e would give them another race of wondrous origin

far different from the first.

And now he was in act to hurl his thunderbolts 'gainst the whole world; but he stayed his hand in fear lest perchance the sacred heavens should take fire from so huge a conflagration, and burn from pole to pole. He remembered also that 'twas in the fates that a time would come when sea and land, the unkindled palace of the sky and the beleaguered struc- ture of the universe should be destroyed by fire. And so he laid aside the bolts which Cyclopean 'hands had forged. He preferred a different punishment, to destroy the human race beneath the waves and to send down rain from every quarter of the sky.

Straightway he shuts the North-wind up in the cave of Aeolus, and all blasts soever that put the clouds to flight; but he lets the South-wind loose Forth flies the South-wind with dripping wings, his awful face shrouded in pitchy darkness. His beard is heavy with rain; water flows in streams down his hoary locks; dark clouds rest upon his brow; while his wings and garments drip with dew. And, when he presses the low-hanging clouds with his broad hands, a crashing sound goes forth ; and next the dense clouds pour forth their rain. Iris, the mes- senger of Juno, clad in robes of many hues, draws up water and feeds it to the clouds. The standing grain is overthrown; the crops which have been the object of the farmers' prayers lie ruined; and the hard labour of the tedious year has come to naught.

The wrath of Jove is not content with the waters from his own sky; his sea-god brother aids him with auxiliary waves. He summons his rivers to council. When these have assembled at the palace of their king, he says: "Now is no time to employ a long