of the great marble Hermes in the temple of Hera, my little master," said the image maker. "Great Praxiteles made that one, poor Philo made this one."

"It is beautiful," said Charmides and turned away, holding it tenderly in his hand.

Glaucon waited a moment to pay for the figure. Then he followed Charmides who had walked on. He was standing on the bridge gazing at the water.

"Glaucon," he said, "I must see that statue of Hermes."

They stood there talking about the wonderful works of Praxiteles and of many another artist. Glaucon pointed to a little wooden shed lying in the meadow.

"That," he said, "is the workshop of Phidias. There he made the gold and ivory statue of Zeus that you shall see in Zeus's temple. That workshop will stay there many a year, I think, for people to love because so great a thing was done there."

"Is it so wonderful?" asked Charmides.

"When it was finished," Glaucon answered solemnly, "Phidias stood before it and prayed to Zeus to tell him whether it pleased the god. Great Zeus heard the prayer, and in his joy at the beautiful thing he hurled a blazing thunderbolt and smote the floor before the statue as if to say, 'This image is Zeus himself.' But I have never seen it, for a slave may not pass the sacred wall."

Now the full moon had risen, and the world was swimming in silver light. The statue of Victory hung over the sacred place on spread wings. Many another great form on its high pillar seemed standing in the deep sky above the world. The little pool in the pebbly river had stars in the bottom.

"This Kladeos is a savage little river in the spring," said Glaucon. "It tries to tear away our Olympia or drown it or cover it with sand. You see, men have had to fence it in with stone walls."

But Charmides was looking at the sacred place and its soft shining statues in the sky.

"Let us walk around the wall," he said.

So they left the river and passed the gymnasium and the gate. Along this side the wall cast a wide shadow. Here they walked in silence. Here there were no tents, no torches, no noisy people. Everything was quiet in the evening air. The far-off sounds of the fair were a gentle hum. A hundred pictures were floating in Charmides' mind--Phidias, Zeus, Creon with the strigil, his own little Hermes, the strange people in the fair, the marble Apollo under the sculptor's tent. In a few moments they turned a corner and came out into the soft moonlight. A little beyond gleamed a broad river, the Alphaeus. Charmides and the slave went over and strolled along its banks. Here they were again in the crowd and among tents. They saw a group of people and went toward them. A man sat on a low knoll a little above the crowd. His hair hung about his shoulders and his long robe lay in glistening folds about his feet. A lyre rested on his knees, and he was striking the strings softly. The sweet notes floated high in the moonlit air. At last he lifted his voice and sang:

When the swan spreadeth out his wings to alight On the whirling pools of the foaming stream, He sendeth to thee, Apollo, a note. When the sweet-voiced minstrel lifteth his lyre And stretcheth his hand on the singing string, He sendeth to thee, Apollo, a prayer. Even so do I now, a worshiping bard, With my heart lifted up to begin my lay, Cry aloud to Apollo, the lord of song.

Then he sang of that lordliest of all minstrels, Orpheus--how the trees swung circling about to his music; how the savage beasts lay down at his feet to listen; how the rocks rose up at his bidding and followed him, dancing, to build a town without hands; how he went to the dismal land of the dead to seek his wife and with his clear lyre and sweet voice drew tears from the iron heart of the king of hell and won back his loved Eurydice and lost her again the same hour.

The boy, sitting there in the moonlight, went floating away on the song until he felt himself straying through that fair garden of the dead with singing lyre or riding with Artemis through the sky in her moon chariot.

When the song was ended, Glaucon said, "Come, little master, you have fallen asleep. Let us go home."

And Charmides rose and went, still clutching his image of Hermes in his hand and still holding the song fast in his heart.

In the morning the whole great camp was awake and moving long before daylight. Every man and boy was in his fairest clothes. On every head was a fresh fillet. Every hand bore some beautiful gift for the gods--a vase, a plate of gold, an embroidered robe, a basket of silver. All were pouring to the open gate in the sacred wall. Here a procession formed. Young men led cattle with gilded horns and swinging garlands, or sheep with clean, combed wool. Stately priests in long chitons paced to the music of flutes. The judges glowed in their purple robes. Then walked the athletes, their eyes burning with excitement. And last came all the visitors with gift-laden hands. The slaves and foreigners crowded at the gate to see the procession pass, for on this first holy day only freedmen and Greeks of pure blood might visit the sacred shrines. When Charmides passed through, his heart leaped. Here was no empty field with a few altars. He had never seen a greater crowd in the busy market place at home in Athens. But here the people were even more beautiful than the Athenians. Their limbs were round and perfect. They stood always gracefully. Their garments hung in delicate folds, for they were people made by great artists--people of marble and of bronze. All the gods of Olympos were there, and athletes of years gone by, wrestling, running, hurling the disc. There were bronze chariots with horses of bronze to draw them and men of bronze to hold the reins. There were heroes of Troy still fighting. And here and there were little altars of marble or stone or earth or ashes with an ancient, holy statue. At every one the procession halted. The priests poured a libation and chanted a prayer. The people sang a hymn. Many left gifts piled about the altar. Before Hermes Charmides left his little clay image of the god. And while the priests prayed aloud, the boy sent up a whispered prayer for his brother.

Once the procession came before a low, narrow temple. It was of sun-dried bricks coated with plaster. Its columns were all different from one another. Some were slender, others thick; some fluted, others plain; and all were brightly painted. Charmides smiled up at his father.