The name, Echetlos, is derived from ἐχέτλη, a plough handle. It is not strictly a proper name, but an appellative, meaning “the Holder of the Ploughshare.” The story is found in Pausanias, author of the “Itinerary of Greece” (1, 15, 32). Nothing further is necessary in order to understand this little poem and appreciate its rugged strength than familiarity with the battle of Marathon, and some knowledge of Miltiades and Themistocles, the one known as the hero of Marathon, and the other as the hero of Salamis. The lesson of the poem (“The great _deed_ ne’er grows small, not the great _name_!”) is taught in a way not likely to be forgotten. One is reminded of another, who wished to be nameless, heard only as “the voice of one crying in the wilderness!” The ellipsis in thought between the eighth and ninth stanzas is so easily supplied that it is noticed here only as a simple illustration of what is sometimes the occasion of difficulty (see Introduction, p. iii). It would only have lengthened the poem and weakened it to have inserted a stanza telling in so many words that when the hero could not be found, a message was sent to the Oracle to enquire who it could be. As a companion to “Echetlos” may be read the stirring poem of “Hervé Riel.” ------------------------------------------------------------------------ HELEN’S TOWER. Ἑλένη ἐπὶ πύργῳ Who hears of Helen’s Tower, may dream perchance, How the Greek Beauty from the Scæan Gate Gazed on old friends unanimous in hate, Death-doom’d because of her fair countenance. Hearts would leap otherwise, at thy advance, Lady, to whom this Tower is consecrate: Like hers, thy face once made all eyes elate, Yet, unlike hers, was bless’d by every glance. The Tower of Hate is outworn, far and strange: A transitory shame of long ago, It dies into the sand from which it sprang: But thine, Love’s rock-built Tower, shall fear no change: God’s self laid stable Earth’s foundations so, When all the morning-stars together sang. The tower is one built by Lord Dufferin, in memory of his mother Helen, Countess of Gifford, on one of his estates in Ireland. “The Greek Beauty” is, of course, Helen of Troy, and the reference in the alternative heading is apparently to that fine passage in the third book of the “Iliad,” where Helen meets the Trojan chiefs at the Scæan Gate (see line 154, which speaks of “Helen at the Tower”). On the last two lines, founded of course on the well-known passage in Job (xxxviii. 4-7), compare Dante: “E il sol montava in su con quelle stelle Ch’eran con lui, quando l’Amor Divino Mosse da prima quelle cose belle.” “Aloft the sun ascended with those stars That with him rose, when Love Divine first moved Those its fair works.” —_Inferno_ I. 38-40. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ SHOP.