Stesichorus also mentions the Cydonian apples, in his Helena, speaking thus:
Before the king's most honour'd throne,Alcman mentions them too. And Cantharus does so like- wise, in the Tereus; where he says—
I threw Cydonian apples down;
And leaves of myrrh, and crowns of roses,
And violets in purple posies.
Likening her bosom to Cydonian apples.And Philemon, in his Clown, calls Cydonian apples strouthia. And Phylarchus, in the sixth book of his Histories, says that apples by their sweet fragrance can blunt the efficacy of even deadly poisons. At all events, he says, that some Phariacan poison having been cast into a chest still smelling from [p. 137] having had some of these apples stored away in it, lost all its effect, and preserved none of its former power, but was mixed and given to some people who were plotted against, but that they escaped all harm. And that afterwards it was ascertained, by an investigation and examination of the man who had sold the poison; and that he felt sure that it arose from the fact of the apples having been put away in the chest.
