One[621] world is not enough for the youth of Pella! He chafes within the narrow limits of the universe, poor soul, as though confined in Gyarus'[622] small rock, or scanty Seriphös. Yet when he shall have entered the city that the brickmakers[623] fortified, he will be content with a sarcophagus![624] Death alone discloses how very small are the puny bodies of men! Men do believe that Athos was sailed through of yore; and all the bold assertions that lying Greeks hazard in history--that the sea was bridged over by the same fleets, and formed into a solid pavement for the transit of wheels. We believe that deep rivers failed, and streams were drunk dry[625] when the Persian dined; and all the flights of Sostratus'[626] song, when his wings are moistened by the god of wine. And yet, in what guise did _he_ return after quitting Salamis, who, like a true barbarian as he was, used to vent his rage in scourges on Corus and Eurus, that had never suffered in this sort in Æolus' prison; and bound in gyves Ennosigæus[627] himself. It was, in fact, an act of clemency that he did not think he deserved branding[628] also. Would any of the gods choose to serve[629] such a man as this? But how did he return? Why, in a single ship; through waves dyed with blood, and with his galley retarded[630] by the shoals of corpses. Such was the penalty that glory, for which he had so often prayed, exacted. "Grant length of life, great Jove, and many years!" This is your only prayer in health and sickness. But with what unremitting and grievous ills is old age crowded! First of all, its face is hideous, loathsome, and altered from its former self; instead of skin a hideous hide and flaccid cheeks; and see! such wrinkles, as, where Tabraca[631] extends her shady dells, the antiquated ape[632] scratches on her wizened jowl! There are many points of difference in the young: this youth is handsomer than that; and he again than a third: one is far sturdier than another. Old mens faces are all alike--limbs tottering and voice feeble,[633] a smooth bald pate, and the second childhood of a driveling nose; the poor wretch must mumble his bread with toothless gums; so loathsome to his wife, his children, and even to himself, that he would excite the disgust even of the legacy-hunter Cossus! His palate[634] is grown dull; his relish for his food and wine[635] no more the same; the joys of love are long ago forgotten; and in spite of all efforts to reinvigorate them, all manly energies are hopelessly extinct. Has this depraved and hoary lechery aught else to hope? Do we not look with just suspicion on the lust that covets the sin but lacks the power?[636]