Note 297 — Chapter VII

Some of these points of grammar which attracted the scorn of Heracleon were whether βάλλω loses a λ in the future; and what were the positives from which the comparatives χεῖρον and βέλτιον, and the superlatives χεῖριστον and βέλτιστον were formed (412 E).—“Quelques années après les guerres médiques, le pinceau de Polygnote couvrit la Lesché des Cnidiens à Delphes de scènes empruntées au monde infernal.” (Bouché-Leclerq: iii. 153.)—It would have been more interesting to a modern student if Heracleon had replied that the pictures of Polygnotus were quite sufficient to keep one mentally alert, and had seized the opportunity to give us an exact description of the scenes depicted and the meaning they conveyed to the men of his time. “‘Not all the treasures,’ as Homer has it, ‘which the stone threshold of the Far-darter holds safe within, would now,’ as Mr. Myers says, ‘be so precious to us as the power of looking for one hour on the greatest work by the greatest painter of antiquity, the picture by Polygnotus in the Hall of the Cnidians at Delphi, of the descent of Odysseus among the dead.’”