Daphne, Emmanuel Michel Benner






away any resentment which she might entertain against his trespass, and she plucks an edelweiss, the mountain flower which grows in the highest and most inaccessible places, to place it in his hand as a protecting talisman.

Miss Diana Coomans turns from Pompeii to Athens for "At the Callirhoe Spring." The fountain of Callirhoe, called the fountain of nine springs, because its waters were distributed in that number of channels, was credited with magical properties and powers, and its fluid treasure was sought with prayer and floral invocation by the maidens, to whom it was supposed to bring good fortune in affairs of the heart. The fountain, it may be added, derived its name from the daughter of the river-god Achelus, to whom it was dedicated. The "Daphne" of Emmanuel Benner also dives into Greek legend for its subject. Daphne, a beautiful nymph of the forest and stream, became the object of a violent passion on the part of Apollo. She scorned him. He pursued her, and she called upon her mother, the Earth, for succor. The appeal was answered. According to one version of the fable she was turned into a laurel tree just as Apollo was about to grasp her, and the laurel was thenceforward a tree sacred to all poets and heroes, and was used as a crown of honor. The name of the transformed nymph was given to the grove in which her transformation occurred, and in which was erected a sanctuary and temple to Apollo and Diana.

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