Epigraph
“Far away in the twilight time
Of every people, in every clime,
Dragons and griffins and monsters dire.
Born of water, or air, or fire,
Or nursed, like the Python, in the mud
And ooze of the old Deucalion flood,
Crawl, and wriggle, and foam with rage,
Through dark tradition and ballad age.”
Whittier.