10
After a moment’s delay, a man named Eumelus, from Elis, came on, who had an old lyre, fitted with wooden pegs, and a costume that, including the wreath, was hardly worth ten drachmas; but as he sang well and played skilfully, he had the best of it and was proclaimed victor, so that he could laugh at Evangelus for the empty display that he had made with his lyre and his gems. Indeed, the story goes that he said to him: “Evangelus, you wear golden laurel, being rich; but I am poor and I wear the laurel of Delphi! ‘However, you got at least this much by your outfit: you are going away not only unpitied for your defeat but hated into the bargain because of this inartistic lavishness of yours.” There you have your own living image in Evangelus, except that you are not at all put out by the laughter of the audience. 1
11
It would not be out of place to tell you another story about something that happened in Lesbos long ago. They say that when the women of Thrace tore Orpheus to pieces, his head and his lyre fell into the Hebrus, and were carried out into the Aegean Sea; and that the head floated along on the lyre, singing a dirge (so the story goes) over Orpheus, while the lyre itself gave out sweet sounds as the winds struck the strings. In that manner they came ashore at Lesbos to the sound of music, and the people there took them up, burying the head where their temple of Dionysus now stands and hanging up the lyre in the temple of Apollo, where it was long preserved.
