ote 3: Strepsiades the uncle.]

[Footnote 4: Poseidon.]

VII.

FOR KLEANDROS OF AIGINA,

WINNER IN THE PANKRATION.

* * * * *

All that we can be certain of as to the date of this ode is that it
was written soon after the final expulsion of the Persians. From the
first strophe we learn that Kleandros had won a Nemean as well as an
Isthmian victory, and perhaps this ode really belongs to the former.
It was to be sung, it seems, before the house of Telesarchos the
winner's father, at Aigina.

* * * * *

For Kleandros in his prime let some of you, ye young men, go stand
before the shining portal of his father Telesarchos, and rouse a song
of triumph, to be a glorious recompense of his toils, for that he hath
achieved reward of victory at Isthmos, and hath showed his strength in
the games of Nemea.

For him I also, albeit heavy at heart[1], am bidden to call upon the
golden Muse. Yea since we are come forth from our sore troubles let
us not fall into the desolation of crownlessness, neither nurse our
griefs; but having ease from our ills that are past mending, we will
set some pleasant thing before the people, though it follow hard on
pain: inasmuch as some god hath put away from us the Tantalos-stone
that hung above our heads, a curse intolerable to Hellas.

But now hath the passing of this terror ended my sore disquietude, and
ever it is better to look only on the thing hard by. For the guile of
time hangeth above the heads of men, and maketh the way of their life
crooked, yet if Freedom abide with them, even such things may mortals
cure.

But it is meet that a man cherish good hope: and meet also that I,
whom seven-gated Thebes reared, proffer chiefly unto Aigina the
choicest of the Graces' gifts, for that from one sire were two
daughters[2] born, youngest of the children of Asopos, and found
favour in the eyes of the king Zeus.

One by the fair stream of Dirke he set to be the queen of a city of
charioteers, and thee the other he bare to the Oinopian isle, and lay
with thee, whence to the sire of great thunderings thou didst bear the
godlike Aiakos, best of men upon the earth.

This man even among divinities became a decider of strife: and his
godlike sons and his sons' sons delighting in battle were foremost in
valour when they met in the ringing brazen melley: chaste also were
they approved, and wise of heart.

Thereof was the god's