[98] In the 15th chapter of Pausanias’ Attics, I know that he does not name Æschylus as one of the persons introduced in the picture; but in chapter 21, after speaking of some other tragic poets, he says, “with respect to the image of Æschylus and the _picture_ in which his valour at Marathon is represented, I am of opinion that these were produced a long time after his death.” What picture, if not that of the battle of Marathon? [99] Polygnotus neglected nothing that could flatter the Athenians. Into this great epic picture he introduced a dog, which having followed a soldier to Marathon, returned unhurt after the battle, and became a pet with the people. Dogs seem to have been in favour at Athens. There is a story of a white dog which trotted through the temple of Minerva Polias down into that of Pandrosus, and placed himself in comfort on the altar, that stood under Minerva’s own olive tree. Another white dog acquired fame by tasting of the meat offered in sacrifice to Apollo. There is also a white dog referred to in the catalogue of monuments of Hercules. The numerous statues of dogs, in bronze and marble, attest the gratitude of the ancients to those friends and guardians of man. [100] Castor and Pollux, as the preservers of seamen, were very early worshipped by the Athenians. [101] It was near this building that the Graces in marble by Socrates stood: they were veiled as became the Graces, fashioned by the hand of wisdom. The veil on the work of Socrates was a real veil; but a friend has observed, that “the veil was a remarkable part of the mythology of the Graces, but it is described as invisible, and having only the moral effect of a veil.” [102] I think that as Epeus is said to have invented the wooden horse, an allegory was intended in this part of the picture. Indeed, I have somewhere seen it remarked, I think in Pausanias, that to suppose that the horse of Epeus was anything but a warlike machine, is to suppose the Trojans very stupid indeed. [103] There are in this part of the picture some verses, by Simonides, to the following effect:-- The artist Polygnotus, for his sire Who claims Aglaiophon, in Thasos born, painted the captured tower of Troy. _Taylor’s Translation_ (of 1794) [104] I cannot help considering the figure of Ocnus, who was represented as twisting a rope of rushes for a she ass to devour, as an emblem of the inactivity--the doing of nothing in the grave. We have a single picture, by another painter of the same subject, as an emblem of idleness, mentioned by Pliny. Pausanias, however, calls the ass of Ocnus the emblem of a thriftless wife.