INTRODUCTION.	7
	goes under the name of Orpheus (but is generally attri­buted to Onomacritus the Athenian, who flourished as early as b.c. 516),* he will not, in my opinion, fail to perceive that both are works by the same hand. The close resem­blance in the versification, in the fondness for spondaic endings, in the diction, in the reduplication of epithets ; and as regards the spirit, the peculiar form, marking a purely Grecian epoch, under which the tender passion is pictured in both, clearly indicate their common origin. Now to establish their common antiquity. The ' Argo-nautica,' being comparatively a mere sketch, must have necessarily preceded the elaborate composition by Apollo­nius Ehodius upon the same theme. The story as told by Orpheus differs from the latter in many important particulars, besides being narrated with much more of primitive simplicity : indeed it is hardly conceivable that any one coming after Apollonius should have attempted to compete with an epic of such established reputation ; or that, having such audacity, he should have deviated so far from his prototype. But, on the grounds above stated, if Onomacritus is the author of the ' Argonautica,' he must also be considered the author of the ' Lithica.' Indeed the question of the high antiquity of the latter is set at vest, if we accept the statement of the scholiast " Demetrius, son of Moschus," that it gave Nicander the idea of his ' Theriaca.' Now as Nicander flourished at the court of Attalas III., about B.c. 135, this circumstance presup­poses a much earlier date in a work selected for his model by a writer of no mean order. There are many expressions in Pliny, where he is laughing at the mystic powers attributed to gems by the Magi of old times, which seem direct allusions to pas-