He saw, and languish'd for the virgin's love,
With many an artful blandishment he strove
Her flight to hinder, and her fears remove.
The more he sues, the more she wings her flight,
And nimbly gains a neighb'ring mountain's height.
Steep shelving to the margin of the flood,

A neighb'ring mountain bare and woodless stood;
Here, by the place secur'd, her steps she stay'd,
And, trembling still, her lover's form survey'd.
His shape, his hue, her troubled sense appall,
And dropping locks that o'er his shoulders fall;
She sees his face divine, and manly brow,
End in a fish's wreathy tail below:
She sees, and doubts within her anxious mind,
Whether he comes of god, or monster kind.
This Glaucus soon perceiv'd; and, "Oh! forbear"
(His hand supporting on a rock lay near) [fear.
"Forbear," he cry'd, "fond maid, this needless
Nor fish am 1, nor monster of the main,
But equal with the wat'ry gods I reign;
Nor Proteus, nor Palæmon me excel,
Nor he whose breath inspires the sounding shell.
My birth, 'tis true, I owe to mortal race,
And I myself but late a mortal was:
Ev'n then in seas, and seas alone, I joy'd;
The seas my hours, and all my cares employ'd.
In meshes now the twinkling prey I drew;
Now skilfully the slender line I threw,
And silent sat the moving float to view.
Not far from shore, there lies a verdant mead,
With herbage half, and half with water spread :
There, nor the horned heifers browsing stray,
Nor shaggy kids, nor wanton lambkins play;
There, nor the sounding bees their nectar cull,
Nor rural swains their genial chaplets pull,
Nor flocks, nor herds, nor mowers haunt the place,
To crop the flow'rs, or cut the bushy grass:
Thither sure first of living race came I,
And sat by chance, my dropping nets to dry.
My scaly prize, in order all display'd,
By number on the greensward there I laid.
My captives, whom or in my nets I took,
Or hung unwary on my wily hook,
Strange to behold! yet what avails a lie?
I saw them bite the grass, as I sat by;
Then sudden darting o'er the verdant plain,
They spread their fins, as in their native main :
I paus'd with wonder struck, while all my prey
Left their new master, and regain'd the sea.
Amaz'd, within my secret self I sought,
What god, what herb the miracle had wrought:
But sure no herbs have pow'r like this,' I cry'd;
And straight I pluck'd some neighb'ring herbs, and
try'd.

Scarce had I bit, and prov'd the wond'rous taste,
When strong convulsions shook my troubled breast;
I felt my heart grow fond of something strange,
And my whole nature lab'ring with a change.
Restless I grew, and ev'ry place forsook,
And still upon the seas I bent my look.

Farewell for ever! farewell, land!' I said;
And plung'd amidst the waves my sinking head.
The gentle pow'rs, who that low empire keep,
Receiv'd me as a brother of the deep;
To Tethys, and to Ocean old, they pray
To purge my mortal earthy parts away.
The wat'ry parents to their suit agreed,

And thrice nine times a secret charm they read,
Then with lustrations purify my limbs,
And bid me bathe beneath a hundred streams:

A hundred streams from various fountains run,
And on my head at once come rushing down.
Thus far each passage I remember well,
And faithfully thus far the tale I tell ;
But then oblivion dark on all my senses fell.
Again at length my thoughts reviving came,
When I no longer found myself the same;
Then first this sea-green beard 1 felt to grow,
And these large honours on my spreading brow;
My long-descending locks the billows sweep,
And my broad shoulders cleave the yielding deep;
My fishy tail, my arms of azure hue,
And ev'ry part divinely chang'd, I viewv.
But what avail these useless honours now?
What joys can immortality bestow?
What though our Nereids all my form approve?
What boots it, while fair Scylla scorns my love?"
Thus far the god; and more he would have said;
When from his presence flew the ruthless maid.
Stung with repulse, in such disdainful sort,
He seeks Titanian Circe's horrid court.

OVID'S METAMORPHOSES.
BOOK XIV.

Translated by Sir Samuel Garth, M. D.

THE TRANSFORMATION OF SCYLLA.
Now Glaucus, with a lover's haste, bounds o'er
The swelling waves, and seeks the Latian shore.
Messena, Rhegium, and the barren coast
Of flaming Etna, to his sight are lost:
At length he gains the Tyrrhene seas, and views
The hills where baneful philtres Circe brews;
Monsters in various forms around her press;
As thus the god salutes the sorceress.

"O Circe, be indulgent to my grief,
And give a love-sick deity relief.
Too well the mighty pow'r of plants I know,
To those my figure and new fate I owe.
Against Messena, on th' Ausonian coast,
I Sylla view'd, and from that hour was lost.
In tend'rest sounds I su'd; but still the fair
Was deaf to vows, and pitiless to pray'r.
If numbers can avail, exert their pow'r ;
Or energy of plants, if plants have more.
I ask no cure; let but the virgin pine
With dying pangs, or agonies, like mine."

No longer Circe could her flame disguise, But to the suppliant god marine replies: "When maids are coy, have manlier aims ia view;

Leave those that fly, but those that like, pursue,
If love can be by kind compliance won;
See, at your feet, the daughter of the Sun."
"Sooner," said Glaucus," shall the ash remove
From mountains, and the swelling surges love;
Or humble sea-weed to the hills repair;
Ere I think any but my Scylla fair."

Straight Circe reddens with a guilty shame,
And vows revenge for her rejected flame.
Fierce liking oft a spite as fierce creates;
For love refus'd, without aversion, hates.
To hurt her hapless rival she proceeds;
And, by the fall of Scylla, Glaucus bleeds.

Some fascinating bev'rage now she brews;
Compos'd of deadly drugs, and baneful juice.
At Rhegium she arrives; the ocean braves,
And treads with unwet feet the boiling waves.

Upon the beach a winding bay there lies,
Shelter'd from seas, and shaded from the skies:
This station Scylla chose: a soft retreat
From chilling winds, and raging Cancer's heat.
The vengeful sorc'ress visits this recess;"
Her charm infuses, and infects the place.
Soon as the nymph wades in, her nether parts
Turn into dogs; then at herself she starts,
A ghastly horrour in her eyes appears;
But yet she knows not who it is she fears:
In vain she offers from herself to run;
And drags about her what she strives to shun.
Oppress'd with grief the pitying god appears;
And swells the rising surges with his tears;
From the detested sorceress he flies;
Her art reviles, and her address denies:
Whilst hapless Scylla, chang'd to rocks, decrees
Destruction to those barks, that beat the seas.

THE VOYAGE OF ENEAS CONTINUED.

HERE bulg'd the pride of fam'd Ulysses' fleet,
But good Æneas 'scap'd the fate he met.
As to the Latian shore the Trojan stood,
And cut with well-tim'd oars the foaming flood:
He weat' er'd fell Charybdis: but cre long
The skies were darken'd, and the t mpest strong.
Then to the Libyan coast he stretches o'er;
And makes at length the Carthaginian shore.
Here Dido, with an hospitable care,
Into her heart receives the wanderer.
From her kind arms th' ungrateful hero flies;
The injur'd queen looks on with dying eyes,
Then to her folly falls a sacrifice.

Eneas now sets sail, and plying gains
Fair Eryx, where his friend Acestes reigns:
First to his sire does fun'ral rites decree,
Then gives the signal n xt, and stands to sea;
Out-runs the islands where volcanoes roar;
Gets clear of Sirens, and their faithless shore:
But loses Palinurus in the way;
Then makes Inarime, and Prochyta.

THE TRANSFORMATION OF CERCOPIANS INTO APES.

THE gallies now by Pythecusa pass;
The name is from the natives of the place.
The father of the gods, detesting lies,
Oft, with abhorrence, heard their perjuries.
Th' abandon'd race, transform'd to beasts, began
To mimic the impertinence of man.

Fiat-nos'd, and furrow'd; with grimace they grin;
And look, to what they were, too near akin:
Merry in make, and busy to no end;
This moment they divert, the next offend:
So much this species of their past retains;
Though lost the language, yet the noise remains.

ENEAS DESCENDS TO HELL.

New, on his right, he leaves Parthenope:
His left, Misenus jutting in the sea:
Arrives at Cuma, and with awe survey'd
The grotto of the venerable maid:
Begs leave through black Avernus to retire;
And view the much-lov'd manes of his sire.
Straight the divining virgin rais'd her eyes;
And, foaming with a holy rage, replies:

"O thou, whose worth thy wond'rous works
proclaim;

The flames, thy piety; the world, thy fame;

Though great be thy request, yet shalt thou see
Th' Elysian fields, th' infernal monarchy;
Thy parent's shade: this arm thy steps shall
To suppliant virtue nothing is deny'd," [quide:

She spoke, and pointin to the golden bough,
Which in th' Avernian grove refulgent grow,
"Seize that," she bids; he listens to the maid;
Then views the mournful mansions of the dead;
The shade of great Anchises, and the place
By fat s determin'd to the Trojan race.

As back to upper light the hero came, He thus salutes the visionary dame :— "O, whether some propitious deity, Or lov'd by these bright rulers of the sky! With grateful incense I shall style you one, And doom no godbead greater than your own. 'Twas you restor❜d me from the realms of night, And gave me to behold the fields of light: To feel the breezes of congenial air; And Nature's blest benevolence to share."

THE STORY OF THE SIBYL.

"I AM no deity," replied the dame, "But n.ortai, and religious rites disclaim. Yet had avoided Death's tyrannic sway, Had I consented to the god of day. With promises he sought my love, and said, Have all you wish, my fair Cumaan maid.' I paus'd; then pointing to a heap of sand, For ev'ry grain, to live a year, demand. But ab! unmindful of th' effect of time, Forgot to covenant for youth, and prime. The smiling loom, I boasted once, is gone, And feeble age with lagging limbs creeps on. Sev'n cent'ries have I liv'd; three more fulfil The period of the years to fish still. Who'il think, that Phoebus, diest in youth divine, Had once believ'd his lustre less than mine? This wither'd frame (so fates have will'd) shall

waste

To nothing, but prophetic words, at last."

The Sibyl mounting now from nether skies,
And the fam'd Ilian prince, at Cuma rise.
He sail'd, and near the place to anchor came,
Since call'd Cajeta from his nurse's name.
Here did the luckless Macareus, a friend
To wise Ulysses, his long labours end.
Here, wand'ring, Achæmenides he meets,
And, sud len, thus his late associate greets.
"Whence came you here, O friend, and whi
ther bound?

All gave you lost on far Cyclopean ground;
A Greek's at last aboard a Trojan found."

THE ADVENTURES OF ACHÆMENIDES. THUS Achæmenides: "With thanks I name Eneas, and his piety proclaim. I 'scap'd the Cyclops through the hero's aid, Else in his maw my mangled limbs had laid. When first your navy under sail he found, He rav'd, till Etna labour'd with the sound. Raging he stalk'd along the mountain's side, And vented clouds of breath at ev'ry stride. His staff a mountain ash; and in the clouds Oft, as he walks, his grisly front he shrowds. Eyeless he grop'd about with vengeful haste, And justled promontories, as he pass'd. Then heav'd a rock's high summit to the main, And bellow'd, like some bursting hurricane.

Oh! could I seize Ulysses in his flight, How 'unlamented were my loss of sight! [vein. These jaws should piece-meal tear each panting Grind ev'ry crackling bone, and pound his brain.' As thus he rav'd, my joints with horrour shook; The tide of blood my chilling heart forsook. 1 saw him once disgorge huge morsels raw, Of wretches un ligested in his maw. From the pale breathless trunks whole limbs he Hs beard all clotted with o'erflowing gore. My anxious hours 1 pass'd in caves; my food Was forest fruits, and wildings of the wood. At length a sail I wafted, and aboard

My fortune found an hospitable lord.

[tore,

Now, in return, your own adventures tell, And what, since first you put to sea, befel.”

THE ADVENTURES OF MACAREUS.

[fame

THEN Macareus-"There reign'd a prince of
O'er Tuscan seas, and Æolus his uame.
A largess to Ulysses he consign'd,
And in a steer's tough hide enclos'd a wind.
Nine days before the swelling gale we ran ;
The tenth, to make the meeting land, began;
When now the merry mariners, to find
Imagiu'd wealth within, the bag unbind.
Forthwith out-rush'd a gust, which backwards
Our gallies to the Læstrigonian shore,
Whose crown Antiphates the tyrant wore.
Some few commission'd were with speed to treat:
We to his court repair, his guards we meet.
Two, friendly flight preserv'd; the third was
doom'd

To be by those curs'd cannibals consum'd.
Inhumanly our hapless friends they treat;
Our men they murder, and destroy our flect.
In time the wise Ulysses bore away,
And dropp'd his anchor in yon faithless bay.
The thoughts of perils past we still retain,
And fear to land, till lots appoint the men.
Polites true, Elpenor giv'n to wine,
Eurylochus, myself, the lots assign.
Design'd for dangers, and resolv'd to dare,
To Circe's fatal palace we repair.

THE ENCHANTMENTS OF CIRCE.

[bore

"BEFORE the spacious front, a herd we find Of beasts, the fiercest of the savage kind, Our trembling steps with blandishments they meet,

And fawn, unlike their species, at our feet.
Within, upon a sumptuous throne of state,
On golden columns rais'd, th' enchantress sate.
Rich was her robe, and amiable her mien,
Her aspect awful, and she look’d a queen,
Her maids not mind the loom, nor houshold care,
Nor wage in needle-work a Scythian war.
But cull in canisters disastrous flow'rs,
And plants from haunted heaths, and fairy bow'rs,
With brazen sickles reap'd at planetary hours.
Each dose the goddess weighs with watchful eye;
So nice her art in impious pharmacy!
Ent'ring she greets us with a gracious look,
And airs, that future amity bespoke.
Her ready nymphs serve up a rich repast;
The bowl she dashes first, then gives to taste.
Quick, to our own undoing, we comply;
Her pow'r we prove, and show the sorcery.

"Soon, in a length of face, our head extends;
Our chine stiff bristles bears, and forward bends:
A breadth of brawn new burnishes our neck;
Anon we grunt, as we begin to speak.
Alone Eurylochus refus'd to taste,

Nor to a beast obscene the man debas'd.
Hither Ulysses hastes (so fates command)
Aud bears the pow'rful moly in his band;
Unsheaths his scimetar, assaults the dame,
Preserves his species, and remains the same.
The nuptial rite this outrage straight attends;
The dow'r desir'd is his transfigur'd friends.
The incantation backward she repeats,
Inverts her rod, and what she did, defeats.
"And now our skin grows smooth, our shape
upright;

Our arms stretch up, our cloven feet unite.
With tears our weeping gen'ral we embrace;
Hang on his neck, and m It upon his face.
Twelve silver moons in Circe's court we stay,
Whilst there they waste th' unwilling hours away.
'Twas here I spy'd a youth in Parian stone;
His head a pecker bore; the cause unknown
To passengers. A nymph of Circe's train
The myst'ry thus attempted to explain.

THE STORY OF PICUS AND CANENS. "PICUS, who once th' Ausonian sceptre held, Could rein the steed, and fit him for the field; So like he was to what you see, that still We doubt if real, or the sculptor's skill. The graces in the finish'd piece you find, Are but the copy of his fairer mind. Four lustres scarce the royal youth could name, Till ev'ry love sick nymph confess'd a flame. Oft for his love the mountain Dryads su'd, And ev'ry silver sister of the flood: Those of Numicus, Aibula, and those Where Almo creeps, and hasty Nar o'erflows: Where sedgy Anio glides through smiling meads, Where shady Farfar rustles in the reeds: And those that love the lakes, and homage owe To the chaste goddess of the silver bow.

"In vain each nymph her brightest charms put His heart no sov'reign would obey but one; [on, She whom Venilia, on mount Palatine, To Janus bore, the fairest of her line. Nor did her face alone her charins confess, Her voice was ravishing, and pleas'd no less. Whene'er she sung, so melting were her strains, The flocks unfed seem'd list'ning on the plains; The rivers would stand still, the cedars bend, And birds neglect their pinions to attend; The savage kind in forest-wilds grow tame; And Canens, from her heav'nly voice, her name. Hymen had now in some ill-fated hour Their hands united, as their hearts before. Whilst their soft moments in delights they waste, And each new day was dearer than the past; Picus would sometimes o'er the forests rove, And mingle sports with intervals of love. It chanc'd, as once the foaming boar he chas'd, His jewels sparkling on his Tyrian vest, Lascivious Circe well the youth survey'd, As simpling on the flow'ry hills she stray'd. Her wishing eyes their silent message teil, And from her lap the verdant mischief fell. As she attempts at words, his courser springs O'er hills, and lawns, and ev'n a wish outwings.

dame,

If plants have pow'r, and spells be not a name.' She said and forthwith form'd a boar of air, That sought the covert with dissembled fear. Swift to the thicket Picus wings his way On foot, to chase the visionary prey.

"Now she invokes the daughters of the night, Does noxious juices smear, and charms recite; Such as can veil the Moon's more feeble fire, Or shade the golden lustre of her sire.

In filthy fogs she hides the cheerful noon;
The guard at distance, and the youth alone,
By those fair eyes,' she cries, and ev'ry grace
That finish all the wonders of your face,
Oh! I conjure thee, hear a queen complain;
Nor let the Sun's soft lineage sue in vain.'
"Whoe'er thou art,' reply'd the king, 'forbear,
None can my passion with my Canens share.
She first my ev'ry tender wish possest,
And found the soft approaches to my breast.
In nuptials blest, cach loose desire we shun,
Nor time can end, what innocence begun.'

Think not,' she cry'd,' to saunter out a life,
Of form, with that domestic drudge, a wife;
My just revenge, dull fool, ere long shall show
What ills we women, if refus'd, can do :
Think me a woman, and a lover too.
From dear successful spite we hope for ease,
Nor fail to punish, where we fail to please.'

"Now twice to east she turns, as oft to west; Thrice waves her wand, as oft a charm exprest. On the lost youth her magic pow'r she tries; Aloft he springs, and wonders how he flies. On painted plumes the woods he seeks, and still The monarch oak he pierces with his bill. Thus chang'd no more o'er Latian lands he reigns; Of Picus nothing but the name remains. [air,

the

"The winds from drisling damps now purge The mist subsides, the settling skies are fair: The court their sovereign seek with arms in hand, They threaten Circe, and their lord demand. Quick she invokes the spirits of the air, And twilight elves, that on dun wings repair To charnels, and th' unhallow'd sepulchre.

"Now, strange to tell, the plants sweat drops of blood,

The trees are toss'd from forests where they stood;
Blue serpents o'er the tainted herbage slide,
Pale glaring spectres on the ether ride;
Dogs howl, earth yawns, rent rocks forsake their
beds,

And from their quarries heave their stubborn heads.
The sad spectators stiffen'd with their fears
She sees, and sudden ev'ry limb she smears;
Then each of savage beasts the figure bears.
"The Sun did now to western waves retire,
In tides to temper his bright world of fire.
Canens laments her royal husband's stay;
Ill suits fond love with absence, or delay.
Where she commands, her ready people run;
She wills, retracts; bids, and forbids anon.
Restless in mind, and dying with despair,
Her breasts she beats, and tears her flowing hair.
Six days and nights she wanders on, as chance
Directs, without or sleep, or sustenance.
Tiber at last beholds the weeping fair;
Her feeble limbs no more the mourner bear;
Stretch'd on his banks, she to the flood complains,
And faintly tunes her voice to dying strains.

And, as she droops, her elegy she sings.
Ere long sad Canens wastes to air; whilst fame
The place stili honours with her hapless name.
"Here did the tender tale of Picus cease,
Above belief the wonder 1 confess.
Again we sail, but more disasters meet,
Foretold by Circe, to our suff'ring fleet.
Myself unable further woes to bear,
Declin'd the voyage, and am refug'd here.",

ENEAS ARRIVES IN ITALY.

THUS Macareus. Now with a pious aim
Had good Æneas rais'd a fun'ral flame,
In honour of his hoary nurse's name.
Her epitaph he fix'd; and setting sail,
Cajeta left, and catch'd at ev'ry gale.

He steer'd at distance from the faithless shore,
Where the false goddess reigns with fatal pow'r;
And sought those grateful groves, that shade the
Where Tiber rolls majestic to the main,
And fattens, as he runs, the fair campain.

[plain,

With fair Lavinia, and Latinus' throne :
His kindred gods the hero's wishes crown
But not without a war the prize he won.
Drawn up in bright array the battle stands:
Turnus with arms his promis'd wife demands.
Hetrurians, Latians, equal fortune share;
And doubtful long appears the face of war.
Both pow'rs from neighb'ring princes seek sup-
And embassies appoint for new allies. [plies,
Æneas, for relief, Evander moves;
His quarrel he asserts, his cause approves.
The bold Rutiliaus, with an equal speed,
Sage Venulus dispatch to Diomede.
The king, late griefs revolving in his mind,
These reasons for neutrality assign'd.

"Shall I, of one poor dotal town possest,
My people thin, my wretched country waste?
An exii'd prince, and on a shaking throne;
Or risk my patron's subjects, or my own?
You'll grieve the harshness of our hap to hear;
Nor can I tell the tale without a tear.

THE ADVENTURES OF DIOMEDES. "AFTER fam'd Ilium was by Argives won, And flames had finish'd what the sword begun; Pallas, incens'd, pursu'd us to the main, In vengeance of her violated fane. Alone Oileus forc'd the Trojan maid, Yet all were punish'd for the brutal deed. A storm begins, the raging waves run high, The clouds look heavy, and benight the sky; Red sheets of lightning o'er the seas are spread, Our tackling yields, and wrecks at last succeed. 'Tis tedious our disastrous state to tell; Ev'n Priam would have pity'd what befel. Yet Pallas sav'd me from the swallowing main; At home new wrongs to meet, as fates ordain. Chas'd from my country, I once more repeat All suff'rings seas could give, or war complete. For Venus, mindful of her wound, decreed Still new calamities should past succeed. Agmon, impatient through successive ills, With fury love's bright goddess thus reviles: 'These plagues in spite to Diomede are sent; The crime is his, but ours the punishment. Let each, my friends, her puny spleen despise And dare that haughty harlot of the skies.