Book 7

Hephaestus: Have you seen Maia’s baby, Apollo? such a pretty little thing, with a smile for everybody; you can see it is going to be a treasure,

Apollo: That baby a treasure? well, in mischief, Iapetus is young beside it.

Hephaestus: Why, what harm can it do, only just born?

Apollo: Ask Posidon; it stole his trident. Ask Ares; he was surprised to find his sword gone out of the scabbard. Not to mention myself, disarmed of bow and arrows.

Hephaestus: Never! that infant? he has hardly found his legs yet; he is not out of his baby-linen.

Apollo: Ah, you will find out, Hephaestus, if he gets within reach of you.

Hephaestus: He has been.

Apollo: Well? all your tools safe? none missing?

Hephaestus: Of course not.

Apollo: I advise you to make sure.

Hephaestus: Zeus! where are my pincers?

Apollo: Ah, you will find them among the baby-linen,

Hephaestus: So light-fingered? one would swear he had practised petty larceny in the womb.

Apollo: Ah, and you don’t know what a glib young chatterbox he is; and, if he has his way, he is to be our errand-boy! Yesterday he challenged Eros—tripped up his heels somehow, and had him on his back in a twinkling; before the applause was over, he had taken the opportunity of a congratulatory hug from Aphrodite to steal her girdle; Zeus had not done laughing before— the sceptre was gone. If the thunderbolt had not been too heavy, and very hot, he would have made away with that too.

Hephaestus: The child has some spirit in him, by your account.

Apollo: Spirit, yes—and some music, moreover, young as he is.

Hephaestus: How can you tell that?

Apollo: He picked up a dead tortoise somewhere or other, and contrived an instrument with it. He fitted horns to it, with a cross-bar, stuck in pegs, inserted a bridge, and played a sweet tuneful thing that made an old harper like me quite envious. Even at night, Maia was saying, he does not stay in Heaven; he goes down poking his nose into Hades—on a thieves’ errand, no doubt. Then he has a pair of wings, and he has made himself a magic wand, which he uses for marshalling souls—convoying the dead to their place.

Hephaestus: Ah, I gave him that, for a toy.

Apollo: And by way of payment he stole—

Hephaestus: Well thought on; I must go and get them; you may be right about the baby-linen.

Henry Watson Fowler