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DRYOPE
Dryope and Iole were sisters. The former was the wife of
Andraemon, beloved by her husband, and happy in the birth of her
first child. One day the sisters strolled to the bank of a stream
that sloped gradually down to the water's edge, while the upland
was overgrown with myrtles. They were intending to gather flowers
for forming garlands for the altars of the nymphs, and Dryope
carried her child at her bosom, precious burden, and nursed him as
she walked. Near the water grew a lotus plant, full of purple
flowers. Dryope gathered some and offered them to the baby, and
Iole was about to do the same, when she perceived blood dropping
from the places where her sister had broken them off the stem. The
plant was no other than the nymph Lotis, who, running from a base
pursuer, had been changed into this form. This they learned from
the country people when it was too late.
Dryope, horror-struck when she perceived what she had done, would
gladly have hastened from the spot, but found her feet rooted to
the ground. She tried to pull them away, but moved nothing but her
upper limbs. The woodiness crept upward, and by degrees invested
her body. In anguish she attempted to tear her hair, but found her
hands filled with leaves. The infant felt his mother's bosom begin
to harden, and the milk cease to flow. Iole looked on at the sad
fate of her sister, and could render no assistance. She embraced
the growing trunk, as if she would hold back the advancing wood,
and would gladly have been enveloped in the same bark. At this
moment Andraemon, the husband of Dryope, with her father,
approached; and when they asked for Dryope, Iole pointed them to
the new-formed lotus. They embraced the trunk of the yet warm
tree, and showered their kisses on its leaves.
Now there was nothing left of Dryope but her face. Her tears still
flowed and fell on her leaves, and while she could she spoke. "I
am not guilty. I deserve not this fate. I have injured no one. If
I speak falsely, may my foliage perish with drought and my trunk
be cut down and burned. Take this infant and give it to a nurse.
Let it often be brought and nursed under my branches, and play in
my shade; and when he is old enough to talk, let him be taught to
call me mother, and to say with sadness, 'My mother lies hid under
this bark.' But bid him be careful of river banks, and beware how
he plucks flowers, remembering that every bush he sees may be a
goddess in disguise. Farewell, dear husband, and sister, and
father. If you retain any love for me, let not the axe wound me,
nor the flocks bite and tear my branches. Since I cannot stoop to
you, climb up hither and kiss me; and while my lips continue to
feel, lift up my child that I may kiss him. I can speak no more,
for already the bark advances up my neck, and will soon shoot over
me. You need not close my eyes, the bark will close them without
your aid." Then the lips ceased to move, and life was extinct; but
the branches retained for some time longer the vital heat.
Keats, in "Endymion," alludes to Dryope thus:
"She took a lute from which there pulsing came
A lively prelude, fashioning the way
In which her voice should wander. 'T was a lay
More subtle-cadenced, more forest-wild
Than Dryope's lone lulling of her child;" etc.
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