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Updated: May 23, 2025
She tells the tale of the growth of her passion, and vows vengeance if her magic arts are unsuccessful. The scene is probably some garden beneath the moonlit shy, near the town, and within sound of the sea. The characters are Simaetha, and Thestylis, her handmaid. Where are my laurel leaves? come, bring them, Thestylis; and where are the love-charms?
Simaetha, it will be remembered, in the second Idyll of Theocritus, curses her faithless lover Delphis, and as she melts his waxen image she prays that HE TOO MAY MELT. All this is of the nature of Magic, and is independent of and generally more primitive than Theology or Philosophy.
On the other hand, the Megarians, utterly denying and disowning the murder of Anthemocritus, throw the whole matter upon Aspasia and Pericles, availing themselves of the famous verses in the Acharnians, To Megara some of our madcaps ran, And stole Simaetha thence, their courtesan. Which exploit the Megarians to outdo, Came to Aspasia's house, and took off two.
Then when he had gazed on me, he that knows not love, he fixed his eyes on the ground, and sat down on my bed, and spake as he sat him down: 'Truly, Simaetha, thou didst by no more outrun mine own coming hither, when thou badst me to thy roof, than of late I outran in the race the beautiful Philinus: Bethink thee of my love, and whence it came, my Lady Moon!
Nay, depart, and watch by the wrestling-ground of Timagetus, for there is his resort, and there he loves to loiter. Bethink thee of my love, and whence it came, my Lady Moon! 'And when thou art sure he is alone, nod to him secretly, and say, "Simaetha bids thee to come to her," and lead him hither privily. So I spoke; and she went and brought the bright-limbed Delphis to my house.
Pushing back her sailor hat, Alma looked obliquely at him from beneath her drooping lids. "Try me. Perhaps infection haunts the air. Spare us the Greek, come down from your Yale and Harvard heights to the level of my ignorance, and warble for me in English some of your Sicilian lark's melodies. At least I have heard of Amaryllis and Simaetha." Mr. Cutting shook his head.
Kitty watched him, frowning, her hand on her hip, the white wrap she wore over her night-dress twining round her in close folds a slender, brooding sorceress, some Canidia or Simaetha, interrupted in her ritual of hate. But Ashe was in no mood for literary reminiscence. His lip was contemptuous, his brow angry as he replaced the leaf in its cleft stick, whither the flames immediately pursued it.
Thou wilt think it has been dipped in the well-spring of the Hours. Hither, hither, Cissaetha: do thou milk her, Thyrsis. And you young she-goats, wanton not so wildly lest you bring up the he-goat against you. Simaetha, madly in love with Delphis, who has forsaken her, endeavours to subdue him to her by magic, and by invoking the Moon, in her character of Hecate, and of Selene.
Then, methinks, thou wouldst murmur, like thine own Simaetha, the love-lorn witch, 'Farewell, Selene, bright and fair; farewell, ye other stars, that follow the wheels of the quiet Night. Nay, surely it was in such an hour that thou didst behold the girl as she burned the laurel leaves and the barley grain, and melted the waxen image, and called on Selene to bring her lover home.
A grammarian says that Theocritus borrowed this second idyl, the story of Simaetha, from a piece by Sophron. But he had no need to borrow from anything but the nature before his eyes. Ideas change so little among the Greek country people, and the hold of superstition is so strong, that betrayed girls even now sing to the Moon their prayer for pity and help.
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