LHE TYRANTS SOR“CORINTH.

We have already told what the word “tyrant”
meant in Greece,—a despot who set aside the law
and ruled at his own pleasure, but who might be mild
and gentle in his rule. Such were the tyrants of
Sicyon, spoken of in our last tale. The tyrants of
Corinth, the state adjoining Sicyon, were of a harsher
character. Herodotus, the gossipping old historian,
tells some stories about these severe despots which
seem worth telling again.

The government of Corinth, like most of the gov-
ernments of Greece, was in early days an oligarchy,
—that is, it was ruled by a number of powerful aris-
tocrats instead of by a single king. In Corinth these
belonged to a single family, named the Bacchiade
(or legendary descendants of the god Bacchus), who
constantly intermarried, and kept all power to them-
selves.

But one of this family, Amphion by name, had a
daughter, named Labda, whom none of the Bacchiadse
would marry, as she had the misfortune to be lame.
So she married outside the family, her husband being
named Aétion, and a man of noble descent. Having
no children, Aétion applied to the Delphian oracle,
and was told that a son would soon be borne to him,

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