A spreading bay is there, impregnableto all invading storms; and Aetna's throatwith roar of frightful ruin thunders nigh.Now to the realm of light it lifts a cloudof pitch-black, whirling smoke, and fiery dust,shooting out globes of flame, with monster tonguesthat lick the stars; now huge crags of itself,out of the bowels of the mountain torn,its maw disgorges, while the molten rockrolls screaming skyward; from the nether deepthe fathomless abyss makes ebb and flow.Enceladus, his body lightning-scarred,lies prisoned under all, so runs the tale:o'er him gigantic Aetna breathes in firefrom crack and seam; and if he haply turnto change his wearied side, Trinacria's isletrembles and moans, and thick fumes mantle heaven.That night in screen and covert of a grovewe bore the dire convulsion, unawarewhence the loud horror came. For not a starits lamp allowed, nor burned in upper skythe constellated fires, but all was gloom,and frowning night confined the moon in cloud. When from the eastern waves the light of mornbegan to peer, and from the upper skyAurora flamed away the dark and dew,out of the forest sprang a startling shapeof hunger-wasted misery; a manin wretched guise, who shoreward came with handsoutstretched in supplication. We turned backand scanned him well. All grime and foulness he,with long and tangled beard, his savage garbfastened with thorns; but in all else he seemeda Greek, and in his country's league of armssent to the seige of Troy. Then he beheldthe Dardan habit, and our Trojan steel,he somewhat paused, as if in dread dismaysuch sight to see, and falteringly moved;but soon with headlong steps he sought the shore,ejaculating broken sobs and prayers:“By stars above! By gods on high! O, hear!By this bright heavenly air we mortals breathe,save me, sweet Trojans! Carry me awayunto what land ye will! I ask no more.I came, I know it, in the ships of Greece;and I did war, 't is true, with Ilium's gods.O, if the crime deserve it, fling my corseon yonder waves, and in the boundless brinesink me forever! Give me in my deaththe comfort that by human hands I die.”He clasped our knees, and writhing on his ownclung fast. We bid him tell his race and name,and by what fate pursued. Anchises gavehis own right hand in swift and generous aid,and by prompt token cheered the exile's heart,who, banishing his fears, poured forth this tale :— “My home was Ithaca, and I partookthe fortunes of Ulysses evil-starred.My name is Achemenides, my sirewas Adamastus, and I sailed for Troy,being so poor,—O, that I ne'er had changethe lot I bore! In yon vast Cyclops' cavemy comrades, flying from its gruesome door,left me behind, forgotten. 'T is a houseof gory feasts of flesh, 't is deep and dark,and vaulted high. He looms as high as heaven;I pray the blessed gods to rid the earthof the vile monster! None can look on him,none speak with him. He feeds on clotted goreof disembowelled men. These very eyessaw him seize two of our own company,and, as he lolled back in the cave, he clutchedand dashed them on the stones, fouling the floorwith torrent of their blood; myself I saw himcrunch with his teeth the dripping, bloody limbsstill hot and pulsing on his hungry jaw.But not without reward! For such a sightUlysses would not brook, and Ithaca
forgot not in such strait the name he bore.For soon as, gorged with feasting and o'ercomewith drunken slumber, the foul giant laysprawled through the cave, his head dropped helpless down,disgorging as he slept thick drool of goreand gobbets drenched with bloody wine; then we,calling on Heaven and taking place by lot,drew round him like one man, and with a beamsharpened at end bored out that monster eye,which, huge and sole, lay under the grim brow,round as an Argive shield or Phoebus' star.Thus took we joyful vengeance for the shadesof our lost mates. But, O ill-fated men!Fly, I implore, and cut the cables freealong the beach! For in the land abide,like Polyphemus, who in hollow cavekept fleecy sheep, and milked his fruitful ewes,a hundred other, huge as he, who rovewide o'er this winding shore and mountains fair:Cyclops accursed, bestial! Thrice the moonhas filled her horns with light, while here I dwellin lonely woods and lairs of creatures wild;or from tall cliffs out-peering I discernthe Cyclops, and shrink shuddering from the soundof their vast step and cry. My sorry fareis berries and hard corners dropped from trees,or herb-roots torn out from the niggard ground.Though watching the whole sea, only today Have I had sight of ships. To you I fled.Whate'er ye be, it was my only prayerto 'scape that monster brood. I ask no more.O, set me free by any death ye will!” He scarce had said, when moving o'er the crestof a high hill a giant shape we saw:that shepherd Polyphemus, with his flocksdown-wending to the well-known water-side;huge, shapeless, horrible, with blinded eye,bearing a lopped pine for a staff, he madehis footing sure, while the white, fleecy sheep,sole pleasure now, and solace of his woes,ran huddling at his side.Soon to the vast flood of the level brinehe came, and washed the flowing gore awayfrom that out-hollowed eye; he gnashed his teeth,groaning, and deep into the watery waystalked on, his tall bulk wet by scarce a wave.We fled in haste, though far, and with us borethe truthful suppliant; cut silentlythe anchor-ropes, and, bending to the oar,swept on with eager strokes clean out to sea.Aware he was, and toward our loud halloowhirled sudden round; but when no power had heto seize or harm, nor could his fierce pursuito'ertake the Ionian surges as they rolled,he raised a cry incredible; the seawith all its billows trembled; the wide shoreof Italy from glens and gorges moaned,and Aetna roared from every vaulted cave. Then rallied from the grove-clad, Iofty islethe Cyclops' clan, and lined the beach and bay.We saw each lonely eyeball glare in vain,as side by side those brothers Aetna-bornstood towering high, a conclave dark and dire:as when, far up some mountain's famous crest,wind-fronting oaks or cone-clad cypresseshave made assembling in the solemn hills,Jove's giant wood or Dian's sacred grove.We, terror-struck, would fly we knew not where,with loosened sheet and canvas swelling strongbefore a welcome wind; but Helenusbade us both Scylla and Charybdis fear,where 'twixt the twain death straitly hems the way;and so the counsel was to veer our barkthe course it came. But lo! a northern galeburst o'er us from Pelorus' narrowed side,and on we rode far past Pantagia's bayof unhewn rock, and past the haven strongof Megara, and Thapsus Iying low.Such were the names retold, and such the shoresshown us by Achemenides, whose fatemade him familiar there, for he had sailedwith evil-starred Ulysses o'er that sea. Off the Sicilian shore an island lies,wave-washed Plemmyrium, called in olden daysOrtygia; here Alpheus, river-god,from Elis flowed by secret sluice, they say,beneath the sea, and mingles at thy mouth,fair Arethusa! with Sicilian waves.Our voices hailed the great gods of the landwith reverent prayer; then skirted we the shore,where smooth Helorus floods the fruitful plain.Under Pachynus' beetling precipicewe kept our course; then Camarina rosein distant view, firm-seated evermoreby Fate's decree; and that far-spreading valeof Gela, with the name of power it takesfrom its wide river; and, uptowering far,the ramparts of proud Acragas appeared,where fiery steeds were bred in days of old.Borne by the winds, along thy coast I fled,Selinus, green with palm! and past the shoreof Lilybaeum with its treacherous reef;till at the last the port of Drepanum
received me to its melancholy strand.Here, woe is me I outworn by stormful seas,my sire, sole comfort of my grievous doom,Anchises ceased to be. O best of sires!Here didst thou leave me in the weary way;through all our perils—O the bitter loss! —borne safely, but in vain. King Helenus,whose prophet-tongue of dark events foretold,spoke not this woe; nor did Celeno's curseof this forebode. Such my last loss and pain;such, of my weary way, the destined goal.From thence departing, the divine behestimpelled me to thy shores, O listening queen! Such was, while all gave ear, the tale sublimefather Aeneas, none but he, set forthof wanderings and of dark decrees divine:silent at last, he ceased, and took repose.