Then Zeus, calling all the gods to witness that there was no other
means of safety, hurled his thunderbolt; and Phaethon knew no more.

His body fell through the heavens, aflame like a shooting-star; and the
horses of the Sun dashed homeward with the empty chariot.

Poor Clymene grieved sore over the boy's death; but the young Heliades,
daughters of the Sun, refused all comfort. Day and night they wept
together about their brother's grave by the river, until the gods took
pity and changed them all into poplar-trees. And ever after that they
wept sweet tears of amber, clear as sunlight.




NIOBE.


There are so many tales of the vanity of kings and queens that the half
of them cannot be told.

There was Cassiopaeia, queen of Aethiopia, who boasted that her beauty
outshone the beauty of all the sea-nymphs, so that in anger they sent a
horrible sea-serpent to ravage the coast. The king prayed of an Oracle
to know how the monster might be appeased, and learned that he must
offer up his own daughter, Andromeda. The maiden was therefore chained
to a rock by the sea-side, and left to her fate. But who should come to
rescue her but a certain young hero, Perseus, who was hastening
homeward after a perilous adventure with the snaky-haired Gorgons.
Filled with pity at the story of Andromeda, he waited for the dragon,