shall have your choice. But why
have you torn them up?

_Epicurus._ On the contrary, they were brought hither this morning.
Sosimenes is spending large sums of money on an olive-ground, and has
uprooted some hundreds of them, of all ages and sizes. I shall cover
the rougher part of the hill with them, setting the clematis and vine
and honeysuckle against them, to unite them.

_Ternissa._ Oh, what a pleasant thing it is to walk in the green light
of the vine trees, and to breathe the sweet odour of their invisible
flowers!

_Epicurus._ The scent of them is so delicate that it requires a sigh
to inhale it; and this, being accompanied and followed by enjoyment,
renders the fragrance so exquisite. Ternissa, it is this, my sweet
friend, that made you remember the green light of the foliage, and
think of the invisible flowers as you would of some blessing from
heaven.

_Ternissa._ I see feathers flying at certain distances just above the
middle of the promontory: what can they mean?

_Epicurus._ Cannot you imagine them to be the feathers from the wings
of Zethes and Calaeis, who came hither out of Thrace to behold the
favourite haunts of their mother Oreithyia? From the precipice that
hangs over the sea a few paces from the pinasters she is reported to
have been carried off by Boreas; and these remains of the primeval
forest have always been held sacred on that belief.

_Leontion._ The story is an idle one.

_Ternissa._ Oh no, Leontion! the story is very true.

_Leontion._ Indeed!

_Ternissa._ I have heard not only odes, but sacred and most ancient
hymns upon it; and the voice of Boreas is often audible here, and the
screams of Oreithyia.

_Leontion._ The feathers, then, really may belong to Calaeis and
Zethes.

_Ternissa._ I don't believe it; the winds would have carried them
away.

_Leontion._ The gods, to manifest their power, as they often do by
miracles, could as easily fix a feather eternally on the most
tempestuous promontory, as the mark of their feet upon the flint.

_Ternissa._ They could indeed; but we know the one to a certainty, and
have no such authority for the other. I have seen these pinasters from
the extremity of the Piraeus, and have heard mention of the altar
raised to Boreas: where is it?

_Epicurus._ As it stands in the centre of the platform, we cannot see
it from hence; there is the only piece of level ground in the place.

_Leontion._ Ternissa intends the altar to prove the truth