Bk II:633-675 Chiron and Chariclo's prophecies. The semi-human was pleased with this foster-child of divine origin, glad at the honour it brought him, when his daughter suddenly appeared, her shoulders covered with her long red hair, whom the nymph Chariclo called Ocyrhoë, having given birth to her on the banks of that swift stream. She was not content merely to have learned her father's arts, she also chanted the secrets of the Fates. So when she felt the prophetic frenzy in her mind, and was on fire with the god enclosed in her breast, she looked at the infant boy and cried out, "Grow and thrive, child, healer of all the world! Human beings will often be in your debt, and you will have the right to restore the dead. But if ever it is done regardless of the god's displeasure you will be stopped, by the flame of your grandfather's lightning bolt, from doing so again. From a god you will turn to a bloodless corpse, and then to a god who was a corpse, and so twice renew your fate. "You also, dear father, now immortal, and created by the law of your birth to live on through all the ages, will long for death, when you are tormented by the terrible venom of the Serpent, Hydra, absorbed through your wounded limbs. But at last the gods will give you the power to die, and the Three Goddesses will sever the thread." Other prophecies remained to tell: but she sighed deeply, distressed by the tears welling from her eyes, and cried, "The Fates prevent me, and forbid me further speech. My throat is constricted. These arts are not worth the cost if they incur the gods' anger against me. Better not to know the future! Now I see my human shape being taken away, now grass contents me for food, now my impulse is to race over the wide fields. I am changing to a mare, the form of my kindred. But why am I completely so? Surely my father is still half human." Even as she spoke, the last part of her complaint was hard to understand and her words were troubled. Soon they seemed neither words nor a horse's neighs, but the imitation of a horse. In a little while she gave out clear whinnying noises, and her arms moved in the grass. Then her fingers came together and one thin solid hoof of horn joined her five fingernails. Her head and the length of her neck extended, the greater part of her long gown became a tail, and the loose hair thrown over her neck hung down as a mane on her right shoulder. Now she was altered in both voice and features, and from this marvelous happening she gained a new name. |
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