Page images
PDF
EPUB

To brood in hedge-rows o'er its humble nest;
And, in remembrance of the former ill,
Avoids the heights, and precipices still.

But fix'd with trembling hands; and as he speaks, | Declines the lofty trees, and thinks it best
The tears roll gently down his aged cheeks:
Then kiss'd, and in his arms embrac'd him fast,
But knew not this embrace must be the last.
And mounting upward, as he wings his flight,
Back on his charge he turns his aching sight;
As parent birds, when first their callow care
Leave the high nest to tempt the liquid air.
Then cheers him on, and oft, with fatal art,
Reminds the stripling to perform his part.

These, as the angler at the silent brook,
Or mountain-shepherd leaning on his crook,
Or gaping ploughman, from the vale descries,
They stare, and view them with religious eyes,
And straight conclude them gods; since none,
they,

but

Through their own azure skies could find a way.
Now Delos, Paros, on the left are seen,
And Samos, favour'd by Jove's haughty queen;
Upon the right, the isle Lebynthos nam'd,
And fair Calymnè for its honey fam'd.
When now the boy, whose childish thoughts aspire
To loftier aims, and make him ramble higher,
Grown wild, and wanton, more embolden'd flies
Far from his guide, and soars among the skies,
The soft'ning wax, that felt a nearer sun,
Dissolv'd apace, and soon began to run.
The youth in vain his melting pinions shakes;
His feathers gone, no longer air he takes.
"Oh! father, father," as he strove to cry,
Down to the sea he tumbled from on high,
And found his fate; yet still subsists by fame,
Among those waters that retain his name.

The father, now no more a father, cries,
"Ho, Icarus! where are you?" as he flies;
"Where shall I seek my boy?" he cries again,
And saw his feathers scatter'd on the main.
Then curs'd his art; and fun'ral rites conferr'd,
Naming the country from the youth interr'd.

A partridge, froin a neighb'ring stump, beheld
The sire his monumental marble build;
Who, with peculiar call, and flutt'ring wing,
Chirpt joyful, and malicious seem'd to sing:
The only bird of all its kind, and late
Transform'd in pity to a feather'd state:
From whence, O Dædalus, thy guilt we date.

[past,

His sister's son, when now twelve years were
Was, with his uncle, as a scholar plac'd;
The unsuspecting mother saw his parts,
And genius fitted for the finest arts.
This soon appear'd; for when the spiny bone
In fishes' backs was by the stripling known,
A rare invention thence he learnt to draw,
Fil'd teeth in ir'n, and made the grating saw.
He was the first, that from a knob of brass [pass;
Made two straight arms with widening stretch to
That, while one stood upon the centre's place,
The other round it drew a circling space.
Dædalus envy'd this, and from the top
Of fair Minerva's temple let him drop;
Feigning, that, as he lean'd upon the tow'r,
Careless he stoop'd too much, and tumbled o'er.
The goddess, who th' ingenious still befriends,
On this occasion her assistance lends;
His arms with feathers, as he fell, she veils,
And in the air a new-inade bird he sails.
The quickness of his genius, once so fleet,
Still in his wings remains, and in his feet: [keeps,
Still, though transform'd, his ancient name he
And with low flight the new-shorn stubble sweeps,

At length, fatigu'd with long laborious flights,
On fair Sicilia's plains the artist lights;
Where Cocalus the king, that gave him aid,
Was, for his kindness, with esteem repaid.
Athens no more her doleful tribute sent,
That hardship galant Theseus did prevent;
Their temples hung with garlands, they adore
Each friendly god, but most Minerva's pow'r:
To her, to Jove, to all, their altars smoke,
They each with victims, and perfumes invoke.
Now talking fame, through every Grecian town,
Had spread, immortal Theseus, thy renown.
From him the neighb'ring nations in distress,
In suppliant terms implore a kind redress.

THE STORY OF MELEAGER AND ATALANTA

By Mr. Dryden.

FROM him the Caledonians sought relief;
Though valiant Meleagrus was their chief.
The cause, a boar, who ravag'd far and near:
Of Cynthia's wrath th' avenging minister.
For Oeneus with autumnal plenty bless'd,
By gifts to Heav'n his gratitude express'd:
Cull'd sheafs, to Ceres; to Lyaus, wine;
To Pan, and Pales, offer'd sheep and kine;
And fat of olives, to Minerva's shrine.
Beginning from the rural gods, his hand
Was lib'ral to the pow'rs of high command:
Each deity in ev'ry kind was bless'd,

Till at Diana's fane th'- invidious honour ceas'd.
Wrath touches ev'n the gods: the queen of

night,

Fir'd with disdain, and jealous of her right,
"Unhonour'd though I am, at least," said she,
"Not unreveng'd that impious act shall be."
Swift as the word, she sped the boar away,
With charge on those devoted fields to prey.
No larger bulls th' Egyptian pastures feed,
And none so large Sicilian meadows breed:
His eye-balls glare with fire suffus'd with blood;
His neck shoots up a thick-set thorny wood;
His bristled back a trench impal'd appears,
And stands erected, like a field of spears;
Froth fills his chaps, he sends a grunting sound,
And part he churns, and part befoams the ground.
For tusks with Indian elephants he strove,
And Jove's own thunder from his mouth he drove,
He burns the leaves; the scorching blast invades
The tender corn, and shrivels up the blades:
Or suff'ring not their yellow beards to rear,
He tramples down the spikes, and intercepts the

year.

In vain the barns expect their promis'd load,
Nor barns at home, nor ricks are heap'd abroad:
In vain the hinds the threshing-floor prepare,
And exercise their flails in empty air.
With olives ever-green the ground is strow'd,
And grapes ungather'd shed their gen'rous blood.
Amid the fold he rages, nor the sheep
Their shepherds, nor the grooms their bulls cau

keep.

From fields to walls the frighted rabble run,
Nor think themselves secure within the town;
Till Meleagrus, and his chosen crew,
Contemn the danger, and the praise pursue.

Fair Leda's twins (in time to stars decreed)
One fought on foot, one curb'd the fiery steed;
Then issu'd forth fam'd Jason after these,
Who mann'd the foremost ship that sail'd the
seas;

Then Theseus join'd with bold Pirithous came;
A single concord in a double name;
The Thestian sons, Idas who swiftly ran,
And Ceneus, once a woman, now a man.
Lynceus, with eagle's eyes, and lion's heart;
Leucippus, with his never-erring dart:
Acastus, Phileus, Phoenix, Telamon,
Echion, Lelix, and Eurytion,

Achilles' father, and great Phocus' son;
Dryas the fierce, and Hippasus the strong:

With twice-old Iolas, and Nestor then but young.
Laertes active, and Ancæus bold;

Mopsus the sage, who future things foretold;
And t'other seer, yet by his wife unsold.
A thousand others of immortal fame;
Among the rest, fair Atalanta came,

Grace of the woods; a diamond buckle bound Her vest behind, that else had flow'd upon the ground,

And show'd her buskin'd legs; her head was bare,
But for her native ornament of hair;
Which in a simple knot was ty'd above,
Sweet negligence! unheeded bait of love!
Her sounding quiver on her shoulder ty'd,
One hand a dart, and one a bow supply'd.
Such was her face, as in a nymph display'd
A fair fierce boy, or in a boy betray'd
The blushing beauties of a modest maid.
The Caledonian chief at once the dame
Bebeld, at once his heart receiv'd the flame,

Echion threw the first, but miss'd his mark, And stuck his boar-spear on a maple's bark. Then Jason; and his javelin seem'd to take, But fail'd with over-force, and whizz'd above bis back.

Mopsus was next; but ere he threw, address'd
To Phoebus thus: "O patron, help thy priest:
If I adore, and ever have ador'd

Thy pow'r divine, thy present aid afford;
That I may reach the beast." The god allow'd
His pray'r, and, smiling, gave him what he could:
He reach'd the savage, but no blood he drew:
Dian unarm'd the javelin, as it flew.

This chaf'd the boar, his nostrils flames expire, And his red eye-balls roll with living fire. Whirl'd from a sling, or from an engine thrown, Amid her foes, so flies a mighty stone,

As flew the beast: the left wing put to flight,
The chiefs o'er-born, he rushes on the right.
Empalamos and Pelagon he laid

[aid.

In dust, and next to death, but for their fellows'
Onesimus far'd worse, prepar'd to fly,
The fatal fang drove deep within his thigh,
And cut the nerves: the nerves no more sustain
The bulk; the bulk unpropp'd, falls headlong on
the plain.

Nestor had fail'd the fall of Troy to see,
But leaning on his lance, he vaulted on a tree;
Then gath'ring up his feet, look'd down with fear,
And thought his monstrous foe was still too near.
Against a stump his trunk the monster grinds,
And in the sharpen'd edge new vigour finds;
Then, trusting to his arms, young Othrys found,
And ranch'd his hips with one continu'd wound.
Now Leda's twins, the future stars, appear;

With Heav'ns averse. "O happy youth," he White were their habits, white their borses were:

cry'd,

"For whom thy fates reserve so fair a bride!"
He sigh'd, and had no leisure more to say;
His honour call'd his eyes another way,
And fore'd him to pursue the now-neglected prey.
There stood a forest on a mountain's brow,
Which over-look'd the shaded plains below.
No sounding axe presum'd those trees to bite;
Ceeval with the world, a venerable sight.
The heroes there arriv'd, some spread around
The toil; some search the footsteps on the ground:
Some from the chains the faithful dogs unbound.
Of action eager, and intent in thought,
The chiefs their honourable danger sought.
A valley stood below; the common drain
Of waters from above, and falling rain:
The bottom was a moist, and marshy ground, -
Whose edges were with bending osiers crown'd.
The knotty bulrush next in order stood,
And all within of reeds a trembling wood.
From hence the boar was rous'd, and sprung
amain,

Like lightning sudden, on the warrior train;
Beats down the trees before him, shakes the ground.
The forest echoes to the crackling sound;
Sbout the fierce youth, and clamours ring around.
All stood with their protended spears prepar'd,
With broad steel heads the brandish'd weapons
glar'd.

The beast impetuous with his tusks aside

Deals glancing wounds; the fearful dogs divide: All spend their mouths aloof, but none abide.

! Amphiaraus,

Conspicuous both, and both in act to throw,
Their trembling lances brandish'd at the foe:
Nor had they miss'd, but he to thickets fled,
Conceal'd from aiming spears, not pervious to the
steed.

But Telamon rush'd in, and happ'd to meet
A rising root, that held his fasten'd feet;
So down he fell, whom, sprawling on the ground,
His brother from the wooden gyves unbound.

Meantime the virgin-huntress was not slow
T" expel the shaft from her contracted bow:
Beneath his ear the fasten'd arrow stood,
And from the wound appear'd the trickling blood.
She blush'd for joy: but Meleagrus rais'd
His voice with loud applause, and the fair archer

prais'd.

He was the first to see, and first to show
His friends the mark of the successful blow.
"Nor shall thy valour want the praises due,"
He said; a virtuous envy seiz'd the crew.
They shout; the shouting animates their hearts,
And all at once employ their thronging darts:
But out of order thrown, in air they join,
And multitude makes frustrate the design.
With both his hands the proud Ancæus takes,
And flourishes, his double-biting axe:
Then, forward to his fate, he took a stride
Before the rest, and to his fellows cry'd,
"Give place, and mark the diff'rence, if you can,
Between a woman warrior, and a man.
The boar is doom'd; nor though Diana lend
Her aid, Diana can her beast defend."
Thus boasted he; then stretch'd, on tiptoe stood,
Secure to make his empty promise good.

But the more wary beast prevents the blow,

And upward rips the groin of his audacious foe.
Ancæus falls; his bowels from the wound
Rush out, and clotted blood distains the ground.
Pirithous, no small portion of the war, [far
Press'd on, and shook his lance: to whom from
Thus Theseus cry'd; "O stay, my better part,
My more than mistress; of my heart, the heart.
The strong may fight aloof; Ancæus try'd
His force too near, and by presuming dy'd."
He said, and while he spake his javelin threw,
Hissing in air th' unerring weapon flew;
But on an arm of oak, that stood betwixt
The marksman and the mark, his lance he fixt.
Once more bold Jason threw, but fail'd to wound
The boar, but slew an undeserving hound,
And thro' the dog the dart was nail'd to ground.
Two spears from Meleager's hand were sent,
With equal force, but various in th' event:
The first was fix'd in earth, the second stood
On the boar's bristled back, and deeply drank

his blood.

Now while the tortur'd savage turns around,
And flings about his foam, impatient of the
wound,

The wound's great author close at hand provokes
His rage, and plies him with redoubled strokes;
Wheels, as he wheels; and with his pointed dart
Explores the nearest passage to his heart.
Quick and more quick he spins his giddy gyres,
Then falls, and in much foam his soul expires.
This act with shouts Heav'n-high the friendly band
Applaud, and strain in theirs the victor's hand.
Then all approach the slain with vast surprise,
Admire on what a breadth of earth he lies,
And scarce secure, reach out their spears afar,
And blood their points to prove their partnership

of war.

[blocks in formation]

My labours, and my part of praise, with thine:"
At this presents her with the tusky head,
And chine, with rising bristles roughly spread.
Glad she receiv'd the gift; and seem'd to take
With double pleasure, for the giver's sake.
The rest were seiz'd with sullen discontent,
And a deaf murmur through the squadron went:
All envy'd; but the Thestyan brethren show'd
The least respect, and thus they vent their spleen
aloud;
[share,
Lay down those honour'd spoils, nor think to
Weak woman as thou art, the prize of war:
Ours is the title, thine a foreign claim,
Since Meleagrus from our lineage came.
Trust not thy beauty; but restore the prize
Which he, besotted on that face, and eyes,
Would rend from us :" at this, inflam'd with spite,-|
From her they snatch the gift, from him the giver's
right.

But soon th' impatient prince his falchion drew,
And cry'd, "Ye robbers of another's due,
Now learn the diff'rence, at your proper cost,
Betwixt true valour, and an empty boast."
At this advanc'd, and sudden as the word,
In proud Plexippus' bosom plung'd the sword:
Toxeus amaz'd, and with amazement slow
Or to revenge, or ward the coming blow,

Stood doubting; and, while doubting thus he stood,
Receiv'd the steel bath'd in his brother's blood.
Pleas'd with the first, unknown the second news,
Althea to the temples pays their dues
For her son's conquest; when at length appear
Her grisly brethren stretch'd upon the bier:
Pale at the sudden sight, she chang'd her cheer,
And with her cheer her robes; but hearing tell
The cause, the manner, and by whom they fell,
'Twas grief no more, or grief and rage were one
Within her soul; at last 'twas rage alone;
Which burning upwards in succession, dries
The tears, that stood consid'ring in her eyes.
There lay a log unlighted on the hearth,
When she was lab'ring in the throes of birth
For th' unborn chief; the fatal sisters came,
And rais'd it up, and toss'd it on the flame:
Then on the rock a scanty measure place
Of vital flax, and turn'd the wheel apace;
And turning sung, "To this red brand and thee,
O new-born babe, we give an equal destiny;"
So vanish'd out of view. The frighted dame
Sprung hasty from her bed, and quench'd the
flame.

The log, in secret lock'd, she kept with care,
And that, while thus preserv'd, preserv'd her heir.
This branch she now produc'd; and first she strows
The hearth with heaps of chips, and after blows:
Thrice heav'd her hand, and heav'd, she thrice
repress'd,

The sister and the mother long contest,
Two doubtful titles, in one tender breast:
And now her eyes and cheeks with fury glow;
Now pale her cheeks, her eyes with pity flow:
Now low'ring looks presage approaching storms,
And now prevailing love her face reforms:
Resolv'd, she doubts again; the tears she dry'd
With burning rage, are by new tears supply'd.
And as a ship, which winds and waves assail,
Now with the current drives, now with the gale,
Both opposite, and neither long prevail:
She feels a double force, by turns obeys
Th' imperious tempest, and th' impetuous seas:
So fares Althæa's mind, she first relents
With pity, of that pity then repents:
Sister and mother long the scales divide,
But the beam nodded on the sister's side.
Sometimes she softly sigh'd, then roar'd aloud;
But sighs were stifled in the cries of blood.

The pious impious wretch at length decreed,
To please her brothers ghost', her son should bleeda
And when the fun'ral flames began to rise,
"Receive," she said, "a sister's sacrifice;
A mother's bowels burn:" high in her hand,
Thus while she spoke, she held the fatal brand;
Then thrice before the kindled pile she bow'd,
And the three furies thrice invok'd aloud:

[ocr errors]

Come, come, revenging sisters, come, and view A sister paying her dead brothers' due: A crime I punish, and a crime commit; But blood for blood, and death for death is fit: Great crimes must be with greater crimes repaid, And second fun'rals on the former laid. Let the whole household in one ruin fall, And may Diana's curse o'ertake us all. Shall fate to happy Oeneus still allow One son, while Thestius stands depriv'd of two? Better three lost, than one unpunish'd go. Take then, dear ghosts, (while yet admitted new In Hell you wait my duty) take your due:

A costly off'ring on your tomb is laid,
When with my blood the price of yours is paid.
"Ab! whither am I hurry'd? Ah! forgive,
Ye shades, and let your sister's issue live;
A mother cannot give him death; though he
Deserves it, he deserves it not from me.

“Then shall th' unpunish'd wretch insult the slain,

Triumphant live, nor only live, but reign;
While you, thin shades, the sport of winds are tost
O'er dreary plains, or tread the burning coast?
I cannot, cannot bear; 'tis past, 'tis done;
Perish this impious, this detested son:
Perish his sire, and perish I withal!
And let the house's heir, and the hop'd kingdom
"Where is the mother fled, her pious love,
And where the pains with which ten months I
strove!

[fall!

Ah! had'st thou dy'd, my son, in infant years, Thy little hearse had been bedew'd with tears.

"Thou liv'st by me; to ine thy breath resign; Mine is the merit, the demerit thine. Thy life by double title I require;

Once giv'n at birth, and once preserv'd from fire:
One murder pay, or add one murder more,
And me to them who fell by thee restore.

"I would, but cannot: my son's image stands Before my sight; and now their angry hands My brothers hold, and vengeance these exact; This pleads compassion, and repents the fact. "He pleads in vain, and I pronounce his doom: My brothers, though unjustly, shall o'ercome. But having paid their injur'd ghosts their due, My son requires my death, and mine shall his pursue."

At this, for the last time, she lifts her hand, Averts her eyes, and, half unwilling, drops the The brand, amid the flaming fuel thrown, [brand. Or drew, or seem'd to draw, a dying groan; The fires themselves but faintly lick'd their prey, Then loath'd their impious food, and would have

shrunk away.

Just then the hero cast a doleful cry, And in those absent flames began to fry: The blind contagion rag'd within his veins; But be with manly patience bore his pains: He fear'd not fate, but only griev'd to die Without an honest wound, and by a death so dry. "Happy Ancæus," thrice aloud he cry'd, "With what becoming fate in arms he dy'd!" Then call'd his brothers, sisters, sire around, And, her to whom his nuptial vows were bound, Perhaps his mother; a long sigh he drew, And, his voice failing, took his last adieu. For as the flames augment, and as they stay At their full height, then languish to decay, They rise and sink by fits; at last they soar In one bright blaze, and then descend no more: Just so his inward heats, at height, impair, Till the last burning breath shoots out the soul in Now lofty Calidon in ruins lies;

[air.

All ages, all degrees unsluice their eyes,
And Heav'n and Earth resound with murmurs,
groans, and cries.

Matrons and maidens beat their breasts, and tear
Their habits, and root up their scatter'd hair:
The wretched father, father now no more,
With sorrow sunk, lies prostrate on the floor,
Deforms his hoary locks with dust obscene, [pain.
And curses age, and loaths a life prolong'd with

By steel her stubborn soul his mother freed,
And punish'd on herself her impious deed.

Had I a hundred tongues, a wit so large
As could their hundred offices discharge;
Had Phoebus all his Helicon bestow'd
In all the streams, inspiring all the god; [vain
Those tongues, that wit, those streams, that god in
Would offer to describe his sisters' pain:
They beat their breasts with many a bruising blow,
Till they turn livid, and corrupt the snow.
The corpse they cherish, while the corpse remains,
And exercise, and rub with fruitless pains;
And when to fun'ral flames 'tis borne away,
They kiss the bed on which the body lay:
And when those fun'ral flames no longer burn,
(The dust compos'd within a pious urn)
Ev'n in that urn their brother they confess,
And bug it in their arms, and to their bosomspress.
His tomb is rais'd; then stretch'd along the
ground,

Those living monuments his tomb surround: Ev'n to his name, inscrib'd, their tears they pay, Till tears and kisses wear his name away.

But Cynthia now had all her fury spent, Not with less ruin than a race content: Excepting Gorgè, perish'd all the seed,. And her whom Heav'n for Hercules decreed, Satiate at last, no longer she pursu'd The weeping sisters; but with wings endu'd, And horny beaks, and sent to flit in air: Who yearly round the tomb in feather'd flocks repair.

THE TRANSFORMATION OF THE NAIADS.

By Mr. Vernon.

THESEUS mean while acquitting well his share In the bold chase confed'rate like a war,

To Athens' lofty tow'rs his march ordain'd,
But Achelous stopp'd him on the way,
By Pallas lov'd, and where Erectheus reign'd.
By rains a deluge, and constrain'd his stay.

"O fam'd for glorious deeds, and great by blood,
Rest here," says he, "nor trust the rapid flood,
It solid oaks has from its margin tore,
And rocky fragments down its current bore,
The murmur hoarse, and terrible the roar.
Forc'd from the banks, and in the torrent roll'd;
Oft have I seen herds with their shelt'ring fold
Nor strength the bulky steer from ruin freed,
Nor matchless swiftness sav'd the racing steed.
In cataracts when the dissolving snow
Falls from the hills, and floods the plains below;
Toss'd by the eddies with a giddy round,
Strong youths are in the sucking whirlpools drown'd.
'Tis best with me in safety to abide,
Till usual bounds restrain the ebbing tide,
And the low waters in their channel glide."
Theseus persuaded, in compliance bow'd;
"So kind an offer, and advice so good,
O Achelous, cannot be refus'd;

I'll use them both," said he; and both he us'd.
The grot he enter'd, pumice-built the hall,
And tophi made the rustic of the wall;
The floor, soft moss a humid carpet spread,
And various sheils the chequer'd roof inlaid.
'Twas now the hour when the declining San
Two-thirds had of his daily journey run;

2 Dejanira,

At the spread table Theseus took his place,
Next his companions in the daring chase:
Pirithous bere, the elder Lelex lay,

His locks betraying age with sprinkled grey.
Acharnia's river-god dispos'd the rest,
Grac'd with the equal honour of the feast,
Elate with joy, and proud of such a guest.
The nymphs were waiters, and with naked feet
In order serv'd the courses of the meat.
The banquet done, delicious wine they brought,
Of one transparent gem the cup was wrought.
Then the great hero of this gallant train,
Surveying far the prospect of the main;
"What is that land," says he," the waves em-
brace?"

(And with his finger pointed at the place ;)
"Is it one parted isle which stands alone?
How nam'd? and yet methinks it seems not one."
To whom the watry god made this reply;
""Tis not one isle, but five; distinct they lie;
'Tis distance which deceives the cheated eye.
But that Diana's act may seem less strange,
These once proud Naiads were, before their change.
'Twas on a day more solema than the rest,
Te builocks slain, a sacrificial feast:
The rural gods of all the region near
They bid to dance, and taste the hallow'd cheer.
Me they forgot: affronted with the slight,
My rage and stream swell'd to the greatest height;
And with the torrent of my flooding store, [tore.
Large woods from woods, and fields from fields I
The guilty nymphs, Oh! then, rememb'ring me,
I, with their country, wash'd into the sea;
And joining waters with the social main,
Rent the gross land, and split the firm champain.
Since, the Echinades, remote from shore,
Are view'd as many isles, as nymphs before.

PERIMELE TURNED INTO AN ISLAND.
"BUT yonder far, lo, yonder does appear
An isle, a part to me for ever dear,
From that (it sailors Perimele name)
I doting, forc'd by rape a virgin's fame.
Hippodamas's passion grew so strong,
Gall'd with th' abuse, and fretted at the wrong,
He cast his pregnant daughter from a rock;
1 spread my waves beneath, and broke the shock;
And as her swimming weight my stream convey'd,
I su'd for help divine, and thus I pray'd:

O pow'rful thou, whose trident does command The realm of waters, which surround the land; We sacred rivers, wheresoe'er begun, End in thy lot, and to thy empire run. With favour hear, and help with present aid; Her whom I bear 'twas guilty I betray'd. Yet if her father had been just, or mild, He would have been less impious to his child; In her, have pity'd force in the abuse; In me, admitted love for my excuse. O let relief for her hard case be found, Her, whom paternal rage expell'd from ground, Her whom paternal rage relentless drown'd. Grant her some place, or change her to a place, Which I may ever clasp with my embrace,'

And as accretions of new-cleaving soil

Inlarg'd the mass, the nymph became an isle."

THE STORY OF BAUCIS AND PHILEMON.
By Mr. Dryden.

THUS Achelous ends: his audience hear
With admiration, and admiring fear

The pow'rs of Heav'n; except Ixion's son,
Who laugh'd at all the gods, believ'd in none:
He shook his impious head, and thus replies;
"These legends are no more than pious lies:
You attribute too much to heav'nly sway,
To think they gave us forms, and take away."

The rest of better minds their sense declar'd
Against this doctrine, and with horrour heard.
Then Lelex rose, an old experienc'd man,
And thus with sober gravity began;
Heav'n's pow'r is infinite: earth, air, and sea,
The manufacture mass, the making pow'r obey:
By proof to clear your doubt; in Phrygian ground
Two neighb'ring trees, with walls encompass'd
round,

Stand on a mod'rate rise, with wonder shown,
One a hard oak, a softer linden one:

I saw the place, and them, by Pittheus sent
To Phrygian realis; my grandsire's government.
Not far from thence is seen a lake, the haunt
Of coots, and of the fishing cormorant:
Here Jove with Hermes came; but in disguise
Of mortal men conceal'd their deities;
One laid aside his thunder, one his rod;
And many toilsome steps together trod:
For harbour at a thousand doors they knock'd,
Not one of all the thousand but was lock'd.
At last a hospitable house they found,

A homely shed; the roof, not far from ground,
Was thatch'd with reeds and straw, together

bound.

There Baucis and Philemon liv'd, and there
Had liv'd long marry'd, and a happy pair:
Now old in love, though little was their store,
Inur'd to want, their poverty they bore,
Nor aim'd at wealth, professing to be poor.
For master, or for servant here to call,
Was all alike, where only two were all.
Command was none, where equal love was paid,
Or rather both commanded, both obey'd.

"From lofty roofs the gods repuls'd before,
Now stooping, enter'd through the little door:
The man (their hearty welcome first express'd)
A common settle drew for either guest,
Inviting each his weary limbs to rest.
But ere they sat, officious Baucis lays
Two cushions stuff'd with straw, the seat to raise;
Coarse, but the best she had: then rakes the load
Of ashes from the hearth, and spreads abroad
The living coals; and, lest they should expire,
With leaves and bark she feeds her infant fire:
It smokes; and then with trembling breath she
blows,

[these,

Till in a cheerful blaze the flames arose.
With brush-wood, and with chips she strengthens
And adds at last the boughs of rotten trees.
The fire thus form'd, she sets the kettle on,

"His nodding head the sea's great ruler,bent,
And all his waters shook with his assent. [trest,(Like burnish'd gold the little seether shone)

The nymph still swam, tho' with the fright dis-
I felt her heart leap trembling in her breast;
But hard'ning soon, whilst I her pulse explore,
A crusting earth cas'd her stiff body o'er;

Next took the coleworts which her husband got From his own ground, (a small well-water'd spot;) She stripp'd the stalks of all their leaves; the best She cull'd, and them with handy care she drest.

H

« PreviousContinue »