O had my love been less, or less thy fear!
The victory thus bought is far too dear.
Accursed snake! yet I more curs'd than he!
He gave the wound; the cause was given by me.
Yet none shall say, that unreveng'd you dy'd.'
He spoke; then climb'd a cliff's o'er-hanging side,
And, resolute, leap'd on the foaming tide.
Tethys receiv'd him gently on the wave;
The death he sought deny'd, and feathers gave.
Debarr'd the surest remedy of grief,
And fore'd to live, he curst th' unask'd relief.
Then on his airy pinions upward flies,
And at a second fall successless tries:
The downy plume a quick descent denies.
Enrag'd, he often dives beneath the wave,
And there in vain expects to find a grave.
His ceaseless sorrow for th' unhappy maid
Meager'd his look, and on his spirits prey'd.
Still near the sounding deep he lives; his name
From frequent diving and emerging came,"

THE TWELFTH BOOK OF OVID'S METAMORPHOSES.

Wholly translated.

Connection to the end of the Eleventh Book. sacus, the son of Priam, loving a country life, forsakes the court: living obscurely, he falls in love with a nymph; who, flying from him, was killed by a serpent; for grief of this, he would have drowned himself; but, by the pity of the gods, is turned into a cormorant. Priam, not hearing of Æsacus, believes him to be dead, and raises a tomb to preserve his memory. By this transition, which is one of the finest in all Ovid, the poet naturally falls into the story of the Trojan war, which is summed up, in the present book, but so very briefly, in many places, that Ovid seems more short than Virgil, contrary to his usual style. Yet the house of Fame, which is here described, is one of the most beautiful pieces in the whole Metamorphoses. The fight of Achilles and Cygnus, and the fray betwixt the Lapitha and Centaurs, yield to no other part of this poet: and particularly the loves and death of Cyllarus and Hylonome, the male and female Centaur, are wonderfully moving.

[wept.

PRIAM, to whom the story was unknown,
As dead, deplor'd his metamorphos'd son:
A cenotaph his name and title kept,
And Hector round the tomb, with all his brothers
This pious office Paris did not share;
Absent alone, and author of the war,
Which, for the Spartan queen, the Grecians drew
T' avenge the rape, and Asia to subdue.

A thousand ships were mann'd, to sail the sea:
Nor had their just resentments found delay,
Had not the winds and waves oppos'd their way.
At Aulis, with united powers, they meet;
But there, cross winds or calms detain'd the fleet.
Now, while they raise an altar on the shore,
And Jove with solemn sacrifice adore;
A boding sign the priests and people see:

A snake of size immense ascends a tree,

And, in the leafy summit, spy'd a nest,
Which, o'er her callow young, a sparrow press'd.
Eight were the birds unfledg'd; their mother flew,
And hover'd round her care; but still in view:
Till the fierce reptile first devour'd the brood;
Then seiz'd the fluttering dam, and drank her
This dire ostent the fearful people view; [blood.
Calchas alone, by Phoebus taught, foreknew
What Heaven decreed: and with a smiling glance,
Thus gratulates to Greece her happy chance.
"O Argives, we shall conquer; Troy is ours,
But long delays shall first afflict our powers:
Nine years of labour, the nine birds portend;
The tenth shall in the town's destruction end."
The serpent, who his maw obscene had fill'd,
The branches in his curl'd embraces held:
But, as in spires he stood, he turn'd to stone:
The stony snake retain'd the figure still his own.
Yet not for this the wind-bound navy weigh'd;
Slack were their sails; and Neptune disobey'd.
Some thought him loth the town should be
destroy'd,

Whose building had his hands divine employ'd:
Not so the seer: who knew, and known foreshow'd,
The virgin Phoebe with a virgin's blood
Must first be reconcil'd; the common cause
Prevail'd; and, pity yielding to the laws,
Fair Iphigenia, the devoted maid,

Was, by the weeping priests, in linen robes array'd;
All mourn her fate; but no relief appear'd:
The royal victim bound, the knife already rear'd:
When that offended power, who caus'd their woe,
Relenting ceas'd her wrath; and stopp'd the com-
ing blow.

A mist before the ministers she cast;
And, in the virgin's room, a hind she plac'd.
Th' oblation slain, and Phoebe reconcil'd,
The storm was hush'd, and dimpled Occan smil'd :
A favourable gale arose from shore,
Which to the port desir'd the Grecian galleys bore.
Full in the midst of this created space, [place
Betwixt Heaven, Earth, and Skies, there stands a
Confining on all three; with triple bound;
Whence all things, though remote, are view'd
around,

And thither bring their undulating sound.
The palace of loud Fame; her seat of power;
Plac'd on the summit of a lofty tower;
A thousand winding entries, long and wide,
Receive of fresh reports a flowing tide.
A thousand crannies in the walls are made;
Nor gate nor bars exclude the busy trade.
'Tis built of brass, the better to diffuse
The spreading sounds, and multiply the news;
Where echoes in repeated echoes play:
A mart for ever full, and open night and day.
Nor silence is within, nor voice express,
But a deaf noise of sounds that never cease;
Confus'd, and chiding, like the hollow roar
Of tides, receding from th' insulted shore:
Or like the broken thunder, heard from far,
When Jove to distance drives the rolling war.
The courts are fill'd with a tumultuous din
Of crouds, or issuing forth, or entering in:
A thoroughfare of news: where some devise
Things never heard; some mingle truth with lies:
The troubled air with empty sounds they beat;
Intent to hear, and eager to repeat.
Errour sits brooding there; with added train
Of vain credulity, and joys as vain:

Suspicion, with sedition join'd, are near;

And rumours rais'd, and murmurs mix'd, and panic fear.

Fame sits aloft; and sees the subject ground, And seas about, and skies above; inquiring all around.

The goddess gives th' alarm; and soon is known
The Grecian fleet, descending on the town.
Fix'd on defence, the Trojans are not slow
To guard their shore from an expected foe.
They meet in fight: by Hector's fatal hand
Protesilaus falls, and bites the strand,
Which with expense of blood the Grecians won:
And prov❜d the strength unknown of Priam's son.
And to their cost the Trojan leaders felt
The Grecian heroes, and what deaths they dealt.
From these first onsets, the Sigæan shore
Was strew'd with carcases, and stain'd with gore:
Neptunian Cygnus troops of Greeks had slain;
Achilles in his car had scour'd the plain,
And clear'd the Trojan ranks: where'er he fought,
Cygnus, or Hector, through the fields he sought:
Cygnus he found; on him his force essay'd:
For Hector was to the tenth year delay'd. [yoke,
His white-man'd steeds, that bow'd beneath the
He cheer'd to courage, with a gentle stroke;
Then urg'd his fiery chariot on the foe:
And, rising, shook his lance, in act to throw.
But first he cry'd, "O youth, be proud to bear
Thy death, enobled by Pelides' spear."
The lance pursued the voice without delay;
Nor did the whizzing weapon miss the way,
But pierc'd his cuirass, with such fury sent,
And sign'd his bosom with a purple dint.
At this the seed of Neptune; "Goddess-born,
For ornament, not use, these arms are worn;
This helm, and heavy buckler, I can spare,
As only decorations of the war:

So Mars is arm'd for glory, not for need.
'Tis somewhat more from Neptune to proceed,
Than from a daughter of the sea to spring:
Thy sire is mortal; mine is ocean's king.
Secure of death, I should contemn thy dart,
Though naked, and impassable depart :"
He said, and threw: the trembling weapon pass'd
Through nine bull -hides, each under other plac'd,
On his broad shield, and stuck within the last.
Achilles wrench'd it out; and sent again
The hostile gift; the hostile gift was vain,
He try'd a third, a tough well-chosen spear;
Th' inviolable body stood sincere,
Though Cygnus then did no defence provide,
But, scornful, offer'd his unshielded side.

Not otherwise th' impatient hero far'd,
Than as a bull, encompass'd with a guard,
Amid the circus roars: provok'd from far
Ey sight of scarlet, and a sanguine war,

They quit their ground, his bended horns elude, In vain pursuing, and in vain pursued.

Before to farther fight he would advance, He stood considering, and survey'd his lance. Doubts if he wielded not a wooden spear Without a point: he look'd, the point was there. "This is my hand, and this my lance," he said, "By which so many thousand foes are dead. O whither is their usual virtue fled ? I had it once; and the Lyrnessian wall, And Tenedos, confess'd it in their fall. Thy streams, Caïeus, roll'd a crimson flood: And Thebes ran red with her own natives blood.

Twice Telephus employ'd their piercing steel,
To wound him first, and afterward to heal.
The vigour of this arm was never vain :
And that my wonted prowess I retain,
Witness these heaps of slaughter on the plain."
He said, and doubtful of his former deeds,
To some new trial of his force proceeds.
He chose Menætes from among the rest;
At him he lanch'd his spear, and pierc'd his breast:
On the hard earth the Lycian knock'd his head,
And lay supine; and forth the spirit fled.

Then thus the hero: "Neither can 1 blame
The hand, or javelin; both are still the same.
The same I will employ against this foe;
And wish but with the same success to throw."
So spoke the chief; and while he spoke he threw;
The weapon with unerring fury flew,
At his left shoulder aim'd: nor entrance found;
But back, as from a rock, with swift rebound
Harmless return'd: a bloody mark appear'd,
Which with false joy the flatter'd hero cheer'd.
Wound there was none; the blood that was in
view,

The lance before from slain Menætes drew.

Headlong he leaps from off his lofty car,
And in close fight on foot renews the war.
Raging with high disdain, repeats his blows;
Nor shield nor armour can their force oppose;
Huge cantlets of his buckler strew the ground,
And no defence in his bor'd arms is found.
But on his flesh no wound or blood is seen;
The sword itself is blunted on the skin.

This vain attempt the chief no longer bears;
But round his hollow temples and his ears
His buckler beats: the son of Neptune, stunn'd
With these repeated buffets, quits his ground;
A sickly sweat succeeds, and shades of night;
Inverted Nature swims before his sight:
Th' insulting victor presses on the more,
And treads the steps the vanquish'd trod before,
Nor rest, nor respite gives. A stone there lay
Behind his trembling foe, and stopp'd his way:
Achilles took the advantage which he found,
O'er-turn'd, and push'd him backward on the
ground.

His buckler held him under, while he press'd,
With both his knees above, his panting breast.
Unlac'd his helm: about his chin the twist
He try'd; and soon the strangled soul dismiss'd.
With eager haste he went to strip the dead;
The vanquish'd body from his arms was fled.
His sea-god sire, t' immortalize his fame,
Had turn'd it to the bird that bears his name.
A truce succeeds the labours of this day,
And arms suspended with a long delay.
While Trojan walls are kept with watch and ward;
The Greeks before their trenches mount the guard;
The feast approach'd; when to the blue-eyed maid
His vows for Cygnus slain the victor paid,
And a white heifer on her altar laid.
The reeking entrails on the fire they threw;
And to the gods the grateful odour flew :
Heaven had its part in sacrifice: the rest
Was broil'd and roasted for the future feast.
The chief invited guests were set around;
And hunger first assuag'd, the bowls were crown'd,
Which in deep draughts their cares and labours

drown'd.

The mellow harp did not their ears employ, And mute was all the warlike symphony;

And hurl'd at Amycus; his chin is bent
Against his chest, and down the Centaur sent;
Whoin sputtering bloody teeth, the second blow
Of his drawn sword dispatch'd to shades below.
"Grineus was near; and cast a furious look
On the side-altar, cens'd with sacred smoke,
And bright with flaming fires. The gods,' he

cry'd,

"Have with their holy trade our hands supply'd:
Why use we not their gifts?' Then from the floor
An aitar-stone he heav'd, with all the load it bore:
Altar and altar's freight together flew
Where thickest throng'd the Lapithean crew;
And, at once, Broteas and Oryus slew:
Oryus' mother, Mycale, was known
Down from her sphere to draw the labouring Moon.
"Exadius cry'd, Unpunish'd shall not go
This fact, if arms are found against the foe.'
He look'd about, where on a pine were spread
The votive horus of a stag's branching head:
At Grineus these he throws; so just they fly,
That the sharp antlers stuck in either eye:
Breathless and blind he fell, with blood besmear'd,
His eye-balls, beaten out, hung dangling on his
beard.

Fierce Rhætus, from the hearth, a burning brand
Selects, and whirling waves; till from his hand
The fire took flame; then dash'd it from the right
On fair Charaxus' temples, near the sight:
The whistling pest came on, and pierc'd the bone
And caught the yellow hair, that shrivel'd while
it shone :

Caught, like dry stubble fir'd, or like seerwood;
Yet from the wound ensued no purple flood;
But look'd a bubbling mass of frying blood.

His blazing locks sent forth a crackling sound, And hiss'd, like red hot ir'n within the smithy drown'd.

The wounded warrior shook his flaming hair,
Then (what a team of horse could hardly rear)
He heaves the threshold-stone; but could not throw;
The weight itself forbad the threaten'd blow;
Which, dropping from his lifted arms, came down
Full on Cometes' head, and crush'd his crown.
Nor Rhætus then retain'd his joy: but said,
'So by their fellows may our foes be sped!'
Then with redoubled strokes he plies his head :
The burning lever not deludes his pains;
But drives the batter'd skull within the brains.
"Thus flush'd, the conqueror, with force re-
new'd,

Evagrus, Dryas, Corythus pursued:
First, Corythus, with downy cheeks, he slew ;
Whose fall when fierce Evagrus had in view,
He cry'd, 'What palm is from a beardless prey?
Rbætus prevents what more he had to say;
And drove within his mouth the fiery death,
Which enter'd hissing in, and chok'd his breath.
At Dryas next he flew; but weary Chance
No longer would the same success advance.
But while he whirl'd in fiery circles round
The brand, a sharpen'd stake strong Dryas found;
And in the shoulder's joint inflicts the wound.
The weapon struck: which roaring out with pain
He drew: nor longer durst the fight maintain,
Bet turn'd his back, for fear; and fled amain.
With him fled Orneus, with like dread possess'd;
Traumas and Medon, wounded in the breast;
And Mermeros, in the late race renown'd,
Now limping ran, and tardy with his wound.

Pholus and Melaneus from fight withdrew,
And Abas maim'd, who boars encountering slew:
And Augur Astylos, whose art in vain
From fight dissuaded the four-footed train,
Now beat the hoof with Nessus on the plain;
But to his fellow cry'd,' Be safely slow,
Thy death deferr'd is due to great Alcides' bow.'
"Mean time strong Dryas urg'd his chance so
That Lycidas, Areos, Imbreus fell;
[well,
All one by one, and fighting face to face:
Crenæus fled, to fall with more disgrace:
For, fearful, while he look'd behind, he bore
Betwixt his nose and front the blow before.
Amid the noise and tumult of the fray,
Snoring and drunk with wine, Aphidas lay.
Ev'n then the bowl within his hand he kept,
And on a bear's rough hide securely slept.
Him Phorbas with his flying dart transfix'd;
"Take thy next draught with Stygian waters mix'd,
And sleep thy fill,' th' insulting victor cy'd;
Surpriz'd with death unfelt, the Centaur dy'd;
The ruddy vomit, as he breath'd his soul,
Repass'd his throat, and fill'd his empty bowl.
"I saw Petræus' arms employ'd around
A well-grown oak, to root it from the ground.
This way, and that, he wrench'd the fibrous bands,
The trunk was like a sapling in his hands,
And still obey'd the bent: while thus he stood,
Perithous' dart drove on, and nail'd him to the
: wood.

Lycus and Chromys fell, by him oppress'd:
Helops and Dictys added to the rest

A nobler palm: Helops, through either ear
Transfix'd, receiv'd the penetrating spear.
This Dictys saw; and, seiz'd with sudden fright,
Leapt headlong from the hill of steepy height;
And crush'd an ash beneath, that could not bear
his weight.

The shatter'd tree receives his fall, and strikes,
Within his full-blown paunch, the sharpen'd spikes.
Strong Aphareus had heav'd a mighty stone,
The fragment of a rock, and would have thrown;
But Theseus, with a club of harden'd oak,
The cubit-bone of the bold Centaur broke,
And left him maim'd; nor seconded the stroke:
Then leapt on tall Bianor's back, (who bore
No mortal burthen but his own, before)
Press'd with his knees his sides; the double man,
His speed with spurs increas'd, unwilling ran.
One hand the hero fasten'd on his locks;
His other ply'd him with repeated strokes.
The club hung round his ears and batter'd brows;
He falls; and, lashing up his heels, his rider throws.
"The same Herculean arms Nedymnus wound,
And lay by him Lycotas on the ground;
And Hippasus, whose beard his breast invades ;
And Ripheus, haunter of the woodland shades;
And Tereus, us'd with mountain-bears to strive,
And from their dens to draw 'th', indignant beasts
alive.

"Demoleon could not bear this hateful sight,
Or the long fortune of th' Athenian knight:
But pull'd with all his force, to disengage
From earth a pine, the product of an age:
The root stuck fast: the broken trunk he sent
At Theseus: Theseus frustrates his intent,
And leaps aside, by Pallas warn'd, the blow
To shun (for so he said; and we believ'd it so).
Yet not in vain th' enormous weight was cast,
Which Crantor's body sunder'd at the waist;