Epistulae

us back, swelled by adverse winds. Adverse did I say? far from it: that indeed was the favorable gale. That, I say, was the favorable gale, which retarded my unhappy steps, and struggled to prevent an ill fated voyage. How I wish that it had continued obstinately to oppose the spreading sails! But it is ridiculous to complain of the inconstancy of the wind. Attracted by the fame of the place, I was eager to come within sight of Delos, and seemed to traverse the deep with languid pace. How often did I chide the oars, as slow in bearing us along? How often complain that our sails were not stretched by the stinted blasts? And now I had passed Mycone, Tenos, and Andros, and bright Delos was within view; which I no sooner saw, that I cried out, Why does the island seem to fly me? Do you, as in time past, fluctuate in the vast ocean? Nor reached I land till towards the close of day, when Phœbus was preparing to unharness his purple horses. When these had been recalled to their accustomed way, my mother gave orders to dress my flowing locks. She

adorned my fingers with gems, and my tresses with braids of gold, and threw over my shoulders the embroidered robe. We then walked towards the temple, and offered frankincense and wine to the guardian deities of the island. While my mother was engaged in sprinkling the altars with votive blood, and throwing the sacred entrails upon the smoking fuel, my officious nurse led me through the several courts of the temple, and we traversed the sacred place with wandering steps. Sometimes I walked under magnificent porticoes, sometimes admired the rich gifts of kings, and the finished statues that adorned every part. I admired too the famous altar made of innumerable horns wonderfully derfully joined together, and the tree that supported the pregnant Goddess; with whatever other curiosities (for I cannot now recollect them, nor am I inclined to mention all I then saw) Delos boasts.