[156] A note concerning the use of the term ‘nymph’ may save confusion.  Creizenach remarks that the introduction of a nymph as the beloved of a shepherd is a peculiarity of the renaissance pastoral which manifestly owes its origin to Boccaccio’s Ninfale fiesolano (Geschichte des neueren Dramas, ii. p. 196).  In so far as this view implies that the ‘nymphs’ of pastoral convention are the same order of beings as those either of the Ninfale or of classical myth, it appears to me utterly erroneous.  The ‘nymphs’ who love the shepherds in the renaissance pastorals are nothing but shepherdesses.  The confusion no doubt began with Boccaccio.  The nymph of Diana in the Ninfale is, as we have already seen, nothing but a nun in pagan disguise.  The nymphs of the Ameto are represented as of the classical type, but their amorous confessions reveal them as in nowise differing from mortal woman.  The gradual change in the connotation of the word is one of the results of the blending of Christian and classical ideas.  The original elemental or local spirits even in Greek myth acquired some of the characteristics of votaries (as in the legeud of Calisto), and these Christian tradition tended to accentuate, while popular romance, and in many cases contemporary manners, facilitated the connecting of such characters with tales of secret passion.  Gradually, however, the idea of illicit love gave place to one merely of unrestrained natural desire, the religious elements of the character were forgotten as the supernatural had been earlier, and ‘nymph’ came to be no more than the feminine of ‘shepherd’ in an ideal society which by its freedom of intercourse, as by its honesty of dealing, presented a complete contrast to the polished circles of aristocratic Italy.

[157] A small circular picture in chiaroscuro among the arabesques of the cappella nova in the cathedral at Orvieto.  It represents the youthful Orpheus crowned with the laureate wreath playing before Pluto and Proserpine upon a fiddle or crowd of antique pattern.  At his feet lies Eurydice, while around are spirits of the other world.

[158] In some passages of this speech the resemblance with Ovid is very close: 

famaque si ueteris non est mentita rapinae, uos quoque iunxit Amor... omnia debentur nobis, paulumque morati serius aut citius sedem properamus ad unam... haec quoque, cum iustos matura peregerit annos, iuris erit uestri; pro munere poscimus usum. quod si fata negant ueniam pro coniuge, certum est nolle redire mihi:  leto gaudete duorum. (Met. x. 28, &c.)

[159] Cf. Amores, II. xii, ll. 1, 2, 5, and 16.

[160] This interpretation of the passion of Orpheus, characteristic as it is of renaissance thought, was not original.  Though unknown in early times, it is found in Phanocles, a poet probably of the third or fourth century B. C.

[161] So original:  revision ‘oe oe.’