r unto this isle: for supreme occasion have the
children of Aiakos given them by the showing forth of mighty feats.

Over land and beyond the sea is their name flown forth from afar: even
unto the Ethiopians it sprang forth, for that Memnon came not home:
for bitter was the battle that Achilles made against him, having
descended from his chariot upon the earth, what time by his fierce
spear's point he slew the son of the bright Morn.

And herein found they of old time a way wherein to drive their car:
and I too follow with my burden of song: and all men's minds, they
say, are stirred the most by whatsoever wave at the instant rolleth
nearest to the mainsheet of the ship.

On willing shoulders bear I this double load, and am come a messenger
to proclaim this honour won in the games that men call holy to be the
five-and-twentieth that the noble house of Alkimidas hath shown forth:
yet were two wreaths in the Olympian games beside the precinct of
Kronion denied to thee, boy, and to Polytimidas, by the fall of the
lot[7].

Peer of the dolphin hurrying through the brine--such would I call
Melesias[8] by whom thy hands and strength were guided, as a chariot
by the charioteer.

[Footnote 1: Earth.]

[Footnote 2: The ancients understood little of the rotation of crops,
and often let their fields lie fallow alternate years.]

[Footnote 3: Of the celebrity of alternate generations.]

[Footnote 4: The order of descent was: Agesimachos, Sokleides,
Praxidamas, Theon, Alkimidas. Of these the first, third, and fifth,
were distinguished athletes, the others not.]

[Footnote 5: The Isthmos.]

[Footnote 6: The parsley which grew near the lair of the Nemean lion.]

[Footnote 7: This can hardly mean, as some commentators take it,
the drawing of any particular tie; for if better men than any given
competitor were entered for the match, his defeat would be inevitable
whether they were encountered sooner or later.]

[Footnote 8: Alkimidas' trainer.]

VII.

FOR SOGENES OF AIGINA,

WINNER IN THE BOYS' PENTATHLON.

* * * * *

This victory was probably won B.C. 462. The ode would seem to be full
of allusions, which however we cannot with any certainty explain. It
is partly occupied with the celebration of Achilles' son Neoptolemos,
and Pindar seems anxious to repel the charge of having on some
occasion depreciated that hero.

* * * * *

O Eileithuia that