The-mythology-of-ancient-greece-and-italy-thomas-keightley

INTRODUCTION. 7
of Arcadia, which are so completely shut in by mountains
that the streams leave them by subterranean passages, called
by the ancient Arcadians Zerethra (gpedpa, i. e. fiepedpa),
and by the moderns Katavothra. The plain of the district of
Pheneos had two of these passages piercing the surrounding
mountains, one of which gives origin to the river Ladon. On
the rocky faces of two of the hills, which advance into the
plain, at a height of about fifty feet, runs a line, below which
the colour of the rocks is lighter thau it is above. The na
tural, though probably incorrect inference is, that the waters
stood one time at that height. The ancient Arcadians said
that Apollo, incensed at Hercules' having carried off the tripod
from Delphi and brought it to Pheneos, inundated the valley,
and that Hercules formed the chasms by which the waters
ran off8. Others said that Hades carried off the daughter of
Demeter through one of these chasms under Mount Cylleneb.
The moderns account for the origin of the chasm by the fol
lowing legend. Two devils once possessed the lake : they
dwelt on opposite sides of it, and were continually quarrelling;
a furious contest at length took place between them on the
top of Mount Sacta, whose base was washed by the lake.
The devil who lived on the west side adopted the ingenious
expedient of pelting his adversary with balls of ox-fat, which
sticking to his body and there taking fire, annoyed him be
yond measure. To free himself from this inconvenience, the
worsted fiend plunged into the lake and dashed through the
side of the mountain Sact6, thus forming the passage through
which the waters flowed off and left the plain dryc.
To this head may be referred the practice of the Greeks to
assign the origin of animals and plants to transformations ef
fected by the power of the gods, a practice of which we shall
have to record numerous instances'1. Even in the Moham
medan East examples of this procedure (which was probably
learned from the Greeks) are to be found ; the origin of the
* Paus. Tiii. 14. 2. Plut. de Sera Numinis Vindicta, 12. Catull. lxviii. 109.
b Conon. Narrat. 15. It is not quite certain, however, that it is of these chasms
he speaks.
e Leake's Travels in the Morea, iii. 1-48.
d We meet an instance even in Homer, Od. lix. 5 1 H.