The _dramatis personæ_ of the “Suppliants” of Æschylus vaguely suggest a chapter in the early history of Argolis. Danaus with his fifty daughters comes from the south, fleeing over the sea from his brother Ægyptus and his fifty sons. The early Pelasgian inhabitants of Argos are represented by the king, Pelasgus, who receives the suppliant fugitives into the safe refuge of his Cyclopean walls, which we may identify with the prehistoric Larisa citadel above Argos: “Go get ye to my city fenced with goodly walls, fast locked within the lofty ramparts, subtly wrought.” Henceforward, as in Homer, the Argives and Danai are convertible names. All objection to the newcomers as foreigners is neutralized by realizing that they have only returned to their original home. Inachus, the river god, was the father of Io, who, half transformed into a heifer by the jealousy of Hera, had been made to wander frenzied over land and water until in Egypt she brought forth a son, the great-grandfather of this same Danaus. In the sequel to the “Suppliants” Æschylus gave his interpretation of the story of the Danaides and their trial for the forty-nine murders of that Saint Bartholomew wedding night. Only fragments of this play remain, and the romance of Hypermnestra is familiar to the modern world chiefly from Horace’s incomparable ode. In the “Prometheus,” however, Æschylus both tells the Io story at length and briefly sketches the story of Hypermnestra, which, with the “lovely tale” of Danaë and the infant Perseus, sheds around the Perseid dynasty of Argos a fragrant aroma of romance in striking contrast to the gruesome annals of the Pelopid family, which waft now and again to our nostrils the scent of human blood and the breath of the charnel vault. Prometheus prophesies to Io that, in the fifth generation from her Egyptian-born son, fifty maidens, daughters of Danaus,— “Shall come, not willing it, to Argos back again. Wedlock with kinsmen cousins they are fain to shun, But these with hearts a-flutter, falcons after doves, Not distanced far, shall come to hunt their quarry down, Seeking a wedlock that should not be sought. But God Shall grudge their mating. In her soil Pelasgia Shall give them lodging, slain, laid low by women’s hands, Ares-emboldened, waking sentinels of night. For wife each husband of his life shall rob, and dye Her two-edged sword in murder. May God grant, with love Like this, that Cypris come upon my enemies! One maiden only shall love soften and forbid To slay her love-mate. Nay, her purpose she shall blunt And of twain choices offered she shall rather choose To bear the name of coward than of murderess. From her in Argos shall be bred a royal line.”