Hamilton draws this story from the Latin writer Apuleius, who, like Ovid, was interested in creating beautiful, entertaining tales—a style that could not be further from Hesiod’s pious, fearsome creation stories. Appealing to the Roman aesthetic sense, Apuleius’s protagonist is Psyche, a princess so beautiful that men begin to worship her instead of Venus (the Latin name for Aphrodite). Insulted, Venus sends her son, Cupid (Latin name for Eros), to make Psyche fall in love with the ugliest creature in the world. Cupid, however, falls in love with her himself and magically prevents anyone else from doing so. Apollo convinces Psyche’s father to leave her at the top of a hill to be wed to a monster. However, Zephyr, the West Wind, carries the waiting Psyche to a majestic palace where she bathes and feasts royally, attended by mysterious voices. At night, she feels a man next to her who introduces himself as her husband.