142 MELPOMENE.

ly, Battus should be their prince and leader: to Pit-
tea, they sent accordingly two ships of fifty oars.

CLIV. With this account, as given by the There-
ans, the Cyreneans agree, except in what relates to
Battus; here they differ exceedingly, and tell, in con­
tradiction, the following history:—there is a town in
Crete, named Oaxus, where Etearchus was once king;
having lost his wife, by whom he had a daughter,
called Phronima, he married a second time: no sooner
did his last wife take possession of his house, than sh*
proved herself to Phronima, a real step-mother. Not
content with injuring her by every species of cruelty
and ill-treatment, she at length upbraided her with
being unchaste, and persuaded her husband to believe
so. Deluded by the artifice of his wife, he perpetrated
the following act of barbarity against his daughter:
there was at Oaxus a merchant of Thera, whose name
was Themison; of him, after showing him the usual
rites of hospitality, he exacted an oath that he would
comply with whatever he should require; having done
this, he delivered him his daughter, ordering him to
throw her into the sea. Themison reflected with un­
feigned sorrow on the artifice which had been prac­
tised upon him, and the obligation imposed; he deter­
mined, however, what to do: he took the damsel, and
having sailed to some distance from land, to fulfil hi>
oath, he secured a rope about her, and plunged her
into the sea; but he immediately took her out again,
and carried her to Thera.

CLV. Here Polymnestus, a Therean of some im­
portance, took Phronima to be his concubine, and
after a certain time had a son by her, remarkable for
his shrill and stammering voice: his name, as the
Thereans and Cyreneans assert, was Battus, but I
think it was something else. He was not, I believe,
called Battus till after his arrival in Libya; he was
then so named, either on account of the answer of
the oracle, or from the subsequent dignity which he
attained. Battus, in the Libyan tongue, signifies a
prince; and I should think that the Pythian, foresee­
ing he was to reign in Libya, distinguished him by
this African title. As soon as he grew up, he went