prest him hard embattled Phoibos with his silver bow, neither would
Hades keep his staff unraised, wherewith he leadeth down to ways
beneath the hollow earth the bodies of men that die?

O my mouth, fling this tale from thee, for to speak evil of gods is
a hateful wisdom, and loud and unmeasured words strike a note that
trembleth upon madness. Of such things talk thou not; leave war of
immortals and all strife aside; and bring thy words to the city of
Protogeneia, where by decree of Zeus of the bickering lightning-flash
Pyrrha and Deukalion coming down from Parnassos first fixed their
home, and without bed of marriage made out of stones a race to be one
folk: and hence cometh the name of peoples[2]. Awake for them the
clear-toned gale of song, and if old wine be best, yet among songs
prefer the newer flowers.

Truly men say that once a mighty water swept over the dark earth, but
by the craft of Zeus an ebb suddenly drew off the flood. From these
first men came anciently your ancestors of the brazen shields, sons of
the women of the stock of Iapetos and of the mighty Kronidai, Kings
that dwelt in the land continually; until the Olympian Lord caught up
the daughter[3] of Opöeis from the land of the Epeians, and lay with
her in a silent place among the ridges of Mainalos; and afterward
brought her unto Lokros, that age might not bring him[4] low beneath
the burden of childlessness. But the wife bare within her the seed of
the Mightiest, and the hero saw the bastard born and rejoiced, and
called him by the name of his mother's father, and he became a man
preeminent in beauty and great deeds: and his father gave unto him a
city and a people to rule over.

Then there came unto him strangers, from Argos and from Thebes, and