Verse
Metamorphoses
Book 15, Line 20 by Henry T. Riley (English)
“And, what is still more wonderful, there are some streams which are able to change, not only bodies, but even the mind. By whom has not Salmacis, with its obscene waters, been heard of? Who has not heard , too, of that lake of Æthiopia, of which, if any body drinks with his mouth, he either becomes mad, or falls into a sleep wondrous for its heaviness? Whoever quenches his thirst from the Clitorian spring hates wine, and in his sobriety takes pleasure in pure water. Whether it is that there is a virtue in the water, the opposite of heating wine, or whether, as the natives tell us, after the son of Amithaon, by his charms and his herbs, had delivered the raving daughters of Prœtus from the Furies, he threw the medicines for the mind in that stream; and a hatred of wine remained in those waters.
MetamorphosesOvidHenry T. RileyEnglishVerse permalinkRead in Book 15
Book 15, Line 20ProseID metamorphoses-riley-en-prose-15-20