In the times of the earlier civilizations, men had a wonderfully direct way of obtaining their ends; they chose the simplest means and the fittest, and the survival of their method down to our days is the best proof of a judgment almost as unerring as instinct. With all our mechanical appliances, we can do little better than modify and develop the designs we have inherited. In our wind instruments, everywhere the primitive remains, even as the type of race remains. CHAPTER X. The Isles of Greece. MIDAS THE GLORIOUS. “The Glorious!” So Pindar names the flute player Midas the Sicilian, who had twice obtained the laurel wreath by his performance on the flutes at the Pythic games. It is in his twelfth ode that Pindar celebrates the victory of Midas over all Greece upon that instrument which Athene herself had invented, and he inscribes the ode thus:— TO MIDAS OF AGRAGAS, WINNER OF THE PRIZE FOR FLUTE PLAYING. How strangely this sounds to us, and how little able are we to estimate at its true significance the esteem in which flute players were held by all the people of Greece. Many records there are, telling unmistakably of the passion the Greeks had for this music; of the wealth lavished on the famous players; of the temples in which their names were cut in marble with every token of pride and exultation; and of statues raised to their honour. But greater tribute than any that was given, or than remains, is this,—that Pindar thought the flute player worthy of one of his odes, and immortalized him. His voice was the voice of national feeling, and, as I have said, it sounds strangely to us. We are so civilized, have gone so utterly beyond “Earth’s early days, When simple pleasures pleased,” that we should not recognize the voice of Saturn; and if “The dim echoes of old Triton’s horn” reached our brass belaboured ears, how many think you would listen with reverence? Yet surely for a little while we should find some good in letting our imagination dwell upon the scenes and surroundings that were real in Greek life; some good also in cherishing the belief that the dead beliefs of old humanity were once living beliefs. Pindar, second only because Homer was first, was revered by the whole Greek race, and considered their greatest lyric poet. From the pillars of Hercules to the verge of India, wherever there were Greeks, there Pindar was amongst them. How high an honour, therefore, it was that fell to Midas the flute player. STROPHE. I pray thee, Queen of Splendour, city of peerless grace, Persephone’s home; O thou that on thy tower-clad hill Dwellest, fair Queen, beside the streams of pastoral Agragas! Propitious greet, with favour of Heaven, and man’s good-will, The crown, at Pytho’s festival, that glorious Midas won; And welcome him victorious in that fair Art,—of old, That Pallas found, ...