Ganymede and the Eagle

As you come up the main staircase into the rotunda, the first pier on your left carries three scenes of flight, set one above another. Lowest, modelled in plaster, Eros floats head first down toward Psyche. Above him the winged figure of Fame blows a trumpet. Higher still, in a round frame, is this painted canvas. In the Greek story Zeus, king of the gods, fell in love with Ganymede, a Trojan prince and the most beautiful of mortals, and took the form of an eagle to carry him up to Olympus as cupbearer to the gods. Sargent shows the eagle flying through cloud on outspread wings, with the boy hanging from its neck by both arms and throwing one hand up in fright. The museum's guide to the dome, written in 1922, finishes the story. Zeus paid the boy's father, Tros, for his loss with four divine horses, and Ganymede was later set among the stars as Aquarius, the water carrier.