V.  FRAGMENTS FROM SAPPHO

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XCIIIQuoted by the Scholiast on Hermogenes, and by others, to explain the word, “sweet-apple,” an apple grafted on a quince; it is used as a term of endearment by Theocritus (Idyl ii. 39), “Of thee, my love, my sweet-apple, I sing.” Himerius, writing about 360 A. D., says: “Aphrodite’s orgies we leave to Sappho of Lesbos, to sing to the lyre and make the bride-chamber her theme. She enters the chamber after the games, makes the room, spreads Homer’s bed, assembles the maidens, leads them into the apartment with Aphrodite in the Graces’ car and a band of Loves for playmates. Binding her tresses with hyacinth, except what is parted to fringe her forehead, she lets the rest wave to the wind if it chances to strike them. Their wings and curls she decks with gold, and drives them in procession before the car as they shake the torch on high.” And particularly this: “It was for Sappho to liken the maiden to an apple, allowing to those who would pluck before the time to touch not even with the finger-tip, but to him who was to gather the apple in season to watch its ripe beauty; to compare the bridegroom with Achilles, to match the youth’s deeds with the hero’s.” Further on he says: “Come then, we will lead him into the bride-chamber and persuade him to meet the beauty of the bride. O fair and lovely, the Lesbian’s praises appertain to thee: thy playmates are rosy-ankled Graces and golden Aphrodite, and the Seasons make the meadows bloom.”

As the sweet-apple blushes on the end of the bough, the very end of the bough, which the gatherers overlooked, nay overlooked not but could not reach.