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The pharos built by Sostratus towered in dazzling whiteness above the tide, and before him rose the noble temple buildings, palaces, and porticoes of the city of Alexandria, with which he was familiar, and before and between them statue after statue of marble and bronze, the whole flooded with radiant golden light.
He is throughout a mere passive instrument, leaving to chance, or the exertions of others, his extrication from the various troubles in which he becomes involved: even of the qualities usually regarded as inseparable from a hero of romance, spirit and personal courage, he is so utterly destitute as to suffer himself to be beaten and ill treated, both by Thersander and Sostratus, without an attempt to defend himself; and his lamentations, whenever he finds himself in difficulties, or separated from his ladye-love, are absolutely puerile.
It was in the book of Fate that even this age of ours should not be destitute entirely of noteworthy and memorable men, but produce a body of extraordinary power, and a mind of surpassing wisdom. My allusions are to Sostratus the Boeotian, whom the Greeks called, and believed to be, Heracles; and more particularly to the philosopher Demonax.
He begins by informing his hearer, that he is the son of Hippias, a noble and wealthy denizen of Tyre, and that he had been betrothed from his childhood, as was not unusual in those times, to his own half-sister Calligone: but Leucippe, the daughter of Sostratus, a brother of Hippias, resident at Byzantium, having arrived with her mother Panthia, to claim the hospitality of their Tyrian relatives during a war impending between their native city and the Thracian tribes, Clitophon at once becomes enamoured of his cousin, whose charms are described in terms of glowing panegyric: "She seemed to me like the representation of Europa, which I see in the picture before me her eye beaming with joy and happiness her locks fair, and flowing in natural ringlets, but her eyebrows and eyelashes jetty black her complexion fair, but with a blush in her cheeks like that faint crimson with which the Lydian women stain ivory, and her lips like the hue of a fresh-opened rose."
For I was a friend of Sostratus before incurring their hatred, knowing that he had materially benefited the state. 14. But although his friend, I never took advantage of his power to punish an enemy nor aid a friend.
Sometimes all gazed toward the mouth of the harbour, where the expected ship must soon pass the recently completed masterpiece of Sostratus, the towering lighthouse, still shining in its marble purity. Soon many Alexandrians also crowded the large platform in front of the Temple of Poseidon, and the very wide marble staircase leading from it to the landing place.
Here are light, graceful creations of Hellenic, yonder heavy, sombre ones of Egyptian art, and in the background the exquisite azure of the eternal sea, which the marvellous structure of the heptastadium unites to the land; while on the island of Pharos the lighthouse of Sostratus towers aloft almost to the sky, and with a flood of light points out the way to mariners who approach the great harbour at night.
"The great Athene, Apollo, and all his nine Pierides, have sent their envoys," said the older actor pathetically, "for there, too, are the sculptors Euphranor and Chares, and the godlike builder of the lighthouse, Sostratus in person." "A handsome man," cried the girl flute-player, "but vain, I tell you, vain " "Self-conscious, you ought to say," corrected her companion.
Sometimes all gazed toward the mouth of the harbour, where the expected ship must soon pass the recently completed masterpiece of Sostratus, the towering lighthouse, still shining in its marble purity. Soon many Alexandrians also crowded the large platform in front of the Temple of Poseidon, and the very wide marble staircase leading from it to the landing place.
He began, and his son completed, the famous watch-tower in the island of Pharos; the causeway which united it to the main land, already mentioned, was built by Dexiphanes. Sostratus, the son of this architect, was employed to erect the watch-tower: the design of this tower was to direct the vessels which entered the harbour, and it was justly reckoned one of the wonders of the world.
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