• Among the Greek epigrams is one on Niobe, which runs as follows:⁠— “This sepulchre within it has no corse; This corse without here has no sepulchre, But to itself is sepulchre and corse.” Ovid, Metamorphoses , VI , Croxall’s Tr. :⁠— “Widowed and childless, lamentable state! A doleful sight, among the dead she sate; Hardened with woes, a statue of despair, To every breath of wind unmoved her hair; Her cheek still reddening, but its color dead, Faded her eyes, and set within her head. No more her pliant tongue its motion keeps, But stands congealed within her frozen lips. Stagnate and dull, within her purple veins, Its current stopped, the lifeless blood remains. Her feet their usual offices refuse, Her arms and neck their graceful gestures lose: Action and life from every part are gone, And even her entrails turn to solid stone; Yet still she weeps, and whirled by stormy winds, Borne through the air, her native country finds; There fixed, she stands upon a bleaky hill, There yet her marble cheeks eternal tears distil.” ↩