A Book of Myths, by Jean Lang - Umnet

And earth and sea and sky, and all the creatures of earth and sky, and of
the deep, replied as one:
"The victory is thine, Divine Apollo."
Yet was there one dissentient voice.
Midas, sorely puzzled, utterly un-understanding, was relieved when the
music of Apollo ceased. "If only Pan would play again," he murmured
to himself. "I wish to live, and Pan's music gives me life. I love the
woolly vine-buds and the fragrant pine-leaves, and the scent of the
violets in the spring. The smell of the fresh-ploughed earth is dear to
me, the breath of the kine that have grazed in the meadows of wild
parsley and of asphodel. I want to drink red wine and to eat and love
and fight and work and be joyous and sad, fierce and strong, and very
weary, and to sleep the dead sleep of men who live only as weak
mortals do."
Therefore he raised his voice, and called very loud: "Pan's music is
sweeter and truer and greater than the music of Apollo. Pan is the victor,
and I, King Midas, give him the victor's crown!"
With scorn ineffable the sun-god turned upon Midas, his peasant's face
transfigured by his proud decision. For a little he gazed at him in
silence, and his look might have turned a sunbeam to an icicle.
Then he spoke:
"The ears of an ass have heard my music," he said. "Henceforth shall
Midas have ass's ears."
And when Midas, in terror, clapped his hands to his crisp black hair, he
found growing far beyond it, the long, pointed ears of an ass. Perhaps
what hurt him most, as he fled away, was the shout of merriment that
came from Pan. And fauns and nymphs and satyrs echoed that shout
most joyously.
Willingly would he have hidden in the woods, but there he found no