The reverence in which the oracle was held, even in the most enlightened times, was largely due to the wisdom and prudence of the priests--five in number--who belonged to the noblest Delphian families and held office for life. They were brought into contact with leading men who came to consult the oracle from all parts of the Greek-speaking world,--men like Lycurgus and Solon and Socrates and Xenophon and Alexander the Great,--and they appear to have been on terms of intimacy with such national poets as Hesiod and Pindar and Æschylus. Pindar’s iron chair was carefully preserved in the sacred precincts, and the priest of Apollo cried nightly as he closed the temple, “Let Pindar the poet go in unto the supper of the gods.” The priests put their own interpretations on the ecstatic utterances of the prophetess, which she delivered in their hearing and in the presence of the inquirer after she had drunk the holy water, chewed the laurel-leaf, and mounted the tripod to inhale the narcotic vapour which arose from the chasm beneath. These interpretations they embodied in hexameter verses, generally disappointing from a poetical point of view, considering the auspices under which they were delivered, and frequently ambiguous in their terms, when it did not seem advisable for the oracle to commit itself to a definite opinion. One of the best known and most interesting cases of this sort was the answer given to Crœsus, King of Sardis, when he was deliberating whether he ought to go to war with Persia. Before inquiring on so important a point he resolved to test all the chief oracles, six in number, by asking each of them through a special messenger to say what he was doing on a specified day, on which the question was to be put. The oracle that best stood the test was Delphi, and Crœsus proceeded to ask advice on the momentous question about which he was so anxious, bestowing on the temple of Apollo at the same time magnificent gifts of solid gold and silver, and immense offerings for sacrifice. The answer was that if he went to war with Persia he would destroy a great empire, which he at once took in a favourable sense. He was defeated, however, and Cyrus became master of his city and kingdom, thus fulfilling the oracle in an unexpected sense. He would have been put to death by his conqueror had it not been that when he lay bound upon a funeral pile, which had been already kindled, his exclamations led Cyrus to inquire what he was speaking of, and on hearing of Solon’s warning as to the instability of human greatness, which the fallen monarch had been calling to mind, Cyrus gave orders that Crœsus should be at once released. The flames had taken such hold of the wood, however, that he would still have perished if Apollo had not heard his prayers and sent a heavy shower of rain, which extinguished the fire. The disappointment of his hopes gave such a shock to Crœsus’ faith that, by the leave of Cyrus, he sent to Delphi the