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I know a famous Orphic incantation

To make the brand stick of its own accord

Into the skull of this one-eyed Son of Earth.

Ulysses. Of old I knew ye thus by nature; now
I know ye better.-I will use the aid

Of my own comrades.-Yet, though weak of hand,
Speak cheerfully, that so ye may awaken

The courage of my friends with your blithe words.
Chorus. This I will do with peril of my life,
And blind you with my exhortations, Cyclops.
Hasten and thrust!

And parch up to dust
The eye of the beast
Who feeds on his guest.

Burn and blind

The Etnean hind!

Scoop and draw!

But beware lest he claw

Your limbs near his maw.

Cyclops. Ah me! my eyesight is parched up to cinders! Chorus. What a sweet pæan! Sing me that again ! Cyclops. Ah me! indeed, what woe has fallen upon me? But, wretched Nothings, think ye not to flee

Out of this rock! I, standing at the outlet,

Will bar the way, and catch you as you pass.
Chorus. What are you roaring out, Cyclops?
Cyclops.

Chorus. For you are wicked.

Cyclops.

I perish!

And besides miserable.

Chorus. What, did you fall into the fire when drunk?

Cyclops. 'Twas Nobody destroyed me.

[blocks in formation]

Cyclops. I wish you were as blind as I am!
Chorus.

It cannot be that no one made you blind.

Cyclops. You jeer me; where, I ask, is Nobody?
Chorus. No-where, O Cyclops.

Nay,

Cyclops. It was that stranger ruined me !-the wretch
First gave me wine, and then burnt out my eye,

For wine is strong and hard to struggle with.
Have they escaped, or are they yet within?

Chorus. They stand under the darkness of the rock,
And cling to it.

Cyclops.

At my right hand or left?

Chorus. Close on your right.

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Cyclops. Not there, although you say so.
Chorus.

Now they escape you there.

Not on that side.

They creep about you on your left.

Cyclops. Where then?
Chorus.

Cyclops. Ah! I am mocked! They jeer me in my ills.
Chorus. Not there! he is a little there beyond you.

Cyclops. Detested wretch! where are you?
Ulysses.

I keep with care this body of Ulysses.

Far from you

Cyclops. What do you say? You proffer a new name.
Ulysses. My father named me so.

And I have taken

A full revenge for your unnatural feast;

I should have done ill to have burned down Troy,

And not revenged the murder of my comrades.

Cyclops. Ai! ai! the ancient oracle is accomplished; It said that I should have my eyesight blinded

By you coming from Troy; yet it foretold

That you should pay the penalty for this

By wandering long over the homeless sea.

I

Ulysses. I bid thee weep!-Consider what I say;

go towards the shore, to drive my ship

To mine own land o'er the Sicilian wave.

Cyclops. Not so, if whelming you with this huge stone

I can crush you and all your men together!

I will descend upon the shore, though blind,

Groping my way adown the steep ravine.

Chorus. And we, the shipmates of Ulysses now, Will serve our Bacchus all our happy lives.

EPIGRAMS FROM THE GREEK.

1.-SPIRIT OF PLATO.

"EAGLE! why soarest thou above that tomb? To what sublime and star-y-paven home Floatest thou ?”

"I am the image of swift Plato's spirit, Ascending heaven :- Athens does inherit His corpse below."

II.

A MAN who was about to hang himself,
Finding a purse, then threw away his rope;
The owner, coming to reclaim his pelf,

The halter found, and used it. So is hope
Changed for despair-one laid upon the shelf,
We take the other. Under heaven's high cope
Fortune is God: all you endure and do
Depends on circumstance as much as you.

FROM PLATO.

I. TO STELLA.

THOU Wert the Morning Star among the living,
Ere thy fair light had fled ;-

Now, having died, thou art as Hesperus, giving
New splendour to the dead.

II.

KISSING Helena, together

With my kiss, my soul beside it

Came to my lips, and there I kept it,-
For the poor thing had wandered thither,
To follow where the kiss should guide it.
Oh cruel I to intercept it!

FROM MOSCHUS.

Τὰν ὅλα τὰν γλαυκὰν ὅταν ἄνεμος ἀτρέμα βάλλῃ, κ. τ. λ.

I.

WHEN winds that move not its calm surface sweep

The azure sea, I love the land no more:

The smiles of the serene and tranquil deep
Tempt my unquiet mind. But, when the roar

Of ocean's grey abyss resounds, and foam
Gathers upon the sea, and vast waves burst,
I turn from the drear aspect to the home

Of earth and its deep woods, where, interspersed,
When winds blow loud, pines make sweet melody.
Whose house is some lone bark, whose toil the sea,
Whose prey the wandering fish, an evil lot

Has chosen. But I my languid limbs will fling Beneath the plane, where the brook's murmuring Moves the calm spirit but disturbs it not.

II.

PAN loved his neighbour Echo; but that child
Of Earth and Air pined for the Satyr leaping;

The Satyr loved with wasting madness wild

The bright nymph Lyda:-and so the three went weeping. As Pan loved Echo, Echo loved the Satyr ;

The Satyr, Lyda:—and thus love consumed them. And thus to each which was a woful matter

To bear what they inflicted Justice doomed them;
For, in as much as each might hate the lover,

Each, loving, so was hated.-Ye that love not,
Be warned-in thought turn this example over,
That, when ye love, the like return ye prove not.

FROM VIRGIL.

THE TENTH ECLOGUE. [v. 1-26].

MELODIOUS Arethusa, o'er my verse

Shed thou once more the spirit of thy stream: Who denies verse to Gallus? So, when thou Glidest beneath the green and purple gleam Of Syracusan waters, mayst thou flow

Unmingled with the bitter Doric dew! Begin, and, whilst the goats are browzing now The soft leaves, in our way let us pursue The melancholy loves of Gallus. List!

We sing not to the dead: the wild woods knew His sufferings, and their echoes ..

Young Naiads, . . in what far woodlands wild Wandered ye when unworthy love possessed

Your Gallus? Not where Pindus is up-piled, Nor where Parnassus' sacred mount, nor where

1816.

Aonian Aganippe expands

The laurels and the myrtle-copses dim.
The pine-encircled mountain, Mænalus,
The cold crags of Lycæus, weep for him;
And Sylvan, crowned with rustic coronals,
Came shaking in his speed the budding wands
And heavy lilies which he bore: we knew
Pan the Arcadian.

What madness is this, Gallus? Thy heart's care
With willing steps pursues another there.

FROM DANTE.

DANTE ALLIGHIERI TO GUIDO CAVALCANTI-SONNET.

GUIDO, I would that Lapo, thou, and I,

Led by some strong enchantment, might ascend

A magic ship whose charmed sails should fly

With winds at will, where'er our thoughts might wend,-

So that no change nor any evil chance

Should mar our joyous voyage, but it might be

That even satiety should still enhance

Between our hearts their strict community;
And that the bounteous wizard then would place
Vanna and Bice and my gentle love

Companions of our wandering, and would grace
With passionate talk, wherever we might rove,
Our time, and each were as content and free
As I believe that thou and I should be.

THE FIRST CANZONE OF THE CONVITO.

I.

YE who intelligent the Third Heaven move,
Hear the discourse which is within my heart,

Which cannot be declared, it seems so new.

The Heaven whose course follows your power and art,
O gentle creatures that ye are! me drew,
And therefore may I dare to speak to you
Even of the life which now I live,—and yet

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