The San Francisco call., 1907-01-27
OLE DEAD AMAzOR

as porgOuIue0 INTO q human actribuce
or passion. Niobe lived on the island
Of Delos, where she had many sons and
daughters, of whom she was very proud
and was never weary OF telling her
neighbors about them and their many
virtues, On the same island lived an
other lady named sLeto. She had only
two children. but as she had been
wife to Zeus they had a disting guished
pedigree and were endowed with great
powers. They were named Artemis
! Diana) and Apollo.
The two ladies evidently exchanged
visits very often, and Niobe apparently
never lost an opportunity to extol the
virtues of her children. One day they
.Leto. how strong and fair are my
seven sons and seven daughters Apollo
a-d Artenis are very beautiful, adj
NIT, but are not my children fairer
still?" So Niobe went on tboasting unit.
Leto became very angry, and when Nj
ODE and her children were gone she
called Apollo and said to him: II do
notslove the. Lady Niobe; she is always
boasting ~that her children are more
beautiful than you and Artemis. and
wish you to show her that no one else
issso strong or so beautiful as my chill
dren." Apollo said nothing, but anger
shone from his eyes and dark frowns
en- bow and put on his CULVER filled
with the arrows that never missed their
mark and took his way to the hills
where lived the Lady Niobe and her
children. He placed himself on a high
rock, fitted anstarrow and drew the
string TIL the point Of the arrow
touched the how and let the arrow fly
and one of Nfobe' s. sons fell dead. Then
another arrow found its mark in the
breast of another Of Nfobe's children,
and another and another, till all the
sons and daughters of Niobe lay dead
She could not believe they were really
all gone and went from one to another.
touched them and kissed them, but
they needed not her caresses. Then
she sat on a stone and tears
flowed from her eyes, and she sat and
moved not, weeping on the cold rock,
till her body grew colder and colder
until she became still as the rock IT.
5 self, and the Lady sNiobe was dead. Her
grief had turned her into stone. And
long after. the people that came near
the place would point her out: There
sits the Lady Niobe who was turned
to stone because she had boasted that
s her children were fairer than Apollo
5 and Artemis."
:. so runs the legend Pliny relates
s that the stone was there in his day.
: Perhaps it. is there still But it was
fiIdA1C6lCS OF HIS l0lOA koCOpcc SAeAe R-~
the story into a marble face whose
grief is so pathetic that all who look
! upor..it grieve with her
! Phidias was the creator Of the grand
est art. Of Greece. In his statue or
Athena of the Parthenon he embodied
. the greatest conception or woman
hood ever achieved--the woman we all
, seek but never find, the woman every
girl aspires to become, but never
reaches. Pure, beautiful. inscrutable,
freed from every suggestion Of the pas
esfons, the very highest embodiment Of
womanly sideality, his Athena has never
been equaled. In his statue of Zeus at
; olympia he embodied the highest
human conception of majestic, all
powerful and benef1cent god. The
nearest approach to it is the statue OF
Moses by Michael Angelo. who en-
bodied the same sense Of power and
majesty. but failed in the impression
OF beneflcence. Following Phidias were
his pupils Scopas and Praxiteles, whose
expression Is more of the human. and
most OF the objects in this collection
are of this school The Aphrodits of