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Updated: May 23, 2025
Without naming her intention to Eudora, Philothea laid aside the scroll she had prepared, resolved to place it in the hands of Pericles, to be entrusted to the care of some Persian present at the games, which were to commence on the morrow. Before the hour of noon, Hylax gave notice of approaching strangers, who proved to be Pericles and Plato, attended by Tithonus.
The momentary silence, so apt to follow introductions, was interrupted by an Ethiopian boy, who, at a signal from Tithonus, emerged from behind the columns, and kneeling, presented to Aspasia a beautiful box of ivory, inlaid with gold, filled with the choicest perfumes. The lady acknowledged the costly offering by a gracious smile, and a low bend of the head toward the giver.
Aurora forgot to ask youth for her lover, and though Tithonus is immortal, he is old, Achilles is not quite invulnerable; the sacred waters did not wash the heel by which Thetis held him. Siegfried, in the Niebelungen, is not quite immortal, for a leaf fell on his back whilst he was bathing in the dragon's blood, and that spot which it covered is mortal. And so it must be.
By little and little he had played the dangerous game that made such an appeal to his vanity. The poets were true in their psychology when they pictured the distress of mortal men beloved of goddesses: Tithonus and Aurora, Venus and Adonis, Diana and Endymion. How could aught but tragedy result from such loves as these? How could a mortal have dared to lift his eyes to such a height unbidden?
Though she attained this honor, yet the Sea-Nymphs, her old enemies, prevailed so far as to cause her to be placed in that part of the heaven near the pole, where every night she is half the time held with her head downward, to give her a lesson of humility. "Prince Memnon" was the son of Aurora and Tithonus, of whom we shall hear later.
As she drew aside the curtains of the litter, and looked upon him in tranquil slumber, she thought of the wonderful gift of Tithonus, with an intense anxiety, to which her quiet spirit was usually a stranger. Affectionate recollections of Eudora, and the anticipated joy of meeting, mingled with this deeper tide of feeling, and increased her desire to arrive at the end of their journey.
Now Memnon was the son of the bright Dawn, a beautiful Goddess who had loved and married a mortal man, Tithonus. She had asked Zeus, the chief of the Gods, to make her lover immortal, and her prayer was granted.
"He will look for me, and seem bewildered, as if something were lost," replied Philothea. "Since I perceived this, I have been careful not to excite painful sensations by my absence. Geta will give me notice when slumber seems to be passing away." "And do you think Tithonus can restore him?" inquired Eudora. Philothea answered, "Fear is stronger than hope.
The sculptor of the gods will scarcely be able to fashion half their images." "If the custom continues," rejoined Phidias, "it will indeed require a life-time as long as that conferred upon the namesake of Tithonus." "Thanks to the munificence of artists, every deity has a representative in my dwelling," observed Aspasia.
There was a picture of Aurora in the British Gallery a year or two ago. It was a suffusion of golden light. The Goddess wore her saffron-coloured robes, and appeared just risen from the gloomy bed of old Tithonus. Her very steeds, milk-white, were tinged with the yellow dawn. It was a personification of the morning. Poussin succeeded better in classic than in sacred subjects.
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