Thee, as it sunk to rest, was wont to chant. The jaws of Tænarus too, portals profound Of Pluto, and the grove with murky dread All darkling, he did enter, and approach The Manes, and the terror-king, and hearts Which know not how to melt at human pray'rs. But with the strain thick rous'd from deepest
Of Erebus, the shades began to throng
Thin filmy shades-and phantoms of the dead Of light bereft, as num'rous as the swarms Of birds that bury them in woods, when eve, Or winter show'r from mountains drives them down-
Matrons, and men, and corses life-defunct
Of high-soul'd heroes, and unwedded maids, And youths in prime of life laid on their pyres Before their parents' faces, whom around Black ooze, and Cocyt's grim unsightly reeds, And lake unlovely with its sullen wave Binds fast, and Styx nine times between them pour'd
Imprisons. Yea, the palace halls themselves Amazed stood, and Death's profoundest hell, And they that bear the bluish snakes enwreath'd Their locks among the Furies; and upon him, Gazing with open mouth, did Cerberus
Keep fix'd his triple jaws; and in the air Stopp'd still the wheeling of Ixion's disk. And now his foot recalling, ev'ry hap Had he escaped, and again restor❜d Eurydice to upper air was passing, Following behind (for Proserpine this law Had fix'd), when sudden thoughtlessness sur- pris'd
The unwary lover-one for pardon meet,
If Manes knew to pardon. Sudden he stopped, And back upon Eurydice his regain'd,
E'en now beneath the light, mindless, alas! And soul-subdu'd, he gaz'd. There all his toil Was squander'd, and the ruthless tyrant's com- pacts
Broken; and thrice a crash was heard throughout The Avernian lakes. For her, Who," cries
The wretched one, and thee, Orpheus, hath kill'd?
What frenzy this so wild? Lo once again The ranc'rous fates are summoning me back, And sleep is whelming close my swimming eyes. And now, farewell! Borne am I off, enwrapp'd In tenfold night; and pow'rless unto thee Stretching my hands, alas, no longer thine!" She spoke, and from his eyes, sudden as smoke With the thin air emblended, she did flee A different path; nor him, all vainly grasping At shades, and longing many a word to utter, Saw she thenceforth. Nor did Hell's ferryman Permit her more the barrier-lake to pass. What might he do? Whither himself betake, His spouse twice ravish'd from him? With what wail
The Manes-with what vow the gods persuade ? She now was floating in the Stygian bark
Death cold. For him, throughout sev'n livelong months,
In order due, beneath a skiey rock,
By desert Strymon's wave, they say he wept, And these his woes 'neath icy caves outpour'd, Soothing the tigers with his minstrel spell, And charming oaks to follow. E'en as 'neath A poplar bow'r, lamenting, Philomel
Wails her lost offspring, whom the ploughman hard
Marking for prey has plunder'd from their nest While callow still. But she the livelong night Weeps on, and perched upon a spray, renews Her piteous dirge, and fills the region wide With melancholy wails. No thought of love, No bridal minstrelsy his spirit swerv'd. Alone the glaciers of the northern zone, And snow-chok'd Tanais, and fields ne'er stripp'd Of frost Riphæan he was wont to pace, His 'reft Eurydice and Pluto's boons
Made profitless bewailing. By which task Of duty spurn'd, the Cicon's matrons midst Rituals of gods, and midnight Bacchus' orgies, Tore the youth limb from limb, and scatter'd him O'er the broad fields. Then also, while his head Pluck'd from his marble neck agrian Hebrus Was rolling, as it bore it down the gulph Of the mid stream-Eurydice, his voice And ice-cold tongue-ah! poor Eurydice, With his fast fleeting breath did still invoke Eurydice, throughout the river's length, The banks re-echoed." Thus far Proteus spoke And with a sudden plunge consign'd himself Into the ocean depths, and where he plung'd, The foaming wave toss'd whirling 'neath his head. But not Cyrene. For uncalled she thus Address'd the youth in terror: "O, my son, It is allowed thee to discharge thy cares Distressful from thy soul. Here of thy plague Lies the whole cause. Hence did the nymphs,
She in the depth of groves the dance pursu❜d, Woful destruction send upon thy bees.
Do thou, in suppliant guise, thy gifts present,
Beseeching peace; and the Napaan maids, Won easily, adore; for they will grant Indulgence to thy vows, and all their ire Remit. But what the fashion of thy pray'r, First will I duly tell. Four chosen bulls
Of passing shape, which now for thee are browsing
The crests of green Lycæum, do thou choose, And heifers full as many, with a neck Untouched by yoke.
For these four altar shrines, Close by the heav'nly maidens' high dom'd fanes Construct, and bid the hallow'd blood gush down From out their necks; and in a leafy grove The heifers' carcases themselves abandon. Then when the ninth Aurora hath display'd Her orient dawn, as fun'ral gifts of Orpheus, Poppies in Lethe steeped thou shalt show'r; Eurydice, now pacified, shalt worship
With slaughter'd calf, and slay an ink-black sheep, And then the grove revisit." No delay; His mother's precepts straight he puts in train; Unto the shrines he comes; the altars rears As bade by her. Four bulls of passing form Pick'd from the herd he leads along, and heifers As many, with a neck by yoke untouch❜d. Then when the ninth Aurora had brought on Her dawnings, Orpheus' funeral gifts he show'rs, And then the grove revisits. Here, in sooth, A prodigy they view, sudden, and full
Of marvel to be told- from the whole womb, Throughout the welt'ring entrails of the kine- Bees whizzing out, and from the riven sides In effervescence swarming—and thick clouds Trailing immense, and streaming now together Upon a tree's high crest, and drooping down A cluster from the lithe elastic boughs:
These strains upon the husbandry of fields, And cattle was I chanting, and on trees While mighty Cæsar at the deep Euphrates Thunders in war, and victor gives his laws O'er states, his willing vassals, and aspires To tread the path to Heav'n. In that same hour Me Virgil, sweet Parthenope was nursing, While I was revelling in the studious arts Of ease unknown to fame-I who did make The shepherd's lays my toys, and in my prime Presumptuous grown, thee, Tityrus, did sing Beneath the spreading beech tree's canopied shade.
Printed by A. SPOTTIS WOODE,
New-Street-Square.
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