To learn my doom: for, toss'd from wo to wo,
In every land Ulysses finds a foe:
Nor have these eyes beheld my native shores,
Since in the dust proud Troy submits her towers.
""But, when thy soul from her sweet mansion

fled,

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Say, what distemper gave thee to the dead?
Has life's fair lamp declined by slow decays,
Or swift expired it in a sudden blaze ?
Say, if my sire, good old Laertes, lives?
If yet Telemachus, my son, survives ?
Say, by his rule is my dominion awed,
Or crush'd by traitors with an iron rod?
Say, if my spouse maintains her royal trust;
Though tempted, chaste, and obstinately just? 215
Or if no more her absent lord she wails,
But the false woman o'er the wife prevails ??

220

"Thus I, and thus the parent-shade returns : Thee, ever thee, thy faithful consort mourns: Whether the night descends or day prevails, Thee she by night, and thee by day bewails. Thee in Telemachus thy realm obeys; In sacred groves celestial rites he pays, And shares the banquet in superior state, Graced with such honours as become the great. 225 Thy sire in solitude foments his care: The court is joyless, for thou art not there! No costly carpets raise his hoary head, No rich embroidery shines to grace his bed; Ev'n when keen winter freezes in the skies, Rank'd with his slaves, on earth the monarch lies: Deep are his sighs, his visage pale, his dress The garb of wo and habit of distress.

230

And when the autumn takes his annual round,
The leafy honours scattering on the ground,

235

Regardless of his years, abroad he lies,
His bed the leaves, his canopy the skies.
Thus cares on cares his painful days consume,
And bow his age with sorrow to the tomb!

240

"For thee, my son, I wept my life away; For thee through hell's eternal dungeons stray: Nor came my fate by lingering pains and slow, Nor bent the silver-shafted queen her bow; Nor dire disease bereaved me of my breath; Thou, thou, my son, wert my disease and death; Unkindly with my love my son conspired, 246 For thee I lived, for absent thee expired."

250

"Thrice in my arms I strove her shade to bind, Thrice through my arms she slipp'd like empty wind, Or dreams, the vain illusions of the mind. Wild with despair, I shed a copious tide Of flowing tears, and thus with sighs replied:

""Fliest thou, loved shade, while I thus fondly

mourn ?

Turn to my arms, to my embraces turn!
Is it, ye powers that smile at human harms!
Too great a bliss to weep within her arms ?
Or has hell's queen an empty image sent,
That wretched I might ev'n my joys lament ??
""Oh son of wo,' the pensive shade rejoin'd,
Oh most inured to grief of all mankind!
'Tis not the queen of hell who thee deceives;
All, all are such, when life the body leaves:
No more the substance of the man remains,
Nor bounds the blood along the purple veins :
These the funereal flames in atoms bear,
To wander with the wind in empty air :
While the impassive soul reluctant flies,
Like a vain dream, to these infernal skies.
But from the dark dominions speed thy way,
And climb the steep ascent to upper day;
To thy chaste bride the wondrous story tell,
The woes, the horrors, and the laws of hell.'

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260

265

270

"Thus while she spoke, in swarms hell's empress

brings

274

Daughters and wives of heroes and of kings; Thick and more thick they gather round the blood, Ghost throned on ghost, a dire assembly, stood!

Dauntless my sword I seize; the airy crew,
Swift as it flash'd along the gloom, withdrew;
Then shade to shade in mutual forms succeeds,
Her race recounts, and their illustrious deeds. 280

"Tyro began, whom great Salmoneous bred;

286

290

The royal partner of famed Cretheus' bed.
For fair Enipeus, as from fruitful urns
He pours his watery store, the virgin burns;
Smooth flows the gentle stream with wanton pride,
And in soft mazes rolls a silver tide.
As on his banks the maid enamour'd roves,
The monarch of the deep beholds and loves:
In her Enipeus' form and borrow'd charms,
The amorous god descends into her arms :
Around, a spacious arch of waves he throws,
And high in air the liquid mountain rose;
Thus in surrounding floods conceal'd he proves
The pleasing transport, and completes his loves.
Then softly sighing, he the fair address'd,
And as he spoke her tender hand he press'd.
• Hail, happy nymph! no vulgar births are owed
To the prolific raptures of a god:
Lo! when nine times the moon renews her horn,
Two brother heroes shall from thee be born;
Thy early care the future worthies claim,
To point them to the arduous paths of fame;
But in thy breast the important truth conceal,

Nor dare the secret of a god reveal :

295

For know, thou Neptune view'st! and at my nod Earth trembles, and the waves confess their god.'

300

304

310

"He added not, but mounting spurn'd the plain, Then plunged into the chambers of the main. "Now in the time's full process forth she brings Jove's dread vicegerents in two future kings; O'er proud Iolcos Pelias stretch'd his reign, And godlike Neleus ruled the Pylian plain : Then, fruitful, to her Cretheus' royal bed She gallant Pheres and famed Æson bred :

315

From the same fountain Amythaon rose,
Pleased with the din of war, and noble shout of foes.
"There moved Antiope, with haughty charms,
Who bless'd the almighty Thunderer in her arms:
Hence sprung Amphion, hence brave Zethus came,
Founders of Thebes, and men of mighty name; 320
Though bold in open field, they yet surround
The town with walls, and mound inject on mound;
Here ramparts stood, there towers rose high in air,
And here through seven wide portals rush'd the war.
"There with soft step the fair Alcmena trod, 325
Who bore Alcides to the thundering god:
And Megara, who charm'd the son of Jove,
And soften'd his stern soul to tender love.

"Sullen and sour with discontented mien Jocasta frown'd, the incestuous Theban queen; 330 With her own son she join'd in nuptial bands, Though father's blood imbrued his murderous hands: The gods and men the dire offence detest, The gods with all their furies rend his breast; In lofty Thebes he wore the imperial crown, A pompous wretch! accursed upon a throne. The wife self-murder'd from a beam depends, And her foul soul to blackest hell descends;

335

Thence to her son the choicest plagues she brings, And the fiends haunt him with a thousand stings.

" And now the beauteous Chloris I descry,

A lovely shade, Amphion's youngest joy!
With gifts unnumber'd Neleus sought her arins,
Nor paid too dearly for unequall'd charms;
Great in Orchomenos, in Py Pylos great,
los great,
He sway'd the sceptre with imperial state.
Three gallant sons the joyful monarch told,
Sage Nestor, Periclymenus the bold,
And Chromius last; but of the softer race,
One nymph alone, a miracle of grace.
Kings on their thrones for lovely Pero burn;
The sire denies, and kings rejected mourn.

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350

To him alone the beauteous prize he yields,
Whose arm should ravish from Phylacian fields
The herds of Iphyclus, detain'd in wrong;
Wild, furious herds, unconquerably strong!
This dares a seer, but naught the seer prevails,
In beauty's cause illustriously he fails;
Twelve moons the foe the captive youth detains
In painful dungeons, and coercive chains :
The foe at last, from durance where he lay,
His art revering, gave him back to day;
Won by prophetic knowledge, to fulfil

The steadfast purpose of th' Almighty will.

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360

"With graceful port advancing now I spied 365 Leda the fair, the godlike Tyndar's bride: Hence Pollux sprung, who wields with furious sway The deathful gauntlet, matchless in the fray; And Castor glorious on th' embattled plain Curbs the proud steeds, reluctant to the rein : 370

By turns they visit this ethereal sky,

And live alternate, and alternate die:
In hell beneath, on earth, in heaven above,
Reign the twin gods, the favourite sons of Jove.

"There Ephimedia trod the gloomy plain, Who charm'd the monarch of the boundless main; Hence Ephialtes, hence stern Otus sprung, More fierce than giants, more than giants strong; The earth o'erburden'd groan'd beneath their weight, None but Orion e'er surpass'd their height: The wondrous youths had scarce nine winters told, When high in air, tremendous to behold, Nine ells aloft they rear'd their towering head, And full nine cubits broad their shoulders spread. Proud of their strength, and more than mortal size, The gods they challenge, and affect the skies: 386 Heaved on Olympus tottering Ossa stood; On Ossa, Pelion nods with all his wood.

375

380

Such were they youths! had they to manhood

grown,

Almighty Jove had trembled on his throne:

390