Works, vol 3 | Page 8

Homer meant by his 'carven ivory.' Other women's teeth differ in size; or they project; or there are gaps: here, all was equality and evenness; pearl joined to pearl in unbroken line. Oh, 'twas a wondrous sight, of beauty more than human.
Poly. Stay. I know now whom you mean, as well from your description as from her nationality. You said that there were eunuchs in her train?
Ly. Yes; and soldiers too.
Poly. My simple friend, the lady you have been describing is a celebrity, and possesses the affections of an Emperor.
Ly. And her name?
Poly. Adds one more to the list of her charms; for it is the same as that of Abradatas's wife. [Footnote: See Panthea in Notes.] You know Xenophon's enthusiastic account of that beautiful and virtuous woman?--you have read it a dozen times.
Ly. Yes; and every time I read it, it is as if she stood before me. I almost hear her uttering the words the historian has put into her mouth, and see her arming her husband and sending him forth to battle.
Poly. Ah, my dear Lycinus, this lady has passed you but once, like a lightning flash; and your praises, I perceive, are all for those external charms that strike the eye. You are yet a stranger to her nobility of soul; you know not that higher, more god-like beauty. I am her fellow-countryman, I know her, and have conversed with her many times. You are aware that gentleness, humanity, magnanimity, modesty, culture, are things that I prize more than beauty-and rightly; to do otherwise would be as absurd as to value raiment above the body. Where physical perfection goes hand-in-hand with spiritual excellence, there alone (as I maintain) is true beauty. I could show you many a woman whose outward loveliness is marred by what is within; who has but to open her lips, and beauty stands confessed a faded, withered thing, the mean, unlovely handmaid of that odious mistress, her soul. Such women are like Egyptian temples: the shrine is fair and stately, wrought of costly marble, decked out with gilding and painting: but seek the God within, and you find an ape--an ibis--a goat--a cat. Of how many women is the same thing true! Beauty unadorned is not enough: and her true adornments are not purple and jewels, but those others that I have mentioned, modesty, courtesy, humanity, virtue and all that waits on virtue.
Ly. Why then, Polystratus, you shall give me story for story, good measure, shaken together, out of your abundance: paint me the portrait of her soul, that I may be no more her half-admirer.
Poly. This will be no light task, my friend. It is one thing to commend what all the world can see, and quite another to reveal what is hidden. I too shall want help with my portrait. Nor will sculptors and painters suffice me: I must have philosophers; it is by their canons that I must adjust the proportions of the figure, if I am to attain to the perfection of ancient models.
To begin then. Of her clear, liquid voice Homer might have said, with far more truth than of aged Nestor's, that
honey from those lips distilled.
The pitch, exquisitely soft, as far removed from masculine bass as from ultra-feminine treble, is that of a boy before his voice breaks; sweet, seductive, suavely penetrating; it ceases, and still vibrating murmurs play, echo-like, about the listener's ears, and Persuasion leaves her honeyed track upon his mind. But oh! the joy, to hear her sing, and sing to the lyre's accompaniment. Let swans and halcyons and cicalas then be mute. There is no music like hers; Philomela's self, 'full-throated songstress' though she be, is all unskilled beside her. Methinks Orpheus and Amphion, whose spell drew even lifeless things to hear them, would have dropped their lyres and stood listening in silence to that voice. What should Thracian Orpheus, what should Amphion, whose days upon Cithaeron were divided betwixt his lyre and his herd,--what should they know of true concord, of accurate rhythm, of accentuation and time, of the harmonious adaptation of lyre and voice, of easy and graceful execution? Yes; once hear her sing, Lycinus, and you will know something of Sirens as well as of Gorgons: you have experienced petrifaction; you will next learn what it is to stand entranced, forgetting country and kindred. Wax will not avail you: her song will penetrate through all; for therein is every grace that Terpsichore, Melpomene, Calliope herself, could inspire. In a word, imagine that you hear such notes as should issue from those lips, those teeth that you have seen. Her perfect intonation, her pure Ionic accent, her ready Attic eloquence, need not surprise you; these are her birthright; for is not Smyrna Athens' daughter? And what more natural than that