On the top of Mount Helicon is a small river called the Lamus. And in the district of Thespia is a place called Donacon, (_Reed-bed_), where is the fountain of Narcissus, who they say looked into this water, and not observing that it was his own shadow which he saw was secretly enamoured of himself, and died of love near the fountain. This is altogether silly that any grown person should be so possessed by love as not to know the difference between a human being and a shadow. There is another tradition about him, not so well known as the other, _viz._ that he had a twin-sister, and that the two were almost facsimiles in appearance and hair and dress, and used to go out hunting together, and that Narcissus was in love with this sister, and when she died he used to frequent this fountain and knew that it was his own shadow which he saw, yet though he knew this it gratified his love to think that it was not his own shadow but the image of his sister that he was looking at. But the earth produced I think the flower narcissus earlier than this, if one may credit the verses of Pamphus: for though he was much earlier than the Thespian Narcissus, he says that Proserpine the daughter of Demeter was playing and gathering flowers when she was carried off, and that she was deceived not by violets but by narcissuses.[70] [68] So Tibullus calls Priapus “Bacchi rustica proles,” i. 4. 7. [69] _viz._, at line 11. [70] See Homer’s Hymn to Demeter, lines 8-10. CHAPTER XXXII. The inhabitants of Creusis, a haven of the Thespians, have no public monuments, but in the house of a private individual is a statue of Dionysus made of plaster and adorned by a painting. The sea-voyage from the Peloponnese to Creusis is circuitous and rough, the promontories so jut out into the sea that one cannot sail straight across, and at the same time strong winds blow down from the mountains. And as you sail from Creusis, not well out to sea but coasting along Bœotia, you will see on the right the city Thisbe. First there is a mountain near the sea, and when you have passed that there is a plain and then another mountain, and at the bottom of this mountain is Thisbe. And there is a temple of Hercules and stone statue there in a standing posture, and they keep a festival to him. And nothing would prevent the plain between the mountains being a lake, (so much water is there), but that they have a strong embankment in the middle of the plain, and annually divert the water beyond the embankment and cultivate the dry parts of the plain. And Thisbe, from whom the city got its name, was they say a local Nymph.