Midas

(mi'das.) (Myth.) A king of Phrygia who obtained from Bacchus the gift of changing everything he might touch into gold. This brought its own punishment, since the very food which he placed in his mouth became transmuted into the precious metal. He then appealed to Bacchus, who ordered him to bathe in the river Pactolus, the sands of which ever afterward were golden. The fable also exists that M. having decided in favor of Pan in a musical contest of the latter with Apollo, the offended deity changed his ears into those of an a , as a sign of his stupidity and want of taste.-(Zool.) See MARMOSET. [s. 599]