Then of her gifts to gods not ingrate, nor profiting naught,Promise with silent lip, addressed she timidly vowing.For as an oak that shakes on topmost summit of TaurusIts boughs, or cone-growing pine from bole bark resin exuding,Whirlwind of passing might that twists the stems with its storm-blasts,Uproots, deracinates, forthright its trunk to the farthest,Prone falls, shattering wide what lies in line of its downfall,—Thus was that wildling flung by Theseus and vanquisht of body,Vainly tossing its horns and goring the wind to no purpose.Thence with abounding praise returned he, guiding his footsteps,While a fine drawn thread checked steps in wander abounding,Lest when issuing forth of the winding maze labyrinthineBaffled become his track by inobservable error.But for what cause should I, from early subject digressing,Tell of the daughter who the face of her sire unseeing,Eke her sister's embrace nor less her mother's endearments,Who in despair bewept her hapless child that so gladlyChose before every and each the lively wooing of Theseus?Or how borne by the ship to the yeasting shore-line of DiaCame she? or how when bound her eyes in bondage of slumberLeft her that chosen mate with mind unmindful departing?Often (they tell) with heart inflamed by fiery furyPoured she shrilling of shrieks from deepest depths of her bosom;Now she would sadly scale the broken faces of mountains,Whence she might overglance the boundless boiling of billows,Then she would rush to bestem the salt-plain's quivering waveletAnd from her ankles bare the dainty garment uplifting,Spoke she these words ('tis said) from sorrow's deepest abysses,While from her tear-drencht face outburst cold shivering sobs."Thus from my patrial shore, O traitor, hurried to exile,Me on a lonely strand hast left, perfidious Theseus?Thus wise farest, despite the godhead of Deities spurned,(Reckless, alas!) to your home convoying perjury-curses?Naught, then, ever availed that mind of cruelest counselAlter? No saving grace in you was evermore ready,That to have pity on me vouchsafed your pitiless bosom?Nevertheless not in past time such were the promises wordyLavished; nor such hopes to me the hapless were bidden;But the glad married joys, the longed-for pleasures of wedlock.All now empty and vain, by breath of the breezes bescattered!Now, let woman no more trust her to man when he sweareth,Ne'er let her hope to find or truth or faith in his pleadings,Who when lustful thought forelooks to somewhat attaining,Never an oath they fear, shall spare no promise to promise.Yet no sooner they sate all lewdness and lecherous fancy,Nothing remember of words and reck they naught of fore-swearing.Certes, you did I snatch from midmost whirlpool of ruinDeadly, and held it cheap loss of a brother to sufferRather than fail your need (O false!) at hour the supremest.Therefore my limbs are doomed to be torn of birds, and of feralsPrey, nor shall upheapt Earth afford a grave to my body.Say me, what lioness bare you 'neath lone rock of the desert?What sea spued you conceived from out the spume of his surges!What manner Syrt, what ravening Scylla, what vasty Charybdis?you who for sweet life saved such meeds are lief of returning!If never willed your breast with me to mate you in marriage,Hating the savage law decreed by primitive parent,Still of your competence 'twas within your household to home me,Where I might serve as slave in gladsome service familiar,Laving your snow-white feet in clearest chrystalline watersOr with its purpling gear your couch in company strewing.Yet for what cause should I complain in vain to the winds that unknow me,(I so beside me with grief!) which ne'er of senses enduedHear not the words sent forth nor aught avail they to answer?Now be his course well-nigh engaged in midway of ocean,Nor any mortal shape appears in barrens of sea-wrack.Thus at the latest hour with insults over-sufficientE'en to my plaints fere Fate begrudges ears that would hear me.Jupiter! Lord of All-might, Oh would in days that are bygoneNe'er had Cecropian poops toucht ground at Gnossian foreshore,Nor to the unconquered Bull that tribute direful conveyingHad the false Seaman bound to Cretan island his hawser,Nor had yon evil wight, 'neath shape the softest hard purposeHiding, enjoyed repose within our mansion beguested!Whither can wend I now? What hope lends help to the lost one?Idomenean mounts shall I scale? Ah, parted by whirlpoolsWidest, yon truculent main where yields it power of passage?Aid of my sire can I crave? Whom I willing abandoned,Treading in tracks of a youth bewrayed with blood of a brother!Can I console my soul with the helpful love of a helpmateWho flies me with pliant oars, flies overbounding the sea-depths?Nay, if this Coast I quit, this lone isle lends me no roof-tree,Nor aught issue allows begirt by billows of Ocean:Nowhere is path for flight: none hope shows: all things are silent:All be a desolate waste: all makes display of destruction.Yet never close these eyes in latest languor of dying,Ne'er from my wearied frame go forth slow-ebbing my senses,Ere from the Gods just doom implore I, treason-betrayed,And with my breath supreme firm faith of Celestials invoke I.Therefore, O you who 'venge man's deed with penalties direful,Eumenides! aye wont to bind with viperous hairlocks