head in the desert, and there it still remains concealed.  Where he used to discharge his waters through seven mouths into the sea, there seven dry channels alone remained.  The earth cracked open, and through the chinks light broke into Tartarus, and frightened the king of shadows and his queen.  The sea shrank up.  Where before was water, it became a dry plain; and the mountains that lie beneath the waves lifted up their heads and became islands.  The fishes sought the lowest depths, and the dolphins no longer ventured as usual to sport on the surface.  Even Nereus, and his wife Doris, with the Nereids, their daughters, sought the deepest caves for refuge.  Thrice Neptune essayed to raise his head above the surface, and thrice was driven back by the heat.  Earth, surrounded as she was by waters, yet with head and shoulders bare, screening her face with her hand, looked up to heaven, and with a husky voice called on Jupiter: 

“O ruler of the gods, if I have deserved this treatment, and it is your will that I perish with fire, why withhold your thunderbolts?  Let me at least fall by your hand.  Is this the reward of my fertility, of my obedient service?  Is it for this that I have supplied herbage for cattle, and fruits for men, and frankincense for your altars?  But if I am unworthy of regard, what has my brother Ocean done to deserve such a fate?  If neither of us can excite your pity, think, I pray you, of your own heaven, and behold how both the poles are smoking which sustain your palace, which must fall if they be destroyed.  Atlas faints, and scarce holds up his burden.  If sea, earth, and heaven perish, we fall into ancient Chaos.  Save what yet remains to us from the devouring flame.  O, take thought for our deliverance in this awful moment!”

Thus spoke Earth, and overcome with heat and thirst, could say no more.  Then Jupiter omnipotent, calling to witness all the gods, including him who had lent the chariot, and showing them that all was lost unless speedy remedy were applied, mounted the lofty tower from whence he diffuses clouds over the earth, and hurls the forked lightnings.  But at that time not a cloud was to be found to interpose for a screen to earth, nor was a shower remaining unexhausted.  He thundered, and brandishing a lightning bolt in his right hand launched it against the charioteer, and struck him at the same moment from his seat and from existence!  Phaeton, with his hair on fire, fell headlong, like a shooting star which marks the heavens with its brightness as it falls, and Eridanus, the great river, received him and cooled his burning frame.  The Italian Naiads reared a tomb for him, and inscribed these words upon the stone: 

    “Driver of Phoebus’ chariot Phaeton,
     Struck by Jove’s thunder, rests beneath this stone. 
     He could not rule his father’s car of fire,
     Yet was it much so nobly to aspire”

[Footnote:  See Proverbial Expressions]