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166 I 166 Memnon. and Lesbos was probably very great ^^. The scholiast on II. IX. 129 imagined that the poet alluded to that in the latter island, which was held in the precincts of the temple of Juno^l And I am inclined to suspect that the legend of the rival goddesses may have owed its origin to this local usage. The Homeric poems contain abundant evidence that beauty and valour were attributes equally essential to the idea of a perfect hero. Achilles surpasses all the other Greeks equally in both^. At the same time it is necessary to distinguish this from other cases, in which the beauty ascribed to a mythical person was probably connected with a totally different train of associations. The beauty of Hylas and Hyacinthus, and perhaps that of Pelops and Endymion^^, belongs to a separate head, and has nothing in common with that of Achilles. But that of Peleus, of Bellerophon, of Jason, and Theseus ^^, and other similar heroes, may be properly considered as an early indication of the national turn of mind. And this is confirmed by the im- portance which the Lacedaemonians, who retained the old Greek character with so few refinements, attached to this quality^'. If the Ethiopians paid exclusive regard to it in the election of their kings, we read that Archidamus was fined by the ephors, for preferring a rich wife to one who was more likely to bear princes worthy of Sparta^, and we know what a difficulty the oracle threw into the way of Agesilaus in mounting the throne. If therefore Memnon was a great warrior, it followed almost of course that he was a person of surpassing beauty. But the third feature in the legend of Memnon seems to be that which Mr J. found most difficult to reconcile with the hypothesis that he was a real conqueror ; and as this ob- jection would apply with equal force to the supposition of his having been an imaginary one, I must endeavour to remove 32 Theophrastus ap. Athen. xiii. p. 610. 33 Trapd AecrlSloL^ dyaiv ayerat KaWovs yvvaiKwv ev toj TtTs^'H^as TC/mevei Xeyofie- 1/05 KaXXtcTela. 34 II. II. 674. 35 Athen. xiii. p. 564. 36 About Theseus, see Athen. xiii. p. 601. 37 Heraclides Lembus ap. Athen. p. 566. /cara t»;V ^irdprnv dav/xdlcTaL /ucdWou 6 KaXXtcrT09, Kal yvvi] ij /caXXtcrTj;. 3^ ciriXeyovra^ on (SacrLXia-Kov^ dvrl ^acnXGcov tois '^TraprLdrai^ yevvdv irpo- aipeiTai.