Now from my fond embrace, by tempest torn,
Our other column of the state is borne :
Nor took a kind adieu, nor sought consent!→
Unkind confederates in his dire intent!

Ill suits it with your shows of duteous zeal,
From me the purpos'd voyage to conceal:
Though at the solemn midnight hour he rose,
Why did you fear to trouble my repose?
He either had obey'd my fond desire,
Or seen his mother, pierc'd with grief, expire.
Bid Dolius quick attend, the faithful slave
Whom to my nuptial train Icarius gave,
To tend the fruit-groves: with incessant speed
He shall this violence of death decreed
To good Laertes tell. Experienc'd age
May timely intercept the ruffian rage.
Convene the tribes, the murderous plot reveal,
And to their power to save his race appeal."

Then Euryclea thus: "My dearest dread!
Though to the sword I bow this hoary head,
Or if a dungeon be the pain decreed,
I own me conscious of th' unpleasing deed.
Auxiliar to his flight, my aid implor'd,
With wine and viands I the vessel stor'd :
A solemn oath, impos'd, the secret seal'd,

Till the twelfth dawn the light of Heaven reveal'd,
Dreading th' effect of a fond mother's fear,
He dar'd not violate your royal ear.
But bathe, and, in imperial robes array'd,
Pay due devotions to the martial maid*,
And rest affianc'd in her guardian aid.
Send not to good Laertes, nor engage
In toils of state the miseries of age:
'Tis impious to surmise, the powers divine
To ruia doom the Jove-descended line:
Long shall the race of just Arcesius reign,
And isles remote enlarge his old domain."
The queen her speech with calm attention hears,
Her eyes restrain the silver-streaming tears:
She bathes, and, rob'd, the sacred doom ascends:
Her pious speed a female train attends:
The salted cakes in canisters are laid,
And thus the queen invokes Minerva's aid:

Daughter divine of Jove, whose arm can wield
Th' avenging bolt, and shake the dreaded shield!
If e'er Ulysses to thy fane preferr'd
The best and choicest of his flock and herd;
Hear, goddess, hear, by those oblations won ;
And for the pious sire preserve the son:
His wish'd return with happy power befriend,
And on the suitors let thy wrath descend."

She ceas'd; shrill ecstasies of joy declare The favouring goddess present to the prayer: The suitors heard, and deem'd the mirthful voice A signal of her hymeneal choice:

Whilst one most jovial thus accosts the board;
"Too late the queen selects a second lord:
In evil hour the nuptial rite intends,
When o'er her son disastrous death impends."
Thus he, unskill'd of what the Fates provide!
But with severe rebuke Antinous cry'd :
"These empty vaunts will make the voyage
vain;

Alarm not with discourse the menial train;
The great event with silent hope attend;
Our deeds alone our counsel must commend."
His speech thus ended short, he frowning rose,
And twenty chiefs renown'd for valour chose:

? Minerva.

Down to the strand he speeds with haughty strides,
Where anchor'd in the bay the vessel rides,
Replete with mail and military store,
In all her tackle trim to quit the shore.
The desperate crew ascend, unfurl the sails
(The sea-ward prow invites the tardy gales);
Then take repast, till Hesperus display'd
His golden circlet in the western shade."

Meantime the queen, without reflection due,
Heart-wounded, to the bed of state withdrew :
In her sad breast the prince's fortunes roll,
And hope and doubt alternate seize her soul.
So when the woodman's toil her cave surrounds,
And with the hunter's cry the grove resounds;
With grief and rage the mother lion stung,
Fearless herself, yet trembles for her young.

While pensive in the silent slumberous shade,
Sleep's gentle powers her drooping eyes invade;
Minerva, life-like, on imbodied air
Impress'd the form of Iphthima the fair
(Icarius' daughter she, whose blooming charms
Allur'd Eumelus to her virgin-arms;

A scepter'd lord, who o'er the fruitful plain
Of Thessaly, wide stretch'd his ample reign):
As Pallas will'd, along the sable skies,
To calm the queen, the phantom-sister flies.
Swift on the regal dome descending right,
The bolted valves are pervious to her flight.
Close to her head the pleasing vision stands,
And thus performs Minerva's high commands:
"O why, Penelope, this causeless fear,
To render sleep's soft blessing unsincere ?
Alike devote to sorrow's dire extreme
The day reflection, and the midnight dream!
Thy son the gods propitious will restore,
And bid thee cease his absence to deplore."

To whom the queen (whilst yet her pensive mind
Was in the silent gates of sleep confin'd)
"O sister, to my soul for ever dear,
Who this first visit to reprove my fear?
How in a realm so distant should you know
From what deep source my deathless sorrows flow?
To all my hope my royal lord is lost,
His country's buckler, and the Grecian boast:
And, with consummate woe to weigh me down,
The heir of all his honours and his crown,
My darling son is fled! an easy prey

To the fierce storms, or men more fierce than they :
Who, in a league of blood associates sworn,
Will intercept th' unwary youth's return."
"Courage resume," the shadowy form reply'd,
"In the protecting care of Heaven confide:
On him attends the blue-ey'd martial maid;
What earthly can implore a surer aid?
Me now the guardian goddess deigns to send,
To bid thee patient his return attend."

The queen replies: "If in the blest abodes
A goddess, thou hast commerce with the gods;
Say, breathes my lord the blissful realm of light,
Or lies he wrapt in ever-during night?"

"Inquire not of his doom," the phantom cries, "I speak not all the counsel of the skies: Nor must indulge with vain discourse, or long, The windy satisfaction of the tongue."

Swift through the valves the visionary fair Repass'd, and viewless mix'd with common air. The queen awakes, deliver'd of her woes: With florid joy her heart dilating glows: The vision, manifest of future fate, Makes her with hope her son's arrival wait.

Meantime the suitors plough the watery plain, Telemachus in thought already slain! When sight of lessening Ithaca was lost, Their sail directed for the Samian coast, A small but verdant isle appear'd in view, And Asteris th' advancing pilot knew: An ample port the rocks projected form, To break the rolling waves, and ruffling storm: That safe recess they gain with happy speed, And in close ambush wait the murderous deed.

THE ODYSSEY.

BOOK V.

ARGUMENT.

THE DEPARTURE OF ULYSSES FROM CALYPSO.

FALLAS, in a council of the gods, complains of the detention of Ulysses in the island of Calypso; whereupon Mercury is sent to command his removal. The seat of Calypso described. She consents with much difficulty; and Ulysses builds a vessel with his own hands, on which he embarks. Neptune overtakes him with a terrible tempest, in which he is shipwrecked, and in the last danger of death: till Leucothea, a sea goddess, assists him, and, after innumerable perils, he gets ashore on Phaacia.

THE saffron Morn, with early blushes spread,
Now rose refulgent from Tithonus' bed;
With new-born day to gladden mortal sight,
And gild the courts of Heaven with sacred light.
Then met th' eternal synod of the sky,
Before the god who thunders from on high,
Supreme in might, sublime in majesty.
Pallas, to these, deplores th' unequal fates
Of wise Ulysses, and his toils relates :
Her hero's danger touch'd the pitying power,
The nymph's seducements, and the magic bower.

Thus she began her plaint: "Immortal Jove!
And you who fill the blissful seats above!
Let kings no more with gentle mercy sway,
Or bless a people willing to obey,
But crush the nations with an iron rod,
And every monarch be the scourge of God:
It from your thoughts Ulysses you remove,
Who rul'd his subjects with a father's love.
Sole in an isle, encircled by the main,
Abandon'd, banish'd from his native reign,
Unblest he sighs, detain'd by lawless charms,
And press'd unwilling in Calypso's arms.
'Nor friends are there, nor vessels to convey,
Nor oars to cut th' immeasurable way.
And now fierce traitors, studious to destroy
His only son, their ambush'd fraud employ;
Who, pious, following his great father's fame,
To sacred Pylos and to Sparta came." [who forms
"What words are these," (reply'd the power
The clouds of night, and darkens Heaven with
storms)

"Is not already in thy soul decreed,
The chief's return shall make the guilty bleed?
What cannot wisdom do? Thou may'st restore
The son in safety to his native shore;
While the fell foes, who late in ambush lay,
With fraud defeated, measure back their way."

Then thus to Hermes the command was given:
"Hermes, thou chosen messenger of Heaven!
Go, to the nymph be these our orders borne:
'Tis Jove's decree, Ulysses shall return:
The patient man shall view his old abodes,
Nor help'd by mortal hand, nor guiding gods:
In twice ten days shall fertile Sheria find,
Alone, and floating to the wave and wind.
The bold Phæacians there, whose haughty line
Is mix'd with gods, half human, half divine,
The chief shall honour as some heavenly guest,
And swift transport him to his place of rest.
His vessels loaded with a plenteous store
Of brass, of vestures, and resplendent ore,
(A richer prize than if his joyful isle
Receiv'd him charg'd with Ilion's noble spoil).

His friends, his country, he shall see, though late; Such is our sovereign will, and such is fate."

He spoke. The god, who mounts the winged
Fast to his feet the golden pinions binds, [winds,
That high through fields of air his flight sustain
O'er the wide earth, and o'er the boundless main.
He grasps the wand that causes sleep to fly,
Or in soft slumber seals the wakeful eye:
Then shoots from Heaven to high Pieria's steep,
And stoops incumbent on the rolling deep.
So watery fowl, that seek their fishy food,
With wings expanded o'er the foaming flood,
Now sailing smooth the level surface sweep,
Now dip their pinions in the briny deep.
Thus o'er the world of waters Hermes flew,
Till now the distant island rose in view:
Then swift ascending from the azure wave,
He took the path that winded to the cave.
Large was the grot, in which the nymph he found
(The fair-hair'd nymph with every beauty crown'd);
She sate, and sung: the rocks resound her lays;
The cave was brighten'd with a rising blaze:
Cedar and frankincense, an odorous pile,
Flam'd on the hearth, and wide perfum'd the isle;
While she with work and song the time divides,
And through the loom the golden shuttle guides.
Without the grot a various sylvan scene
Appear'd around, and groves of living green;
Poplars and alders ever quivering play'd,
And nodding cypress form'd a fragrant shade;
On whose high branches, waving with the storm,
The birds of broadest wing their mansion form,
The chough, the sea-mew, the loquacious crow,
And scream aloft, and skim the deeps below.
Depending vines the shelving cavern screen,
With purple clusters blushing through the green.
Four limpid fountains from the clefts distil;
And every fountain pours a several rill,
In mazy windings wandering down the hill:
Where bloomy meads with vivid greens were
crown'd,

And glowing violets threw odours round.
A scene, where if a god should cast his sight,
A god might gaze, and wander with delight!
Joy touch'd the messenger of Heaven: he stay'd
Entranc'd, and all the blissful haunt survey'd.
Him, entering in the cave, Calypso knew;
For powers celestial to each other's view

Stand still confest, though distant far they lie
To habitants of earth, or sea, or sky.
But sad Ulysses, by himself apart,
Pour'd the big sorrows of his swelling heart;
All on the lonely shore he sate to weep,

And roll'd his eyes around the restless deep;
Tow'rd his lov'd coast he roll'd his eyes in vain,
Till, dimm'd with rising grief, they stream'd again.
Now graceful seated on her shining throne,
To Hermes thus the nymph divine begun:

"God of the golden wand! on what behest
Arriv'st thou here, an unexpected guest?
Lov'd as thou art, thy free injunctions lay;
'Tis mine, with joy and duty to obey.
Till now a stranger, in a happy hour
Approach, and taste the dainties of my bower."
Thus having spoke, the nymph the table spread
(Ambrosial eates, with nectar rosy-red);
Hermes the hospitable rite partook,
Divine refection! then, recruited, spoke:
"What mov'd this journey from my native sky,
A goddess asks, nor can a god deny :
Hear then the truth. By mighty Jove's command,
Unwilling, have I trod this pleasing land;
For who, self-mov'd, with weary wing would sweep
Such length of ocean and unmeasur'd deep:
A world of waters! far from all the ways;
Where men frequent, or sacred altars blaze?
But to Jove's will submission we must pay;
What power so great, to dare to disobey?
A man, he says, a man resides with thee,
Of all his kind most worn with misery :

The Greeks (whose arms for nine long years cmploy'd

Their force in Ilion, in the tenth destroy'd)
At length embarking in a luckless hour,
With conquest proud, incens'd Minerva's power:
Hence on the guilty race her vengeance hurl'd,
With storms pursued them through the liquid
world.

There all his vessels sunk beneath the wave!
There all his dear companions found their grave!
Sav'd from the jaws of death by Heaven's decree,
The tempest drove him to these shores and thee.
Him, Jove now orders to his native lands
Straight to dismiss; so destiny commands;
Impatient fate his near return attends,
And calls him to his country and his friends."

Ev'n to her inmost soul the goddess shook;
Then thus her anguish and her passion broke:
"Ungracious gods! with spite and envy curst!
Still to your own ethereal race the worst!
Ye envy mortal and immortal joy,
And love, the only sweet of life, destroy.
Did ever goddess by her charms engage
A favour'd mortal, and not feel your rage?
So when Aurora sought Orion's love,
Her joys disturb'd your blissful hours above,
Till, in Ortygia, Dian's winged dart
Had pierc'd the hapless hunter to the heart.
So when the covert of the thrice-ear'd field
Saw stately Ceres to her passion yield,
Scarce could läsion taste her heavenly charms,
But Jove's swift lightning scorch'd him in her arins.
And is it now my turn, ye mighty powers!
Am I the envy of your blissful bowers?
A man, an outcast to the storm and wave,
It was my crime to pity, and to save;
When he who thunders rent his bark in twain,
And sunk his brave companions in the main.

Alone, abandon'd, in mid ocean tost,

The sport of winds, and driven from every coast,
Hither this man of miseries I led,

Receiv'd the friendless, and the hungry fed;
Nay promis'd (vainly promis'd) to bestow
Immortal life, exempt from age and woe.
'Tis past-and Jove decrees he shall remove;
Gods as we are, we are but slaves to Jove.
Go then he may (he must, if he ordain,
Try all those dangers, all those deeps, again):
But never, never shall Calypso send

To toils like these, her husband and her friend.
What ships have I, what sailors to convey,
What oars to cut the long laborious way?
Yet, I'll direct the safest means to go:
That last advice is all I can bestow,"

To her, the power who bears the charming rod :
"Dismiss the man, nor irritate the god :
Prevent the rage of him who reigns above,
For what so dreadful as the wrath of Jove ?"
Thus having said, he cut the cleaving sky,
And in a moment vanish'd from her eye.
The nymph, obedient to divine command,
To seek Ulysses, pac'd along the sand.
Him pensive on the lonely beach she found,
With streaming eyes in briny torrents drown'd,
And inly pining for his native shore:
For now the soft enchantress pleas'd no more:
For now, reluctant, and constrain'd by charms,
Absent he lay in her desiring arms,
In slumber wore the heavy night away,
On rocks and shores consum'd the tedious day;
There sate all desolate, and sigh'd alone,
With echoing sorrows made the mountains groan,
And roll'd his eyes o'er all the restless main,
Till, dimm'd with rising grief, they stream'd again.
Here, on his musing mood the goddess prest,
Approaching soft, and thus the chief addrest:

Unhappy man! to wasting woes a prey, No more in sorrows languish life away: Free as the winds I give thee now to roveGo, fell the timber of yon lofty grove, And form a raft, and build the rising ship, Sublime to bear thee o'er the gloomy deep. To store the vessel, let the care be mine, With water from the rock, and rosy wine, And life-sustaining bread, and fair array, And prosperous gales to waft thee on the way. These, if the gods with my desires comply, (The gods, alas! more mighty far than I, And better skill'd in dark events to come) In peace shall land thee at thy native home." With sighs, Ulysses heard the words she spoke, Then thus his melancholy silence broke: "Some other motive, goddess! sways thy mind, (Some close design, or turn of womankind) Nor my return the end, nor this the way,. On a slight raft to pass the swelling sea, Huge, horrid, vast! where scarce in safety sails The best-built ship, though Jove inspire the gales. The bold proposal how shall I fulfil; Dark as I am, unconscious of thy will? Swear then thou mean'st not what my soul forebodes; Swear by the solemn oath that binds the gods."

Him, while he spoke, with smiles Calypso ey'd, And gently grasp'd his hand, and thus reply'd: "This shows thee, friend, by old experience taught, And learn'd in all the wiles of human thought, How prone to doubt, how cautious are the wise? But hear, O Earth! and hear ye sacred Skies!

And thou, O Styx! whose formidable floods
Glide through the shades, and bind th' attesting
No form'd design, no meditated end, [gods!
Lurks in the counsel of thy faithful friend ;
Kind the persuasion, and sincere my aim;
The same my practice, were my fate the same.
Heaven has not curst me with a heart of steel,
But given the sense, to pity, and to feel."

Thus having said, the goddess march'd before:
He trod her footsteps, in the sandy shore.
At the cool cave arriv'd, they took their state;
He fill'd the throne where Mercury had sate.
For him, the nymph a rich repast ordains,
Such as the mortal life of man sustains;
Before herself were plac'd the cates divine,
Ambrosial banquet, and celestial wine..
Their hunger satiate, and their thirst represt,
Thus spoke Calypso to her godlike guest:

"Ulysses!" (with a sigh she thus began)
"O sprung from gods! in wisdom more than man;
Is then thy home the passion of thy heart?
Thus wilt thou leave me, are we thus to part?
Farewell! and ever joyful may'st thou be,
Nor break the transport with one thought of me.
But ah, Ulysses! wert thou given to know
What fate yet dooms thee, yet, to undergo;
Thy heart might settle in this scene of ease,
And ev'n these slighted charms might learn to please.
A willing goddess and immortal life

Might banish from thy mind an absent wife.
Am I inferior to a mortal dame?

Less soft my feature, less august my frame?
Or shall the daughters of mankind compare
Their earth-born beauties with the heavenly fair?"
"Alas! for this" (the prudent man replies)
"Against Ulysses shall thy anger rise?
Lov'd and ador'd, oh goddess! as thou art,
Forgive the weakness of a human heart.
Though well I see thy graces far above
The dear, though mortal, object of my love,
Of youth eternal well the difference know,
And the short date of fading charms below;
Yet every day, while absent thus I roan,
I languish to return and die at home.
Whate'er the gods shall destine me to bear
In the black ocean, or the watery war,
'Tis mine to master with a constant mind;
Inur'd to perils, to the worst resign'd.
By seas, by wars, so many dangers run;
Still I can suffer: their high will be done!"
Thus while he spoke, the beamy Sun descends,
And rising night her friendly shade extends.
To the close grot the lonely pair remove,
And slept delighted with the gifts of love.
When rosy morning call'd them from their rest,
Ulysses rob'd him in the cloak and vest.
The nymph's fair head a veil transparent grac'd,
Her swelling loins a radiant zone embrac'd
With flowers of gold: an under robe, unbound,
In snowy waves flow'd glittering on the ground.
Forth issuing thus, she gave him first to wield
A weighty ax with truest temper steel'd,
And double edg'd; the handle smooth and plain,
Wrought of the clouded olive's easy grain;
And next, a wedge to drive with sweepy sway:
Then to the neighbouring forest led the way.
On the lone island's utmost verge they stood
Of poplars, pines, and firs, a lofty wood,
Whose leafless summits to the skies aspire,
Scorch'd by the Sun, or sear'd by heavenly fire

(Already dry'd). These pointing out to view,
The nymph just show'd him, and with tears withdrew.
Now toils the hero; trees on trees o'erthrown
Fall crackling round him, and the forest groan:
Sudden, full twenty on the plain are strow'd,
And lopp'd, and lighten'd of their branchy load.
At equal angles these dispos'd to join,
He smooth'd and squar'd them, by the rule and line.
(The wimbles for the work Calypso found)
With those he pierc'd them, and with clinchers
Long and capacious as a shipwright forms [bound.
Some bark's broad bottoin to out-ride the storms,
So large he built the raft: then ribb'd it strong
From space to space, and nail'd the planks along;
These form'd the sides: the deck he fashion'd last;
Then o'er the vessel rais'd the taper mast,
With crossing sail-yards dancing in the wind;
And to the helm the guiding rudder join'd
(With yielding osiers fenc'd, to break the force
Of surging waves, and steer the steady course).
Thy loom, Calypso! for the future sails
Supply'd the cloth, capacious of the. gales.
With stays and cordage last he rigg'd the ship,
And, roll'd on levers, lanch'd her in the deep.

Four days were past, and now the work complete,
Shone the fifth morn: when from her sacred seat
The nymph dismiss'd him, (odorous garments given)
And bath'd in fragrant oils that breath'd of Heaven:
Then fill'd two goat-skins with her hands divine,
With water one, and one with sable wine:
Of every kind, provisions heav'd aboard;
And the full decks with copious viands stor'd.
The goddess last a gentle breeze supplies,
To curl old ocean, and to warm the skies.

And now, rejoicing in the prosperous gales, With beating heart, Ulysses spreads his sails; Plac'd at the helm he sate, and mark'd the skies, Nor clos'd in sleep his ever-watchful eyes. There view'd the Pleiads, and the Northern team, And great Orion's more refulgeut beam, To which, around the axle of the sky The Bear, revolving, points his golden eye: Who shines exalted on th' etherial plain, Nor bathes his blazing forehead in the main. Far on the left those radiant fires to keep The nymph directed, as he sail'd the deep. Full seventeen nights he cut the foamy way: The distant land appear'd the following day: Then swell'd to sight Phæacia's dusky coast, And woody mountains, half in vapours lost : That lay before him, indistinct and vast, Like a broad shield amid the watery waste.

But him, thus voyaging the deeps below, From far, on Solyme's aerial brow, The king of ocean saw, and seeing burn'd (From Ethiopia's happy climes return'd); The raging monarch shook his azure head, And thus in secret to his soul he said: "Heavens! how uncertain are the powers on high? Is then revers'd the sentence of the sky, In one man's favour; while a distant guest I shar'd secure the Ethiopian feast? Behold how near Phæacia's land he draws! The land, affix'd by fate's eternal laws To end his toils. Is then our anger vain? No; if this sceptre yet commands the main." He spoke, and, high the forky trident hurl'd, Rolls clouds on clouds, and stirs the watery world, At once the face of earth and sea deforins, Swells all the winds, and rouses all the storms.

Down rush'd the Night: East, West, together roar; |
And South, and North, roll mountains to the shore;
Then shook the hero, to despair resign'd,
And question'd thus his yet unconquer'd mind:
"Wretch that I am! what farther fates attend
This life of toils, and what my destin'd end?
Too well, alas! the island goddess knew,
On the black sea what perils should ensue.
New horrours now this destin'd head enclose;
Unfill'd is yet the measure of my woes;
With what a cloud the brows of Heaven are crown'd!
What raging winds! what roaging waters round!
'Tis Jove himself the swelling tempests rears;
Death, present death, on every side appears.
Happy! thrice happy! who, in battle slain,
Prest, in Atrides' cause, the Trojan plain :
Oh! had I dy'd before that well-fought wall;
Had some distinguish'd day renown'd my fall
(Such as was that, when showers of javelins fled
From conquering Troy around Achilles dead):
All Greece had paid me solemn funerals then,
And spread my glory with the sons of men.
A shameful fate now hides my hapless head,
Unwept, unnoted, and for ever dead !"

A mighty wave rush'd o'er him as he spoke,
The raft it cover'd, and the mast it broke;
Swept from the deck, and from the rudder torn,
Far on the swelling surge the chief was borne:
While by the howling tempest rent in twain
Flew sail and sail-yards rattling o'er the main.
Long press'd, he heav'd beneath the weighty wave,
Clogg'd by the cumbrous vest Calypso gave:
At length, emerging from his nostrils wide
And gushing mouth, effus'd the briny tide,
Ev'n then not mindless of his last retreat,
He seiz'd the raft, and leapt into his seat,
Strong with the fear of death. The rolling flood
Now here, now there, impell'd the floating wood.
As when a heap of gather'd thorns is cast
Now to, now fro, before th' autumnal blast;
Together clung, it rolls around the field;
So roll'd the float, and so its texture held:
And now the South, and now the North, bear sway,
And now the East the foamy floods obey,

And now the West wind whirls it o'er the sea.
The wandering chief, with toils on toils opprest,
Leucothea saw, and pity touch'd her breast
(Herself a mortal once, of Cadmus' strain,
But now an azure sister of the main).
Swift as a sea-mew springing from the flood:
All radiant on the raft the goddess stood:
Then thus address'd him: "Thou whom Heaven
decrees

To Neptune's wrath, stern tyrant of the seas,
(Unequal contest!) not his rage and power,
Great as he is, such virtue shall devour.
What I suggest, thy wisdom will perform;
Forsake thy float, and leave it to the storm;
Strip off thy garments; Neptune's fury brave
With naked strength, and plunge into the wave.
To reach Phæacia all thy nerves extend,
There fate decrees thy miseries shall end.
This heavenly scarf beneath thy bosom bind,
And live; give all thy terrours to the wind.
Soon as thy arms the happy shore shall gain,
Return the gift, and cast it in the main;
Observe my orders, and with heed obey,
Cast it far off, and turn thy eyes away."
With that, her hand the sacred veil bestows,
Then down the deeps she div'd from whence she rose;

A moment snatch'd the shining form away, And all was cover'd with the curling sea.

Struck with amaze, yet still to doubt inclin'd,
He stands suspended, and explores his mind.
"What shall I do? Unhappy me! who knows
But other gods intend me other woes?
Whoe'er thou art, I shall not blindly join
Thy pleaded reason, but consult with inine:
For scarce in ken appears that distant isle.
Thy voice foretels me shall conclude my toil.
Thus then I judge; while yet the planks sustain
The wild waves' fury, here I fix'd remain :
But when their texture to the tempests yields,
I lanch adventurous on the liquid fields,
Join to the help of gods the strength of man,
And take this method, since the best I can."
While thus his thoughts an anxious council
hold

The raging god a watery mountain roll'd;
Like a black sheet the whelming billow spread
Bursts o'er the float, and thunder'd on his head.
Planks, beams, disparted fly: the scatter'd wood
Rolls diverse, and in fragments strows the flood.
So the rude Boreas, o'er the fields new-shorn,
Tosses and drives the scatter'd heaps of corn.
And now a single beam the chief bestrides ;
There pois'd a while above the bounding tides,
His limbs discumbers of the clinging vest,
And binds the sacred cincture round his breast:
Then prone on ocean in a moment flung,
Stretch'd wide his eager arms, and shot the seas
All naked now, on heaving billows laid,
Stern Neptune ey'd him, and contemptuous said:
'Go, learn'd in woes, and other woes essay!
Go, wander helpless on the watery way:
Thus, thus find out the destin'd shore, and then
(If Jove ordains it) mix with happier men.
Whate'er thy fate, the ills our wrath could raise
Shall last remember'd in thy best of days."

[along.

This said, his sea-green steeds divide the foam, And reach high Æga and the towery dome.

Now, scarce withdrawn the fierce earth-shaking power,

1

Jove's daughter, Pallas, watch'd the favouring hour,
Back to their caves she bade the winds to flv,
And hush'd the blustering brethren of the sky.
The drier blasts alone of Boreas sway,
And bear him soft on broken waves away;
With gentle force impelling to that shore,
Where fate has destin'd he shall toil no more.
And now two nights, and now two days were past,
Since wide he wander'd on the watery waste:
Heav'd on the surge with intermitting breath,
And hourly panting in the arms of death.
The third fair morn now blaz'd upon the main;
Then glassy smooth lay all the liquid plain;
The winds were hush'd, the billows scarcely curl'd,
And a dead silence still'd the watery world;
When lifted on a ridgy wave he 'spies

The land at distance, and with sharpen'd eyes.
As pious children joy with vast delight
When a lov'd sire revives before their sight,
(Who, lingering long has call'd on death in vain,
Fix'd by some demon to his bed of pain,
Till Heaven by miracle his life restore);
So joys Ulysses at th' appearing shore,
And sees (and labours onward as he sees)
The rising forests and the tufted trees.
And now, as near approaching as the sound
Of human voice the listening ear may wound,