Since yet the early hour of night allows
Time for discourse, and time for soft repose,
If scenes of misery can entertain,
Woes I unfold, of woes a dismal train.
Prepare to hear of murder and of blood;
Of godlike heroes who uninjured stood
Amidst a war of spears in foreign lands,
Yet bled at home, and bled by female hands.
Now suminon'd Proserpine to hell's black hall
The heroine shades; they vanish'd at her call.
When lo! advanced the fornis of heroes slain
By stern Ægysthus, a majestic train,
For since of womankind so few are just,
Think all are false, nor even the faithful trist.
But say, resides my son in royal port,
475 In rich Orchomenos, or Sparta's court?
Or say in Pyle? for yet he views the light,
Nor glides a phantom through the realms of night.
Then I: Thy suit is vain, nor can I say
If yet he breathes in realms of cheerful day:
480 Or pale or wan beholds these nether skies:
Truth I revere, for wisdom never lies.
And high above the rest, Atrides press'd the plain.
He quaffed the gore; and straight his soldier knew, 485
And from his eyes pour'd down the tender dew:
His arms he stretch'd; his arins the touch deceive,
Nor in the fond embrace, embraces give:
His substance vanish'd, and his strength decay'd,
Now all Atrides is an empty shade.
Moved at the sight, I for a space resign'd
To soft affliction all my manly mind;
At last with tears-O what relentless doom,
Imperial phantom, bow'd thee to the tomb?
Say while the sea, and while the tempest raves,
Has Fate oppress'd thee in the roaring waves,
Or nobly seized thee in the dire alarms
Of war and slaughter, and the clash of arms!
The ghost returns: O chief of humankind
For active courage and a patient mind;
Nor while the sea, nor whilst the tempest raves,
Has Fate oppress'd me on the roaring waves!
Nor nobly seized me in the dire alarms
Thus in a tide of tears our sorrows flow,
And add new horror to the realms of woe;
Till side by side along the dreary coast
Advanced Achilles' and Patroclus' ghost,
A friendly pair! near these the Pylian
And towering Ajax, an illustrious shade!
War was his joy, and pleased with loud alarms,
None but Pelides brighter shone in arms.
Through the thick gloom his friend Achilles knew, And as he speaks the tears descend in dew.
Comest thou alive to view the Stygian bounds,
Where the wan spectres walk eternal rounds:
Nor fear'st the dark and dismal waste to tread,
495 Throng'd with pale ghosts, familiar with the dead?
To whom with sighs: I pass these dreadful gates
To seek the Theban, and consult the Fates:
For still, distress'd, I rove from coast to coast,
Lost to my friends, and to my country lost.
500 But sure the eye of Time beholds no name
So blest as thine in all the rolls of fame :
Alive we hail'd thee with our guardian gods,
And dead thou rulest a king in these abodes.
Talk not of ruling in this dolorous gloom,
505 Nor think vain words (he cried) can ease my door
Rather I choose laborionsly to bear
A weight of woes, and breathe the vital air,
A slave to some poor hind that toils for bread;
Than reign the scepter'd monarch of the dead.
But say, if in my steps my sou proceeds,
And emulates his god-like father's deeds?
If at the clash of arms, and shout of foes.
Swells his bold heart, his bosom nobly glows?
Say, if my sire, the reverend Peleus reigns,
515 Great in his Pthia, and his throne maintains;
Or, weak and old, my youthful arm demands,
To fix the sceptre steadfast in his hands?
O might the lamp of life rekindled burn,
And death release me from the silent urn!
This arm, that thunder'd o'er the Phrygian plain,
And swell'd the ground with mountains of the slain.
Should vindicate my injured father's fame,
Crush the proud rebel, and assert his claim.
Illustrious shade (I cried), of Peleus' fates
525 No circumstance the voice of fame relates:
But hear with pleased attention the renown,
The wars and wisdom of thy gallant son.
With me from Scyros to the field of fame
Radiant in arms the blooming hero came.
Of war and slaughter, and the clash of arms.
Stabb'd by a murderous hand Atrides died,
A foul adulterer, and a faithless bride;
Even in my mirth, and at the friendly feast,
O'er the full bowl, the traitor stabb'd his guest;
Thus by the gory arm of slaughter falls
The stately ox, and bleeds within the stalls.
But not with me the direful murder ends,
These, these expired! their crime, they were my friends:
Thick as the boars, which some luxurious lord
Kills for the feast, to crown the nuptial board.
When war has thunder'd with its loudest stormus,
Death thou hast seen in all her ghastly forms;
In duel met her on the listed ground,
When hand to hand they wound return for wound;
But never have thy eyes astonish'd view'd
So vile a deed, so dire a scene of blood.
Even in the flow of joy, when now the bowl
Glows in our veins, and opens every soul,
We groan, we faint; with blood the dome is dyed,
And o'er the pavement floats the dreadful tide-
Her breast all gore, with lamentable cries,
The bleeding innocent Cassandra dies!
Then though pale death froze cold in every vein,
My sword I strive to wield, but strive in vain;
Nor did my traitress wife these eyelids close,
Or decently in death my limbs compose.
O woman, woman, when to ill thy mind
Is bent, all hell contains no fouler fiend:
And such was mine! who basely plunged her sword
Through the fond bosom where she reign'd adored!
Alas! I hoped, the toils of war o'ercome,
To meet soft quiet and repose at home:
Delusive hope! O wife, thy deeds disgrace
The perjured sex, and blacken all the race;
And should posterity one virtuous find,
Name Clytemnestra, they will curse the kind.
O injured shade, I cried, what mighty woes
To thy imperial race from woman rose!
By woman here thou treadst this mournful strand,
And Greece by woman lies a desert land.
Warn'd by my ills beware, the shade replies,
Nor trust the sex that is so rarely wise;
When earnest to explore thy secret breast,
Unfold some trifle, but conceal the rest.
But in thy consort cease to fear a foe,
For thee she feels sincerity of woe:
When Troy first bled beneath the Grecian arms,
She shone unrivall'd with a blaze of charms;
Thy infant son her fragrant bosom press'd,
Hung at her knee, or wanton'd at her breast:
But now the years a numerous train have ran:
The blooming boy is ripen'd into man:
Thy eyes shall see him burn with noble fire,
The sire shall bless his son, the son his sire:
But my Orestes never met these eyes,
Without one look the murder'd father dies;
Then from a wretched friend this wisdom learn,
Even to thy queen disguised, unknown, return :
When Ilion in the horse received her doom, And unseen armies ambush'd in its womb, 550 Greece gave her latent warriors to my care, "Twas mine on Troy to pour the imprison'd war: Then when the boldest bosom beat with fear, When the stern eyes of heroes dropp'd a tear; Fierce in his look his ardent valour glow'd, 555 Flush'd in his cheek, or sallied in his blood; Indignant in the dark recess he stands, Pants for the battle, and the war demands: His voice breathed death, and with a martial air He grasp'd his sword, and shook his glittering spear. 650 500 And when the gods our arms with conquest crown'd, When Troy's proud bulwarks smoked upon the ground,
Greece to reward her so.dier's gallant toits.
Heap'd high his navy with unnumber'd spoils.
Thus great in glory from the din of war,
Safe he return'd, without one hostile scar;
Though spears in iron tempests rain'd around,
Yet innocent they play'd, and guiltless of a wound.
While yet I spoke, the shade with transport glow'd,
Rose in his majesty, and nobler trod ;
With haughty stalk he sought the distant glades
Of warrior kings, and join'd the illustrious shades.
Now without number ghost by ghost arose,
All wailing with unutterable woes.
Alone, apart, in discontented mood,
A gloomy shade the sullen Ajax stood;
For ever sad with proud disdain he pined,
And the lost arm for ever stung his mind;
Though to the contest Thetis gave the laws,
And Pallas, by the Trojans, judged the cause.
O why was I victorious in the strife?
O dear-bought honour with so brave a life!
With him the strength of war, the soldiers' pride,
Our second hope to great Achilles died!
Touch'd at the sight from tears I scarce refrain,
And tender sorrow thrills in every vein;
Pensive and sad I stand, at length accost
With accents mild the inexorable ghost.
Still burns thy rage? and can brave souls resent
Even after death? Relent, great shade, relent!
Perish those arms which by the gods' decree
Accursed our army with the loss of thee!
With thee we fell; Greece wept thy hapless fates,
And shook astonish'd through her hundred states
Not more, when great Achilles press'd the ground,
And breathed his manly spirit through the wound.
O deem thy fall not owed to man's decree,
Jove hated Greece, and punish'd Greece in thee!
Turn then, oh peaceful turn, thy wrath control,
And calm the raging tempest of thy soul.
While yet I speak, the shade disdains to stay,
In silence turns, and sullen stalks away.
Touca'd at his sour retreat, through deepest night,
Through hell's black bounds I had pursued his flight,
And forced the stubborn spectre to reply;
But wondrous visions drew my curious eye
High on a throne, tremendous to behold,
Stern Minos waves a mace of burnish'd gold;
Around ten thousand thousand spectres stand
Through the wide dome of Dis, a trembling band.
Still as they plead, the fatal lots he rolls,
Absolves the just, and dooms the guilty souls.
There huge Orion, of portentous size,
Swift through the gloom a giant-hunter flies;
A pondrous mass of brass with direful sway
Aloft he whirls, to crush the savage prey;
Stern beasts in trains that by his truncheon fell,
Now grisly forms, shoot o'er the lawns of hell.
There Tityus large and long, in fetters bound,
O'erspreads nine acres of infernal ground;
Two ravenous vultures, furious for their food,
Scream o'er the fiend, and riot in his blood,
There, in the bright assemblies of the skies,
He nectar quaffs, and Hebe crowns his joys.
655 Here hovering ghosts, like fowl, his shade surround,
And clang their pinions with terrific sound ;
Gloomy as night he stands, in act to throw
The aerial arrow from the twanging bow.
Around his breast a wondrous zone is roll'd,
Where woodland monsters grin in fretted gold
There sullen lions sternly seem to roar,
The bear to growl, to foam the tusky boar,
There war and havock and destruction stood,
And vengeful murder red with human blood.
665 Thus terribly adorn'd the figures shine,
Inimitably wrought with skill divine.
The mighty ghost advanced with awful look,
And turning his grim visage, sternly spoke.
O exercised in grief! by arts refined!
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670 O taught to bear the wrongs of base mankind!
Such, such was I still toss'd from care to care,
While in your world I drew the vital air!
Even I, who from the Lord of Thunders rose,
Bore toils and dangers, and a weight of woes;
675 To a base monarch still a slave confined
(The hardest bondage to a generous mind!)
Down to these worlds I trod the dismal way,
And dragg'd the three-mouth'd dog to upper day;
Even hell I conquer'd, through the friendly aid
Of Maia's offspring and the martial maid.
Thus he, nor deign'd for our reply to stay,
But, turning, stalk'd with giant strides away.
Curious to view the kings of ancient days,
The mighty dead that lived in endless praise,
Resolved I stand; and haply had survey'd
The god-like Theseus, and Pirithous' shade;
But swarms of spectres rose from deepest hell,
With bloodless visage, and with hideous yell,
They scream, they shriek; sad groans and dismal sounds
690 Stun my scared ears, and pierce hell's utmost bounds.
No more my heart the dismal din sustains,
And my cold blood hangs shivering in my veins ;
Lest Gorgon, rising from the infernal lakes,
With horrors arm'd, and curls of hissing snakes,
Should fix me stiffen'd at the monstrous sight,
A stony image, in eternal night!
Straight from the direful coast to purer air
I speed my flight, and to my mates repair.
My mates ascend the ship; they strike their oars ;
700 The mountains lessen, and retreat the shores;
Swift o'er the waves we fly; the freshening gales
Sing through the shrouds, and stretch the swelling sails
Incessant gore the liver in his breast,
The immortal liver grows, and gives the immortal feast.
For as o'er Panope's enamell'd plains
Latona journey'd to the Pythian fanes,
With haughty love the audacious monster strove
To force the goddess, and to rival Jove.
There Tantalus along the Stygian bounds
Pours out deep groans (which groans all hell resounds);
Even in the circling floods refreshment craves,
The Sirens, Scylla and Charybdis.
He relates how, after his return from the shades he was sent by Circe on his voyage, by the coast of the Sirens, and by the strait of Scylla and Charybdis: the manner in which he escaped those dangers: how, being cast on the island Trinacria, his companions destroyed the oxen of the Sun: the vengeance that followed; how all perished by shipwreck except himself, who, swimming on the mast of the ship, arrived on the island of Calypso. With which his narration concludes.
Back from his lip the treacherous water flies.
Above, beneath, around, his hapless head,
Trees of all kinds delicious fruitage spread;
There figs sky-dyed, a purple hue disclose,
Green looks the olive, the pomegranate glows,
There dangling pears exalting scents unfold,
And yellow apples ripen into gold:
The fruit he strives to seize; but blasts arise
Toss it on high, and whirl it to the skies.
I turn'd my eye, and as I turn'd survey'd
A mournful vision! the Sisyphian shade;
With many a weary step, and many a groan,
Up the high hill he heaves a huge round stone;
The huge round stone, resulting with a bound,
Thunders impetuous down, and smokes along the ground.
Again the restless orb his toil renews,
Dust mounts in clouds, and sweat descends in dews. 740
Now I the strength of Hercules behold,
A towering spectre of gigantic mould,
A shadowy form! for high in heaven's abodes
Himself resides, a god among the gods;
Soon as the morn restored the day, we paid
Sepulchral honours to Elpenors shade.
Now by the ax the rushing forest bends,
And the huge pile along the shore ascends,
Around we stand, a melancholy train,
And a loud groan re-echoes from the main.
Fierce o'er the pyre, by fanning breezes spread
The hungry flame devours the silent dead.
A rising tomb, the silent dead to grace,
Fast by the roarings of the main we place;
The rising tomb a lofty column bore,
And high above it rose the tapering oar.
Meantime the goddess our return survey'd
From the pale ghosts, and hell's tremendous shade.
Swift she descends: a train of nymphs divine
Bear the rich viands and the generous wine:
In act to speak the power of magic stands,
And graceful thus accosts the listening bands.
O sons of woe! decreed by adverse fates
Alive to pass through hell's eternal gates!
All, soon or late, are doom'd that path to tread;
More wretched you! twice nuinber'd with the dead!
This day adjourn your cares, exalt your souls,
Indulge the taste, and drain: the sparkling bowls;
And when the morn unveils her saffron ray,
Spread your broad sails, and plough the liquid wav
Lo I this night, your faithful guide, explain
Your woes by land, your dangers on the main.
The goddess spoke: in feasts we waste the day,
'Till Phoebus downward plunged his burning ray;
Then sable night ascends, and balmy rest
Seals every eye, and calms the troubled breast.
Then curious she commands me to relate
The dreadful scenes of Pluto's dreary state.
She sat in silence while the tale I tell,
The wondrous visions, and the laws of hell.
Then thus: The lot of man the gods dispose;
These ills are past: now hear thy future woes.
O prince, attend! some favouring power be kind,
And print the important story on thy mind!
Next, where the Sirens dwell, you plough the seas; Their song is death, and makes destruction please. Unblest the man, whom music wins to stay Nigh the curst shore, and listen to the lay. No more that wretch shall view the joys of life, His blooming offspring, or his beauteous wife. In verdant meads they sport; and wide around Lie human bones, that whiten all the ground; The ground polluted floats with human gore, And human carnage taints the dreadful shore. Fly swift the dangerous coast; let every ear Be stopp'd against the song! tis death to hear! Firm to the mast with chains thyself be bound, Nor trust thy virtue to the enchanting sound. If, mad with transport, freedom thou demand, Be every fetter strain'd, and added band to band. These seas o'erpass'd, be wise! but I refrain To mark distinct thy voyage o'er the main: New horrors rise! let prudence be thy guide, And guard thy various passage through the tide. High o'er the main two rocks exalt their brow, The boiling billows thundering roll below; Through the vast waves the dreadful wonders move, Hence named Erratic by the gods above. No bird of air, no dove of swiftest wing, That bears ambrosia to the etherial king, Shuns the dire rocks: in vain she cuts the skies, The dire rocks meet, and crush her as she flies; Not the fleet bark, when prosperous breezes play, Ploughs o'er that roaring surge its desperate way; O'erwhelm'd it sinks: while round a smoke expires, And the waves flashing seem to burn with fires. Scarce the famed Argo pass'd these raging floods, The sacred Argo, fill'd with demigods Even she had sunk, but Jove's imperial bride Wing'd her fleet sail, and push'd her o'er the tide. High in the air the rock its suininit shrouds In brooding tempests, and in rolling clouds: Loud storms around, and mists eternal rise, Beat its bleak brow, and intercept the skies. When all the broad expansion bright with day Glows with the autumnal or the suminer ray, The summer and the autumn glow in vain, The sky for ever lowers, for ever clouds remain. Impervious to the step of man it stands,
150 fly the dreadful sight! expand thy sails,
Ply the strong oar, and catch the nimble gales; Here Scylla bellows from her dire abodes, Tremendous pest, abhorr'd by man and gods! Hideous her voice, and with less terrors roar 20 The whelps of lions in the midnight hour. Twelve feet deforni'd and foul the fiend dispreads; Six horrid necks she rears, and six terrific heads; Her jaws grin dreadful with three rows of teeth: Jaggy they stand, the gaping den of death; 25 Her parts obscene the raging billows hide; Her bosom terribly o'erlooks the tide. When stung with hunger she embroils the flood, The sea-dog and the dolphin are her food;
She makes the huge leviathan her prey,
40 'Midst roaring whirlpools, and absorbs the main: Thrice in her gulfs the boiling seas subside, Thrice in dire thunders she refunds the tide. Oh, if thy vessel plough the direful waves When seas retreating roar within her caves, 45 Ye perish all! though he who rules the main Lend his strong aid, his aid he lends in vain. Ah, shun the horrid gulf! by Scylla fly, "Tis better six to lose, than all to die.
I then: O nymph propitious to my prayer,
Goddess divine, my guardian power, declare,
Is the foul fiend from humau vengeance freed?
Or, if I rise in arins, can Scylla bleed?
Then she: Oh worn by toils, oh broke in fight,
Still are new toils and war thy dire delight?
55 Will martial flames for ever fire thy mind,
And never, never be to heaven resign'd?
How vain thy efforts to avenge the wrong!
Deathless the pest! impenetrably strong!
Furious and fell, tremendous to behold!
60 Even with a look she withers all the bold!
She mocks the weak attempts of human might:
Oh fly her rage! thy conquest is thy flight.
If but to seize thy arms thou make delay,
Again the fury vindicates her prey,
65 Her six mouths yawn, and six are snatch'd away,
From ber foul womb Cratais gave to air
This dreadful pest! To her direct thy prayer,
To curb the monster in her dire abodes,
And guard thee through the tumult of the floods.
70 Thence to Trinacria's shore you bend your way,
Where graze thy herds, illustrious source of day! Seven herds, seven flocks enrich the sacred plains, Each herd, each flock, full fifty heads contains; The wondrous kind a length of age survey, By breed increase not, nor by death decay, Two sister goddesses possess the plain, The constant guardians of the wooly train: Lampetie fair, and Phaethusa young. From Plicebus and the bright Nesra sprung: Here, watchful o'er the flocks, in shady bowers And flowery meads they waste the joyous hours Rob not the god! and so propitious gales Attend thy voyage, and impel thy sails; But if thy impious hands the flocks destroy, 85 The gods, the gods avenge it, and ye die! "Tis thine alone (thy friends and navy lost) Through tedious toils to view thy native coast. She ceased: and now arose the inorning ray; Swift to her done the goddess held her way. 90 Then to my mates I measured back the plain, Climb'd the tal! bark, and rush'd into the main ; Then bending to the stroke, their oars they drew To their broad breasts, and swift the galley flew. Up sprung a brisker breeze; with freshening galės, The friendly goddess stretch'd the swelling sails; We drop our oars; at ease the pilct guides: The vessel light along the level glides. When, rising sad and slow, with pensive look, Thus to the melancholy train I spoke :
Though borne by twenty feet, though arm'd with twerty
hands;
Smooth as the polish of the mirror rise
The slippery sides, and shoot into the skies.
Full in the centre of this rock display'd,
A yawning cavern casts a dreadful shade:
Nor the fleet arrow from the twanging bow,
Sent with full force, could reach the depth below.
Wide to the west the horrid gulf extends,
And the dire passage down to hell descends.
Oh friends, ol ever partners of iny woes,
100 Attend while I what heaven foredooms disclose,
Hear all! Fate hangs o'er all; on you it lies
To live or perish! to be safe, be wise!
In flowery meads the sportive Sirens play,
Touch the soft lyre, and tune the vocal lay;
Me, me alone, with fetters firmly bound,
The gods allow to hear the dangerous sound.
Hear and obey: if freedom I demand,
Re every fetter strain'd, be added band to band.
While yet I speak the winged galley flies,
And lo! the Siren shores like mists arise.
Sunk were at once the winds: the air above,
And waves below at once forgot to move:
When in her gulfs the rushing sea subsides,
She drains the ocean with the refluent tides:
The rock rebellows with a thundering sound;
Deep, wondrous deep, below appears the ground.
Struck with despair, with trembling hearts we view d
The yawning dungeon, and the tumbling flood;
When lo! fierce Scylla stoop'd to seize her prey,
Stretch'd her dire jaws, and swept six men away;
Chiefs of renown! loud-echoing shrieks arise:
I turn and view them quivering in the skies;
They call, and aid with out-stretch'd arms implore:
In vain they call those arms are stretch'd no more.
As from some rock that overhangs the flood,
The silent fisher casts the insidious food,
210 With fraudful care he waits the finny prize,
And sudden lifts it quivering to the skies:
So the foul monster lifts her prey on high,
So paint the wretches struggling in the sky:
In the wide dungeon she devours her food,
Some dæmon calm'd the air, and smooth'd the deep,
Hush'd the loud winds, and charm'd the waves to sleep.
Now every sail we furl, each oar we ply;
Lash'd by the stroke, the frothy waters fly.
The ductile wax with busy hands I mould,
And cleft in fragments, and the fragments roll'à
The aerial region now grew warm with day,
The wax dissolved beneath the burning ray;
Then every ear I barr'd against the strain,
And from access of phrenzy lock'd the brain.
Now round the masts my mates the fetters roll'd,
And bound me limb by limb with fold on fold.
Then bending to the stroke, the active train
Plunge all at once their oars, and cleave the main.
While to the shore the rapid vessel flies,
Our swift approach the Siren choir descries;
Celestial music warbles from their tongue,
And thus the sweet deluders tune the song.
Oh stay, oh pride of Greece! Ulysses, stay!
Oh cease thy course, and listen to our lay!
Blest is the man ordain'd our voice to hear,
The song instructs the soul, and charins the ear.
Approach! thy soul shall into raptures rise!
Approach and learn new wisdom from the wise!
We know whate'er the kings of mighty name
Achieved at Ilion in the field of fame;
Whate'er beneath the sun's bright journey lies,
Où stay, and learn new wisdom from the wise!
Thus the sweet charmers warbled o'er the main;
My soul takes wing to meet the heavenly strain;
I give the sign, and struggle to be free:
Swift row my mates, and shoot along the sea;
New chains they add, and rapid urge the way,
Till, dying off, the distant sounds decay:
Then, scudding swiftly from the dangerous ground,
The deafen'd ear unlock'd the chains unbound.
Now all at once tremendous scenes unfold;
Thunder'd the deeps, the smoking billows roll'd!
Tumultuous waves embroil the bellowing flood,
All trembling, deafen'd, and aghast we stood!
No more the vessel plough'd the dreadful wave,
Fear seized the mighty, and unnerved the brave;
Each dropt his oar: but swift from man to man
With looks serene I turn'd, and thus began :
Oh friends! oh often tried in adverse storms!
With ills familiar in more dreadful forms!
Deep in the dire Cyclopean den you lay
Yet safe return'd-Ulysses led the way.
Learn courage hence, and in my care confide:
Lo! still the same Ulysses is your guide.
Attend my words! your oars incessant ply;
Strain every nerve, and bid the vessel fly.
If from yon justling rocks and wavy war
Jove safety grants, he grants it to your care.
And thou, whose guiding hand directs our way,
Pilot, attentive listen and obey!
215 And the flesh trembles while she churns the blood.
Worn as I am with griefs, with care decay'd,
Never, I never, scene so dire survey'd!
My shivering blood, congeal'd, forgot to flow;
Aghast I stood, a nionument of woe!
Now from the rocks the rapid vessel flies,
And the hoarse din like distant thunder dies;
To Sol's bright isle our voyage we pursue,
And now the glittering mountains rise to view.
There sacred to the radiant god of day,
225 Graze the fair herds, the flocks promiscuous stray:
Then suddenly was heard along the main
To low the ox, to bleat the woolly train,
Straight to my anxious thoughts the sound convey'd 320
The words of Circe and the Theban shade;
230 Warn'd by their awful voice these shores to shun,
With cautious fears oppress'd, I thus begun.
O friends! oh ever exercised in care!
Hear heaven's commands, and reverence what ye hear!
To fly these shores the prescient Theban shade
235 And Circe warns! O be their voice obey'd:
Some mighty woe relentless heaven forebodes:
Fly these dire regions, and revere the gods!
While yet I spoke a sudden sorrow ran
Through every breast, and spread from man to man,
Till wrathful thus Eurylochus began:
O cruel thou! some fury sure has steel'd
That stubborn soul, by toil untaught to yield!
From sleep debarr'd, we sink from woes to woes;
And cruel, enviest thou a short repose?
245 Still must we restless rove, new seas explore,
The sun descending, and so near the shore?
And lo! the night begins her gloomy reign,
And doubles all the terrors of the main.
Oft in the dead of night loud winds arise,
250 Lash the wild surge, and bluster in the skies;
Or should the fierce south-west his rage display,
And toss with rising storms the watry way,
Though gods descend from heaven's aërial plain
To lend us aid, the gods descend in vain;
255 Then while the night displays her awful shade,
Sweet time of slumber! be the night obey'd!
Haste ye to land! and when the morning ray
Sheds her bright beains, pursue the destined way. 350
A sudden joy in every bosom rose:
So will'd soine dæmon, minister of woes!
Bear wide thy course, nor plough those angry waves 260
Where rolls yon smoke, yon tumbling ocean raves:
Steer by the higher rock; lest whirl'd around
We sink, beneath the circling eddy drown'd.
While yet I speak, at once their oars they seize,
Stretch to the stroke, and brush the working seas.
Cautious the name of Scylla I suppress'd;
That dreadful sound had chill'd the boldest breast.
Meantime, forgetful of the voice divine,
All dreadful bright my limbs in armour shine;
High on the deck I take my dangerous stand,
Two glittering javelins lighten in my hand:
Prepared to whirl the whizzing spear I stay,
Till the fell fiend arise to seize her prey.
Around the aungeon, studious to behold
The hideous pest, my labouring eyes I roll'd;
In vain the dismal dungeon dark as night
Veils the dire monster, and confounds the sight.
Now through the rocks, appall'd with deep dismay,
We bend our course, and stein the desperate way;
Dire Scylla there a scene of horror forms,
And here Charybdis fills the deep with storias.
When the tide rushes from her rumbling caves
To whom with grief-O swift to be undone,
Constrain'd I aet what wisdom bids me shun.
But yonder herds and yonder flocks forbear;
Attest the heavens, and call the gods to hear;
Content, an innocent repast display,
By Circe given, and fly the dangerous prey.
Thus I and while to shore the vessel flies,
With hands uplifted they attest the skies;
Then, where a fountain's gurgling waters play,
270 They rush to land and end in feasts the day:
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They feed; they quaff: and now (their hunger fled)
Sigh for their friends devour'd, and mourn the dead,
Nor cease the tears till each in slumber shares
A sweet forgetfulness of human cares.
Now far the night advanced her gloomy reign,
And setting stars roll'd down the azure plain:
When, at the voice of Jove, wild whirlwinds rise,
And clouds and double darkness veil the skies;
The moon, the stars, the bright ethereal host
Seem as extinct, and all their splendours lost;
The furious teinpest roars with dreadful sound:
Air thunders, rolls the ocean, groans the ground.
All night it raged: when morning rose, to land
We haul'd our bark, and moor'd it on the strand,
Where in a beauteous grotto's cool recess
Dance the green Nereids of the neighbouring seas.
And high above the rock she spouts the main;
There while the wild winds whistled o er the main. Thus careful I address'd the listening train.
With speed the bark we climb; the spacious sails
Loosed from the yards invite the impelling gales.
Past sight of shore, along the surge we bound,
And all above is sky, and ocean all around;
When lo! a murky cloud the Thunderer forms
Full o'er our heads, and blackens heaven with storms.
Night dwells o'er all the deep: and now outflies
The gloomy West, and whistles in the skies.
The mountain-billows roar! the furious blast
Howls o'er the shroud, and rends it from the mast: 480
The mast gives way, and crackling as it bends,
Tears up the deck; and all at once descends;
The pilot by the tumbling ruin slain,
Dash'd from the helm, falls headlong in the main
Then Jove in anger bids his thunders roll,
And forky lightnings flash from pole to pole:
395 Fierce at our heads his deadly bolt he aims,
Red with uncommon wrath, and wrapt in flames:
Full on the bark it fell; now high, now low,
Toss'd and re-toss'd, it reel'd beneath the blow;
At once into the main the crew it shook:
O friends, be wise! nor dare the flocks destroy
Of these fair pastures: if ye touch, ye die.
Warn'd by the high command of heaven, be awed;
Holy the flocks, and dreadful is the god!
That god who spreads the radiant beams of light,
And views wide earth and heaven's unmeasured height.
And now the moon had run her monthly round,
The south-east blustering with a dreadful sound:
Unhurt the beeves, untouch'd the woolly train
Low through the grove, or range the flowery plain: 390
Then fail'd our food; then fish we make our prey,
Or fowl that screaming haunt the watry way.
Till now, froin sea or flood no succour found,
Famine and meagre want besieged us round.
Pensive and pale from grove to grove I stray'd,
From the loud storms to find a sylvan shade;
There o'er my hands the living wave I pour;
And heaven and heaven's immortal thrones adore,
To calm the roarings of the stormy main,
And grant ine peaceful to my realins again.
Then o'er my eyes the gods soft slumber shed,
While thus Eurylochus arising said.
O friends, a thousand ways frail mortals lead
To the cold tomb, and dreadful all to tread;
But dreadful most, when by a slow decay
Pale hunger wastes the manly strength away.
Why cease ye then to implore the powers above
And offer hecatombs to thundering Jove?
Why seize ye not yon beeves, and fleecy prey?
Arise unanimous; arise and slay!
And if the gods ordain a safe return,
To Phoebus shrines shall rise, and altars burn.
But, should the powers that o'er mankind preside
Decree to plunge us in the whelming tide,
Better to rush at once to shades below,
Tnan linger life away, and nourish woe!
'Thus he the beeves around securely stray,
When swift to ruin they invade the prey;
They seize, they kill!-but for the rite divine,
The barley fail'd, and for libations wine.
Swift from the oak they strip the shady pride;
And verdant leaves the flowery cake supplied.
With prayer they now address the etherial train,
Slay the selected beeves, and flay the slain :
The thighs, with fat involved, divide with art,
Strew'd o'er with morsels cut from every part.
Water, instead of wine, is brought in urns,
And pour'd profanely as the victim burns.
he thighs thus offer'd, and the entrails dress'd,
They roast the fragments, and prepare the feast.
'Twas then soft slumber fled my troubled brain;
Back to the bark I speed along the main.
When lo! an odour from the feast exhales,
Spreads o'er the coast, and scents the tainted gales;
A chilly fear congeal'd my vital blood,
And thus, obtesting heaven, I mourn'd aloud.
O sire of men and gods, immortal Jove!
O all ye blissful powers that reign above!
Why were my cares beguiled in short repose?
O fatal slumber, paid with lasting woes!
A deed so dreadful all the gods alarms,
Vengeance is on the wing, and heaven in arms!
Meantime Lampetie mounts the aërial way,
And kindles into rage the god of day:
400 Sulphureous odours rose, and smouldering smoke.
Like fowl that haunt the floods, they sink, they rise,
Now lost, now seen, with shrieks and dreadful cries;
And strive to gain the bark; but Jove denies.
Firm at the helm I stand, when fierce the main
405 Rush'd with dire noise, and dash'd the sides in twain;
Again impetuous drove the furious blast,
Snapt the strong helm, and bore to sea the mast
Firm to the mast with cords the helm I bind,
And ride aloft, to Providence resign'd,
410 Through tumbling billows and a war of wind.
Now sunk the West, and now a southern breeze
More dreadful than the tempest, lash'd the ceas;
For on the rocks it bore where Scylla raves,
And dire Charybdis rolls her thundering waves.
415 All night I drove; and at the dawn of day,
Fast by the rocks beheld the desperate way:
Just when the sea within her gulfs subsides,
And in the roaring whirlpools rush the tides.
Swift from the float I vaulted with a bound,
420 The lofty fig-tree seized, and clung around:
So to the beam the bat tenacious clings,
And pendant round it clasps his leathern wings.
High in the air the tree its boughs display'd,
And o'er the dungeon cast a dreadful shade,
All unsustain'd between the wave and sky,
Beneath my feet the whirling billows fly,
What time the judge forsakes the noisy bar
To take repast, and stills the wordy war;
Charybdis rumbling from her inmost caves,
430 The mast refunded on her refluent waves.
Swift from the tree, the floating mast to gain,
Sudden I dropp'd amidst the flashing main;
Once more undaunted on the ruin rode,
And oar'd with labouring arms along the flood.
Unseen I pass'd by Scylla's dire abodes:
So Jove de reed (dread sire of men and gods),
Then nine long days I plough'd the calmner seas,
Heaved by the surge, and wafted by the breeze.
Weary and wet the Ogygian shores I gain,
440 When the tenth sun descended to the main.
There, in Calypso's ever-fragrant bowers,
Refresh'd I lay, and joy beguiled the hours.
My following fates to thee, O king, are known,
And the bright partner of thy royal throne.
Enough: in misery can words avail?
And what go tedious as a twice-told tale?
Vengeance, ye powers (he cries), and thou whose hand
Ainis the red bolt, and hurls the writhen brand!
Slain are those herds which I with pride survey,
When through the ports of heaven I pour the day,
Or deep in ocean plunge the burning ray,
Vengeance, ye gods! or I the skies forego,
And bear the lamp of heaven to shades below.
To whom the thundering Power: O source of day! Whose radiant lamp adorns the azure way,
Still inay thy beams through heaven's bright portals rise.
The joy of earth, and glory of the skies;
Lo! my red arm I bare, my thunders guide,
To dash the offenders in the whelming tide.
To fair Calypso, from the bright abodes,
Hermes convey'd these counsels of the gods.
The Arrival of Ulysses in Ithaca.
Meantime from man to man my tongue exclaims, 460 Ulysses takes leave of Alcinoüs 'and Arcte, and
embarks in the evening. Next morning the ship arrives at Ithaca; where the sailors as Ulysses is yet sleeping, lay him on the shore with all his treasures. On their return, Neptune changes their ship into a rock. In the meantime Ulysses awaking, knows not his native Ithaca, by reason of a mist which Pallas hud cast round him. He breaks into loud lamentations; till the goddess appearing to him in the form of a shepherd, discovers the country to him, and points out the particular places
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