Metamorphoses
Ovid
Ovid. Metamorphoses. More, Brookes, translator. Boston: Cornhill Publishing Co., 1922.
- When Pyramus and Thisbe, who were known
- the one most handsome of all youthful men,
- the other loveliest of all eastern girls,—
- lived in adjoining houses, near the walls
- that Queen Semiramis had built of brick
- around her famous city, they grew fond,
- and loved each other—meeting often there—
- and as the days went by their love increased.
- They wished to join in marriage, but that joy
- their fathers had forbidden them to hope;
- and yet the passion that with equal strength
- inflamed their minds no parents could forbid.
- No relatives had guessed their secret love,
- for all their converse was by nods and signs;
- and as a smoldering fire may gather heat,
- the more 'tis smothered, so their love increased.
- Now, it so happened, a partition built
- between their houses, many years ago,
- was made defective with a little chink;
- a small defect observed by none, although
- for ages there; but what is hid from love?
- Our lovers found the secret opening,
- and used its passage to convey the sounds
- of gentle, murmured words, whose tuneful note
- passed oft in safety through that hidden way.
- There, many a time, they stood on either side,
- thisbe on one and Pyramus the other,
- and when their warm breath touched from lip to lip,
- their sighs were such as this: “Thou envious wall
- why art thou standing in the way of those
- who die for love? What harm could happen thee
- shouldst thou permit us to enjoy our love?
- But if we ask too much, let us persuade
- that thou wilt open while we kiss but once:
- for, we are not ungrateful; unto thee
- we own our debt; here thou hast left a way
- that breathed words may enter loving ears.,”
- so vainly whispered they, and when the night
- began to darken they exchanged farewells;
- made presence that they kissed a fond farewell
- vain kisses that to love might none avail.
- When dawn removed the glimmering lamps of night,
- and the bright sun had dried the dewy grass
- again they met where they had told their love;
- and now complaining of their hapless fate,
- in murmurs gentle, they at last resolved,
- away to slip upon the quiet night,
- elude their parents, and, as soon as free,
- quit the great builded city and their homes.
- Fearful to wander in the pathless fields,
- they chose a trysting place, the tomb of Ninus,
- where safely they might hide unseen, beneath
- the shadow of a tall mulberry tree,
- covered with snow-white fruit, close by a spring.
- All is arranged according to their hopes:
- and now the daylight, seeming slowly moved,
- sinks in the deep waves, and the tardy night
- arises from the spot where day declines.
- Quickly, the clever Thisbe having first
- deceived her parents, opened the closed door.
- She flitted in the silent night away;
- and, having veiled her face, reached the great tomb,
- and sat beneath the tree; love made her bold.
- There, as she waited, a great lioness
- approached the nearby spring to quench her thirst:
- her frothing jaws incarnadined with blood
- of slaughtered oxen. As the moon was bright,
- Thisbe could see her, and affrighted fled
- with trembling footstep to a gloomy cave;
- and as she ran she slipped and dropped her veil,
- which fluttered to the ground. She did not dare
- to save it. Wherefore, when the savage beast
- had taken a great draft and slaked her thirst,
- and thence had turned to seek her forest lair,
- she found it on her way, and full of rage,
- tore it and stained it with her bloody jaws:
- but Thisbe, fortunate, escaped unseen.
- Now Pyramus had not gone out so soon
- as Thisbe to the tryst; and, when he saw
- the certain traces of that savage beast,
- imprinted in the yielding dust, his face
- went white with fear; but when he found the veil
- covered with blood, he cried; “Alas, one night
- has caused the ruin of two lovers! Thou
- wert most deserving of completed days,
- but as for me, my heart is guilty! I
- destroyed thee! O my love! I bade thee come
- out in the dark night to a lonely haunt,
- and failed to go before. Oh! whatever lurks
- beneath this rock, though ravenous lion, tear
- my guilty flesh, and with most cruel jaws
- devour my cursed entrails! What? Not so;
- it is a craven's part to wish for death!”
- So he stopped briefly; and took up the veil;
- went straightway to the shadow of the tree;
- and as his tears bedewed the well-known veil,
- he kissed it oft and sighing said, “Kisses
- and tears are thine, receive my blood as well.”
- And he imbrued the steel, girt at his side,
- deep in his bowels; and plucked it from the wound,
- a-faint with death. As he fell back to earth,
- his spurting blood shot upward in the air;
- so, when decay has rift a leaden pipe
- a hissing jet of water spurts on high.—
- By that dark tide the berries on the tree
- assumed a deeper tint, for as the roots
- soaked up the blood the pendent mulberries
- were dyed a purple tint.
- Thisbe returned,
- though trembling still with fright, for now she thought
- her lover must await her at the tree,
- and she should haste before he feared for her.
- Longing to tell him of her great escape
- she sadly looked for him with faithful eyes;
- but when she saw the spot and the changed tree,
- she doubted could they be the same, for so
- the colour of the hanging fruit deceived.
- While doubt dismayed her, on the ground she saw
- the wounded body covered with its blood;—
- she started backward, and her face grew pale
- and ashen; and she shuddered like the sea,
- which trembles when its face is lightly skimmed
- by the chill breezes;—and she paused a space;—
- but when she knew it was the one she loved,
- she struck her tender breast and tore her hair.
- Then wreathing in her arms his loved form,
- she bathed the wound with tears, mingling her grief
- in his unquenched blood; and as she kissed
- his death-cold features wailed; “Ah Pyramus,
- what cruel fate has taken thy life away?
- Pyramus! Pyramus! awake! awake!
- It is thy dearest Thisbe calls thee! Lift
- thy drooping head! Alas,”—At Thisbe's name
- he raised his eyes, though languorous in death,
- and darkness gathered round him as he gazed.
- And then she saw her veil; and near it lay
- his ivory sheath—but not the trusty sword
- and once again she wailed; “Thy own right hand,
- and thy great passion have destroyed thee!—
- And I? my hand shall be as bold as thine—
- my love shall nerve me to the fatal deed—
- thee, I will follow to eternity—
- though I be censured for the wretched cause,
- so surely I shall share thy wretched fate:—
- alas, whom death could me alone bereave,
- thou shalt not from my love be reft by death!
- And, O ye wretched parents, mine and his,
- let our misfortunes and our pleadings melt
- your hearts, that ye no more deny to those
- whom constant love and lasting death unite—
- entomb us in a single sepulchre.
- “And, O thou tree of many-branching boughs,
- spreading dark shadows on the corpse of one,
- destined to cover twain, take thou our fate
- upon thy head; mourn our untimely deaths;
- let thy fruit darken for a memory,
- an emblem of our blood.” No more she said;
- and having fixed the point below her breast,
- she fell on the keen sword, still warm with his red blood.
- But though her death was out of Nature's law
- her prayer was answered, for it moved the Gods
- and moved their parents. Now the Gods have changed
- the ripened fruit which darkens on the branch:
- and from the funeral pile their parents sealed
- their gathered ashes in a single urn.
- So ended she; at once Leuconoe
- took the narrator's thread; and as she spoke
- her sisters all were silent.
- “Even the Sun
- that rules the world was captive made of Love.
- My theme shall be a love-song of the Sun.
- 'Tis said the Lord of Day, whose wakeful eye
- beholds at once whatever may transpire,
- witnessed the loves of Mars and Venus. Grieved
- to know the wrong, he called the son of Juno,
- Vulcan, and gave full knowledge of the deed,
- showing how Mars and Venus shamed his love,
- as they defiled his bed. Vulcan amazed,—
- the nimble-thoughted Vulcan lost his wits,
- so that he dropped the work his right hand held.
- But turning from all else at once he set
- to file out chains of brass, delicate, fine,
- from which to fashion nets invisible,
- filmy of mesh and airy as the thread
- of insect-web, that from the rafter swings.—
- Implicit woven that they yielded soft
- the slightest movement or the gentlest touch,
- with cunning skill he drew them round the bed
- where they were sure to dally. Presently
- appeared the faithless wife, and on the couch
- lay down to languish with her paramour.—
- Meshed in the chains they could not thence arise,
- nor could they else but lie in strict embrace,—
- cunningly thus entrapped by Vulcan's wit.—
- At once the Lemnian cuckold opened wide
- the folding ivory doors and called the Gods,—
- to witness. There they lay disgraced and bound.
- I wot were many of the lighter Gods
- who wished themselves in like disgraceful bonds.—
- The Gods were moved to laughter: and the tale
- was long most noted in the courts of Heaven.
- The Cytherean Venus brooded on
- the Sun's betrayal of her stolen joys,
- and thought to torture him in passion's pains,
- and wreak requital for the pain he caused.
- Son of Hyperion! what avails thy light?
- What is the profit of thy glowing heat?
- Lo, thou whose flames have parched innumerous lands,
- thyself art burning with another flame!
- And thou whose orb should joy the universe
- art gazing only on Leucothea's charms.
- Thy glorious eye on one fair maid is fixed,
- forgetting all besides. Too early thou
- art rising from thy bed of orient skies,
- too late thy setting in the western waves;
- so taking time to gaze upon thy love,
- thy frenzy lengthens out the wintry hour!
- And often thou art darkened in eclipse,
- dark shadows of this trouble in thy mind,
- unwonted aspect, casting man perplexed
- in abject terror. Pale thou art, though not
- betwixt thee and the earth the shadowous moon
- bedims thy devious way. Thy passion gives
- to grief thy countenance—for her thy heart
- alone is grieving—Clymene and Rhodos,
- and Persa, mother of deluding Circe,
- are all forgotten for thy doting hope;
- even Clytie, who is yearning for thy love,
- no more can charm thee; thou art so foredone.
- Leucothea is the cause of many tears,
- Leucothea, daughter of Eurynome,
- most beauteous matron of Arabia's strand,
- where spicey odours blow. Eurynome
- in youthful prime excelled her mother's grace,
- and, save her daughter, all excelled besides.
- Leucothea's father, Orchamas was king
- where Achaemenes whilom held the sway;
- and Orchamas from ancient Belus' death
- might count his reign the seventh in descent.
- The dark-night pastures of Apollo's steeds
- are hid below the western skies; when there,
- and spent with toil, in lieu of nibbling herbs
- they take ambrosial food: it gives their limbs
- restoring strength and nourishes anew.
- Now while these coursers eat celestial food
- and Night resumes his reign, the god appears
- disguised, unguessed, as old Eurynome
- to fair Leucothea as she draws the threads,
- all smoothly twisted from her spindle. There
- she sits with twice six hand-maids ranged around,
- and as the god beholds her at the door
- he kisses her, as if a child beloved
- and he her mother. And he spoke to her:
- “Let thy twelve hand-maids leave us undisturbed,
- for I have things of close import to tell,
- and seemly, from a mother to her child.”,
- so when they all withdrew the god began,
- “Lo, I am he who measures the long year;
- I see all things, and through me the wide world
- may see all things; I am the glowing eye
- of the broad universe! Thou art to me
- the glory of the earth!” Filled with alarm,
- from her relaxed fingers she let fall
- the distaff and the spindle, but, her fear
- so lovely in her beauty seemed, the God
- no longer brooked delay: he changed his form
- back to his wonted beauty and resumed
- his bright celestial. Startled at the sight
- the maid recoiled a space; but presently
- the glory of the god inspired her love;
- and all her timid doubts dissolved away;
- without complaint she melted in his arms.
- So ardently the bright Apollo loved,
- that Clytie, envious of Leucothea's joy,
- where evil none was known, a scandal made;
- and having published wide their secret love,
- leucothea's father also heard the tale.
- Relentlessly and fierce, his cruel hand
- buried his living daughter in the ground,
- who, while her arms implored the glowing Sun,
- complained. “For love of thee my life is lost.”
- And as she wailed her father sowed her there.
- Hyperion's Son began with piercing heat
- to scatter the loose sand, a way to open,
- that she might look with beauteous features forth
- too late! for smothered by the compact earth,
- thou canst not lift thy drooping head; alas!
- A lifeless corse remains.
- No sadder sight
- since Phaethon was blasted by the bolt,
- down-hurled by Jove, had ever grieved the God
- who daily drives his winged steeds. In vain
- he strives with all the magic of his rays
- to warm her limbs anew. — The deed is done—
- what vantage gives his might if fate deny?
- He sprinkles fragrant nectar on her grave,
- and lifeless corse, and as he wails exclaims,
- “But naught shall hinder you to reach the skies.”
- At once the maiden's body, steeped in dews
- of nectar, sweet and odourate, dissolves
- and adds its fragrant juices to the earth:
- slowly from this a sprout of Frankincense
- takes root in riched soil, and bursting through
- the sandy hillock shows its top.
- No more
- to Clytie comes the author of sweet light,
- for though her love might make excuse of grief,
- and grief may plead to pardon jealous words,
- his heart disdains the schemist of his woe;
- and she who turned to sour the sweet of love,
- from that unhallowed moment pined away.
- Envious and hating all her sister Nymphs,
- day after day,—and through the lonely nights,
- all unprotected from the chilly breeze,
- her hair dishevelled, tangled, unadorned,
- she sat unmoved upon the bare hard ground.
- Nine days the Nymph was nourished by the dews,
- or haply by her own tears' bitter brine;—
- all other nourishment was naught to her.—
- She never raised herself from the bare ground,
- though on the god her gaze was ever fixed;—
- she turned her features towards him as he moved:
- they say that afterwhile her limbs took root
- and fastened to the around.
- A pearly white
- overspread her countenance, that turned as pale
- and bloodless as the dead; but here and there
- a blushing tinge resolved in violet tint;
- and something like the blossom of that name
- a flower concealed her face. Although a root
- now holds her fast to earth, the Heliotrope
- turns ever to the Sun, as if to prove
- that all may change and love through all remain.
- Thus was the story ended. All were charmed
- to hear recounted such mysterious deeds.
- While some were doubting whether such were true
- others affirmed that to the living Gods
- is nothing to restrain their wondrous works,
- though surely of the Gods, immortal, none
- accorded Bacchus even thought or place.
- When all had made an end of argument,
- they bade Alcithoe take up the word:
- she, busily working on the pendent web,
- still shot the shuttle through the warp and said;
- “The amours of the shepherd Daphnis, known
- to many of you, I shall not relate;
- the shepherd Daphnis of Mount Ida, who
- was turned to stone obdurate, for the Nymph
- whose love he slighted—so the rivalry
- of love neglected rouses to revenge:
- neither shall I relate the story told
- of Scython, double-sexed, who first was man,
- then altered to a woman: so I pass
- the tale of Celmus turned to adamant,
- who reared almighty Jove from tender youth:
- so, likewise the Curetes whom the rain
- brought forth to life: Smilax and Crocus, too,
- transpeciated into little flowers:
- all these I pass to tell a novel tale,
- which haply may resolve in pleasant thoughts.
- Learn how the fountain, Salmacis, became
- so infamous; learn how it enervates
- and softens the limbs of those who chance to bathe.
- Although the fountain's properties are known,
- the cause is yet unknown. The Naiads nursed
- an infant son of Hermes, surely his
- of Aphrodite gotten in the caves
- of Ida, for the child resembled both
- the god and goddess, and his name was theirs.
- The years passed by, and when the boy had reached
- the limit of three lustrums, he forsook
- his native mountains; for he loved to roam
- through unimagined places, by the banks
- of undiscovered rivers; and the joy
- of finding wonders made his labour light.
- Leaving Mount Ida, where his youth was spent,
- he reached the land of Lycia, and from thence
- the verge of Caria, where a pretty pool
- of soft translucent water may be seen,
- so clear the glistening bottom glads the eye:
- no barren sedge, no fenny reeds annoy,
- no rushes with their sharpened arrow-points,
- but all around the edges of that pool
- the softest grass engirdles with its green.
- A Nymph dwells there, unsuited to the chase,
- unskilled to bend the bow, slothful of foot,
- the only Naiad in the world unknown
- to rapid-running Dian. Whensoever
- her Naiad sisters pled in winged words,
- “Take up the javelin, sister Salmacis,
- take up the painted quiver and unite
- your leisure with the action of the chase;”
- she only scorned the javelin and the quiver,
- nor joined her leisure to the active chase.
- Rather she bathes her smooth and shapely limbs;
- or combs her tresses with a boxwood comb,
- Citorian; or looking in the pool
- consults the glassed waters of effects
- increasing beauty; or she decks herself
- in gauzy raiment, and reposing lolls
- on cushioned leaves, or grass-enverdured beds;
- or gathers posies from the spangled lawns.
- Now, haply as she culled the sweetest flowers
- she saw the youth, and longing in her heart
- made havoc as her greedy eyes beheld.
- Although her love could scarcely brook delay,
- she waited to enhance her loveliness,
- in beauty hoping to allure his love.
- All richly dight she scanned herself and robes,
- to know that every charm should fair appear,
- and she be worthy: wherefore she began:
- “O godlike youth! if thou art of the skies,
- thou art no other than the god of Love;
- if mortal, blest are they who gave thee birth;
- happy thy brother; happy, fortunate
- thy sister; happy, fortunate and blest
- the nurse that gave her bosom; but the joys
- surpassing all, dearest and tenderest,
- are hers whom thou shalt wed. So, let it be
- if thou so young have deigned to marry, let
- my joys be stolen; if unmarried, join
- with me in wedlock.” So she spoke, and stood
- in silence waiting for the youth's reply.
- He knows nor cares for love—with loveliness
- the mounting blushes tinge his youthful cheeks,
- as blush-red tint of apples on the tree,
- ripe in the summer sun, or as the hue
- of painted ivory, or the round moon
- red-blushing in her splendour, when the clash
- of brass resounds in vain. And long the Nymph
- implored; almost clung on his neck, as smooth
- and white as ivory; unceasingly
- imploring him to kiss her, though as chaste
- as kisses to a sister; but the youth
- outwearied, thus:
- “I do beseech you make
- an end of this; or must I fly the place
- and leave you to your tears?” Affrighted then
- said Salmacis, “To you I freely give—
- good stranger here remain.” Although she made
- fair presence to retire, she hid herself,
- that from a shrub-grown covert, on her knees
- she might observe unseen.
- As any boy
- that heedless deems his mischief unobserved,
- now here now there, he rambled on the green;
- now in the bubbly ripples dipped his feet,
- now dallied in the clear pool ankle-deep;—
- the warm-cool feeling of the liquid then,
- so pleased him, that without delay he doffed
- his fleecy garments from his tender limbs.
- Ah, Salmacis, amazement is thy meed!
- Thou art consumed to know his naked grace!
- As the hot glitters of the round bright sun
- collected, sparkle from the polished plate,
- thine eyes are glistened with delirious fires.
- Delay she cannot; panting for his joy,
- languid for his caressing, crazed, distract,
- her passion difficult is held in check.—
- He claps his body with his hollow palms
- and lightly vaults into the limped wave,
- and darting through the water hand over hand
- shines in the liquid element, as though
- should one enhance a statue's ivorine,
- or glaze the lily in a lake of glass.
- And thus the Naiad, “I have gained my suit;
- his love is mine,—is mine!” Quickly disrobed,
- she plunged into the yielding wave—seized him,
- caressed him, clung to him a thousand ways,
- kissed him, thrust down her hands and touched his breast:
- reluctant and resisting he endeavours
- to make escape, but even as he struggles
- she winds herself about him, as entwines
- the serpent which the royal bird on high
- holds in his talons; —as it hangs, it coils
- in sinuous folds around the eagle's feet;—
- twisting its coils around his head and wings:
- or as the ivy clings to sturdy oaks;
- or as the polypus beneath the waves,
- by pulling down, with suckers on all sides,
- tenacious holds its prey. And yet the youth,
- descendant of great Atlas, not relents
- nor gives the Naiad joy. Pressing her suit
- she winds her limbs around him and exclaims,
- “You shall not scape me, struggle as you will,
- perverse and obstinate! Hear me, ye Gods!
- Let never time release the youth from me;
- time never let me from the youth release!”
- Propitious deities accord her prayers:
- the mingled bodies of the pair unite
- and fashion in a single human form.
- So one might see two branches underneath
- a single rind uniting grow as one:
- so, these two bodies in a firm embrace
- no more are twain, but with a two-fold form
- nor man nor woman may be called—Though both
- in seeming they are neither one of twain.
- When that Hermaphroditus felt the change,
- so wrought upon him by the languid fount,
- considered that he entered it a man,
- and now his limbs relaxing in the stream
- he is not wholly male, but only half,—
- he lifted up his hands and thus implored,
- albeit with no manly voice; “Hear me
- O father! hear me mother! grant to me
- this boon; to me whose name is yours, your son;
- whoso shall enter in this fount a man
- must leave its waters only half a man.”
- Moved by the words of their bi-natured son
- both parents yield assent: they taint the fount
- with essences of dual-working powers.
- Now though the daughters of King Minyas
- have made an end of telling tales, they make
- no end of labour; for they so despise
- the deity, and desecrate his feast.
- While busily engaged, with sudden beat
- they hear resounding tambourines; and pipes
- and crooked horns and tinkling brass renew,
- unseen, the note; saffron and myrrh dissolve
- in dulcet odours; and, beyond belief,
- the woven webs, dependent on the loom,
- take tints of green, put forth new ivy leaves,
- or change to grape-vines verdant. There the thread
- is twisted into tendrils, there the warp
- is fashioned into many-moving leaves—
- the purple lends its splendour to the grape.
- And now the day is past; it is the hour
- when night ambiguous merges into day,
- which dubious owns nor light nor dun obscure;
- and suddenly the house begins to shake,
- and torches oil-dipped seem to flare around,
- and fires a-glow to shine in every room,
- and phantoms, feigned of savage beasts, to howl.—
- Full of affright amid the smoking halls
- the sisters vainly hide, and wheresoever
- they deem security from flaming fires,
- fearfully flit. And while they seek to hide,
- a membrane stretches over every limb,
- and light wings open from their slender arms.
- In the weird darkness they are unaware
- what measure wrought to change their wonted shape.
- No plumous vans avail to lift their flight,
- yet fair they balance on membraneous wing.
- Whenever they would speak a tiny voice,
- diminutive, apportioned to their size,
- in squeaking note complains. Adread the light,
- their haunts avoid by day the leafy woods,
- for sombre attics, where secure they rest
- till forth the dun obscure their wings may stretch
- at hour of Vesper;—this accords their name.
- Throughout the land of Thebes miraculous
- the power of Bacchus waxed; and far and wide
- Ino, his aunt, reported the great deeds
- by this divinity performed. Of all
- her sisters only she escaped unharmed,
- when Fate destroyed them, and she knew not grief—
- only for sorrow of her sisters' woes.—
- While Ino vaunted of her mother-joys,
- and of her kingly husband, Athamas,
- and of the mighty God, her foster-child;
- Juno, disdaining her in secret, said;
- “How shall the offspring of a concubine
- transform Maeonian mariners, overwhelm
- them in the ocean, sacrifice a son
- to his deluded mother, who insane,
- tears out his entrails; how shall he invent
- wings for three daughters of King Minyas,
- while Juno unavenged, bewails despite?—
- Is it the end? the utmost of my power?
- His deeds instruct the way; true wisdom heeds
- an enemy's device; by the strange death
- of Pentheus, all that madness could perform
- was well revealed to all; what then denies
- a frenzy may unravel Ino's course
- to such a fate as wrought her sisters' woe?”
- A shelving path in shadows of sad yew
- through utter silence to the deep descends,
- infernal, where the languid Styx exhales
- vapours; and there the shadows of the dead,
- descend, after they leave their sacred urns,
- and ghostly forms invade: and far and wide,
- those dreary regions Horror and bleak Cold
- obtain.
- The ghosts, arrived, not know the way,—
- which leadeth to the Stygian city-gates,—
- not know the melancholy palace where
- the swarthy Pluto stays, though streets and ways
- a thousand to that city lead, and gates
- out-swing from every side: and as the sea
- with never-seen increase engulfs the streams
- unnumbered of the world, that realm enfolds
- the souls of men, nor ever is it filled.
- Around the shadowy spirits go; bloodless
- boneless and bodiless; they throng the place
- of judgment, or they haunt the mansion where
- abides the Utmost Tyrant, or they tend
- to various callings, as their whilom way; —
- appropriate punishment confines to pain
- the multitude condemned.
- To this abode,
- impelled by rage and hate, from habitation
- celestial, Juno, of Saturn born, descends,
- submissive to its dreadful element.
- No sooner had she entered the sad gates,
- than groans were uttered by the threshold, pressed
- by her immortal form, and Cerberus
- upraising his three-visaged mouths gave vent
- to triple-barking howls.—She called to her
- the sisters, Night-begot, implacable,
- terrific Furies. They did sit before
- the prison portals, adamant confined,
- combing black vipers from their horrid hair.
- When her amid the night-surrounding shades
- they recognized, those Deities uprose.
- O dread confines! dark seat of wretched vice!
- Where stretched athwart nine acres, Tityus,
- must thou endure thine entrails to be torn!
- O Tantalus, thou canst not touch the wave,
- and from thy clutch the hanging branches rise!
- O Sisyphus, thou canst not stay the stone,
- catching or pushing, it must fall again!
- O thou Ixion! whirled around, around,
- thyself must follow to escape thyself!
- And, O Belides, (plotter of sad death
- upon thy cousins) thou art always doomed
- to dip forever ever-spilling waves!
- When that the daughter of Saturnus fixed
- a stern look on those wretches, first her glance
- arrested on Ixion; but the next
- on Sisyphus; and thus the goddess spoke;—
- “For why should he alone of all his kin
- suffer eternal doom, while Athamas,
- luxurious in a sumptuous palace reigns;
- and, haughty with his wife, despises me.”
- So grieved she, and expressed the rage of hate
- that such descent inspired, beseeching thus,
- no longer should the House of Cadmus stand,
- so that the sister Furies plunge in crime
- overweening Athamas.—Entreating them,
- she mingled promises with her commands.—
- When Juno ended speech, Tisiphone,
- whose locks entangled are not ever smooth,
- tossed them around, that backward from her face
- such crawling snakes were thrown;—then answered she:
- “Since what thy will decrees may well be done,
- why need we to consult with many words?
- Leave thou this hateful region and convey
- thyself, contented, to a better realm.”
- Rejoicing Juno hastens to the clouds—
- before she enters her celestial home,
- Iris, the child of Thaumas, purifies
- her limbs in sprinkled water.
- Waiting not,
- Tisiphone, revengeful, takes a torch;—
- besmeared with blood, and vested in a robe,
- dripping with crimson gore, and twisting-snakes
- engirdled, she departs her dire abode—
- with twitching Madness, Terror, Fear and Woe:
- and when she had arrived the destined house,
- the door-posts shrank from her, the maple doors
- turned ashen grey: the Sun amazed fled.
- Affrighted, Athamas and Ino viewed
- and fled these prodigies; but suddenly
- that baneful Fury stood across the way,
- blocking the passage— There she stands with arms
- extended, and alive with twisting vipers.—
- She shakes her hair; the moving serpents hiss;
- they cling upon her shoulders, and they glide
- around her temples, dart their fangs, and vomit
- corruption.—Plucking from the midst two snakes,
- she hurls them with her pestilential hand
- upon her victims, Athamas and Ino, whom,
- although the vipers strike upon their breasts,
- no injury attacks their mortal parts;—
- only their minds are stricken with wild rage,
- inciting to mad violence and crime.
- And with a monstrous composite of foam—
- once gathered from the mouth of Cerberus,
- the venom of Echidna, purposeless
- aberrances, crimes, tears, hatred—the lust
- of homicide, and the dark vapourings
- of foolish brains; a liquid poison, mixed,
- and mingled with fresh blood, in hollow brass,
- and boiled, and stirred up with a slip of hemlock—
- she took of it, and as they trembled, threw
- that mad-mixed poison on them; and it scorched
- their inmost vitals—and she waved her torch
- repeatedly, within a circle's rim—
- and added flame to flame.—
- Then, confident
- of having executed her commands,
- the Fury hastened to the void expanse
- where Pluto reigns, and swiftly put aside
- the serpents that were wreathed around her robes.
- At once, the son of Aeolus, enraged,
- shouts loudly in his palace; “Ho, my lads!
- Spread out your nets! a savage lioness
- and her twin whelps are lurking in the wood;—
- behold them!” In his madness he believes
- his wife a savage beast. He follows her,
- and quickly from her bosom snatches up
- her smiling babe, Learchus, holding forth
- his tiny arms, and whirls him in the air,
- times twice and thrice, as whirls the whizzing sling,
- and dashes him in pieces on the rocks; —
- cracking his infant bones.
- The mother, roused
- to frenzy (who can tell if grief the cause,
- or fires of scattered poison?) yells aloud,
- and with her torn hair tangled, running mad,
- she carries swiftly in her clutching arms,
- her little Melicerta! and begins
- to shout, “Evoe, Bacche!”—Juno hears
- the shouted name of Bacchus, and she laughs,
- and taunts her;—“Let thy foster-child award!”
- There is a crag, out-jutting on the deep,
- worn hollow at the base by many waves,
- where not the rain may ripple on that pool;—
- high up the rugged summit overhangs
- its ragged brows above the open sea:
- there, Ino climbs with frenzy-given strength,
- and fearless, with her burden in her arms,
- leaps in the waves where whitening foams arise.
- Venus takes pity on her guiltless child,
- unfortunate grand-daughter, and begins
- to soothe her uncle Neptune with these words;—
- “O Neptune, ruler of the deep, to whom,
- next to the Power in Heaven, was given sway,
- consider my request! Open thy heart
- to my descendants, which thine eyes behold,
- tossed on the wild Ionian Sea! I do implore thee,
- remember they are thy true Deities—
- are thine as well as mine—for it is known
- my birth was from the white foam of thy sea;—
- a truth made certain by my Grecian name.”
- Neptune regards her prayer: he takes from them
- their mortal dross: he clothes in majesty,
- and hallows their appearance. Even their names
- and forms are altered; Melicerta, changed,
- is now Palaemon called, and Ino, changed,
- Leucothoe called, are known as Deities.
- When her Sidonian attendants traced
- fresh footprints to the last verge of the rock,
- and found no further vestige, they declared
- her dead, nor had they any doubt of it.
- They tore their garments and their hair—and wailed
- the House of Cadmus— and they cursed at Juno,
- for the sad fate of the wretched concubine.
- That goddess could no longer brook their words,
- and thus made answer, “I will make of you
- eternal monuments of my revenge!”
- Her words were instantly confirmed—The one
- whose love for Ino was the greatest, cried;
- “Into the deep; look—look—I seek my queen.”
- But even as she tried to leap, she stood
- fast-rooted to the ever-living rock;
- another, as she tried to beat her breast
- with blows repeated, noticed that her arms
- grew stiff and hard; another, as by chance,
- was petrified with hands stretched over the waves:
- another could be seen, as suddenly
- her fingers hardened, clutching at her hair
- to tear it from the roots.—And each remained
- forever in the posture first assumed.—
- But others of those women, sprung from Cadmus,
- were changed to birds, that always with wide wings
- skim lightly the dark surface of that sea.
- Unwitting that his daughter and his son
- are Ocean deities, Agenor's son,—
- depressed by sorrow and unnumbered woes,
- calamities, and prodigies untold,—
- the founder fled the city he had built,
- as though fatalities that gathered round
- that city grieved him deeper than the fate
- of his own family; and thence, at last
- arrived the confines of Illyria;
- in exile with his wife.—
- Weighted with woe,
- bowed down with years, their minds recalled the time
- when first disaster fell upon their House:—
- relating their misfortunes, Cadmus spoke;
- “Was that a sacred dragon that my spear
- impaled, when on the way from Sidon's gates
- I planted in the earth those dragon-teeth,
- unthought-of seed? If haply 'tis the Gods,
- (whose rage unerring, gives me to revenge)
- I only pray that I may lengthen out,
- as any serpent.” Even as he spoke,
- he saw and felt himself increase in length.
- His body coiled into a serpent's form;
- bright scale's enveloped his indurate skin,
- and azure macules in speckled pride,
- enriched his glowing folds; and as he fell
- supinely on his breast, his legs were joined,
- and gradually tapered as a serpent's tail.—
- Some time his arms remained, which stretching forth
- while tears rolled down his human face, not changed
- as yet, he said; “Hither, O hapless one!
- Come hither my unhappy wife, while aught
- is left of manhood; touch me, take my hand,
- unchanged as yet—ah, soon this serpent-form
- will cover me!”
- So did he speak, nor thought
- to make an end; but suddenly his tongue
- became twin-forked. As often as he tried,
- a hissing sound escaped; the only voice
- that Nature left him. —
- And his wife bewailed,
- and smote her breast, “Ah, Cadmus, ah!
- Most helpless one, put off that monster-shape!
- Your feet, your shoulders and your hands are gone;
- your manly form, your very colour gone; all—all
- is changed!—Oh, why not, ye celestial Gods,
- me likewise, to a serpent-shape transform!”—
- So ended her complaint. Cadmus caressed
- her gently with his tongue; and slid to her
- dear bosom, just as if he knew his wife;
- and he embraced her, and he touched her neck.
- All their attendants, who had seen the change,
- were filled with fear; but when as crested snakes
- the twain appeared in brightly glistening mail,
- their grief was lightened: and the pair, enwreathed
- in twisting coils, departed from that place,
- and sought a covert in the nearest grove.—
- There, then, these gentle serpents never shun
- mankind, nor wound, nor strike with poisoned fangs;
- for they are always conscious of the past.