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 keen spiritual anguish, so it is earthly passion and bodily suffering which give a human interest to Heracles the very son of Zeus. He stands by the altar on Mount Cenæum, doing sacrifice to his Olympian Father for the taking of Œchalia; clad in the robe which his messenger, Lichas, has just brought him as the gift of Deianeira; the robe which she has secretly anointed with the blood of the Centaur Nessus, believing this to be a charm which shall win back to her the love of Heracles. What follows is thus told:—

"At first, hapless one, he prayed with cheerful heart, rejoicing in his comely garb. But when the flame of sacrifice began to blaze from the holy offerings and from the resinous wood, sweat broke out upon his flesh, and the tunic clung to his sides, and at every joint, close-glued as if by workman's hand; and there came a biting pain twitching at his bones; and then the venom as of a deadly, cruel adder began to eat him.

"Then it was that he cried out on the unhappy Lichas, in nowise guilty for thy crime, asking with what thoughts he brought this robe; and he, knowing nothing, hapless man, said that he had only brought thy gift, as he was charged. Then Heracles, as he heard it, and as a piercing spasm clutched his lungs, caught him by the foot, where the ankle hinges in the socket, and flung him at a rock washed on both sides by the sea; and Lichas has his white brain oozing through his hair, as the skull is cloven and the blood scattered therewith.