Classic Poem

BOOK XIX

C ONSULTING secret with the blue-eyed Maid,
Still in the dome divine Ulysses stayed:
Revenge, mature for act, inflamed his breast,
And thus the son the fervent sire addressed:
" Instant convey those steely stores of war
To distant rooms, disposed with secret care:
The cause demanded by the suitor-train,
To soothe their fears, a specious reason feign;
Say, since Ulysses left his natal coast,
Obscene with smoke, their beamy lustre lost,
His arms deform the roof they wont adorn,
From the glad walls, inglorious lumber, torn.
Suggest, that Jove the peaceful thought inspired,
Lest, they by sight of swords to fury fired,
Dishonest wounds, or violence of soul,
Defame the bridal feast and friendly bowl. "
The prince, obedient to the sage command,
To Euryclea thus: " The female band
In their apartments keep; secure the doors:
These swarthy arms among the covert stores
Are seemlier hid: my thoughtless youth they blame,
Imbrowned with vapour of the smouldering flame. "
" In happier hour, " pleased Euryclea cries,
" Tutored by early woes, grow early wise!
Inspect with sharpened sight and frugal care
Your patrimonial wealth, a prudent heir.
But who the lighted taper will provide,
The female train retired, your toils to guide? "
" Without infringing hospitable right,
This guest, " he cried, " shall bear the guiding light:
I cheer no lazy vagrants with repast;
They share the meal that earn it ere they taste. "
He said: from female ken she straight secures
The purposed deed, and guards the bolted doors;
Auxiliar to his son, Ulysses bears
The plumy-crested helms and pointed spears,
With shields indented deep in glorious wars.
Minerva viewless on her charge attends,
And with her golden lamp his toil befriends.
Not such the sickly beams, which unsincere
Gild the gross vapour of this nether sphere!
A present deity the prince confessed,
And, rapt with ecstasy, the sire addressed:
" What miracle thus dazzles with surprise!
Distinct in rows the radiant columns rise;
The walls, where'er my wondering sight I turn,
And roofs amidst a blaze of glory burn!
Some visitant of pure ethereal race
With his bright presence deigns the dome to grace. "
" Be calm, " replies the sire; " to none impart,
But oft revolve the vision in thy heart:
Celestials, mantled in excess of light,
Can visit unapproached by mortal sight.
Seek thou repose: whilst here I sole remain,
To explore the conduct of the female train;
The pensive queen, perchance, desires to know
The series of my toils, to soothe her woe. "
With tapers flaming day his train attends,
His bright alcove the obsequious youth ascends;
Soft slumbering shades his drooping eyelids close
Till on her eastern throne Aurora glows.
Whilst, forming plans of death, Ulysses stayed,
In council secret with the martial Maid,
Attendant nymphs in beauteous order wait
The queen, descending from her bower of state.
Her cheeks the warmer blush of Venus wear,
Chastened with coy Diana's pensive air,
An ivory seat with silver ringlets graced,
By famed Icmalius wrought, the menials placed:
With ivory, silvered thick, the footstool shone
O'er which the panther's various hide was thrown.
The sovereign seat with graceful air she pressed;
To different tasks their toil the nymphs addressed:
The golden goblets some, and some restored
From stains of luxury the polished board:
These to remove the expiring embers came,
While those with unctuous fire foment the flame.
'Twas then Melantho with imperious mien
Renewed the attack, incontinent of spleen;
" Avaunt, " she cried, " offensive to my sight!
Deem not in ambush here to lurk by night,
Into the woman-state asquint to pry;
A day-devourer, and an evening-spy!
Vagrant, begone! before this blazing brand
Shall urge " — and waved it hissing in her hand.
The insulted hero rolls his wrathful eyes,
And, " Why so turbulent of wrath? " he cries;
" Can these lean shrivelled limbs, unnerved with age,
These poor but honest rags, enkindle rage?
In crowds we wear the badge of hungry fate;
And beg, degraded from superior state:
Constrained, a rent-charge on the rich I live;
Reduced to crave the good I once could give:
A palace, wealth, and slaves, I late possessed,
And all that makes the great be called the blessed.
My gate, an emblem of my open soul,
Embraced the poor, and dealt a bounteous dole.
Scorn not the sad reverse, injurious maid;
'Tis Jove's high will, and be his will obeyed!
Nor think thyself exempt: that rosy prime
Must share the general doom of withering time:
To some new channel soon the changeful tide
Of royal grace the offended queen may guide;
And her loved lord unplume thy towering pride.
Or, were he dead, 'tis wisdom to beware:
Sweet blooms the prince beneath Apollo's care;
Your deeds with quick impartial eye surveys,
Potent to punish what he cannot praise. "
Her keen reproach had reached the sovereign's ear:
" Loquacious insolent! " she cries, " forbear:
To thee the purpose of my soul I told;
Venial discourse, unblamed, with him to hold:
The storied labours of my wandering lord,
To soothe my grief, he haply may record;
Yet him, my guest, thy venomed rage hath stung;
Thy head shall pay the forfeit of thy tongue!
But thou on whom my palace cares depend,
Eurynome, regard the stranger friend:
A seat, soft spread with furry spoils, prepare;
Due distant for us both to speak and hear. "
The menial fair obeys with duteous haste:
A seat adorned with furry spoils she placed;
Due-distant for discourse the hero sate;
When thus the sovereign from her chair of state:
" Reveal, obsequious to my first demand,
Thy name, thy lineage, and thy natal land. "
He thus: " O queen, whose far-resounding fame
Is bounded only by the starry frame,
Consummate pattern of imperial sway,
Whose pious rule a warlike race obey;
In wavy gold thy summer vales are dressed;
Thy autumns bend with copious fruit oppressed;
With flocks and herds each grassy plain is stored;
And fish of every fin thy seas afford;
Their affluent joys the grateful realms confess,
And bless the power that still delights to bless.
Gracious permit this prayer, imperial dame;
Forbear to know my lineage, or my name:
Urge not this breast to heave, these eyes to weep;
In sweet oblivion let my sorrows sleep;
My woes awaked will violate your ear;
And to this gay censorious train appear
A winy vapour melting in a tear. "
" Their gifts the gods resumed, " the queen rejoined,
" Exterior grace, and energy of mind,
When the dear partner of my nuptial joy
Auxiliar troops combined, to conquer Troy.
My lord's protecting hand alone would raise
My drooping verdure, and extend my praise!
Peers from the distant Samian shore resort:
Here, with Dulichians joined, besiege the court:
Zacynthus, green with ever-shady groves,
And Ithaca, presumptuous boast their loves:
Obtruding on my choice a second lord,
They press the hymenaean rite abhorred.
Misrule thus mingling with domestic cares,
I live regardless of my state affairs;
Receive no stranger-guest, no poor relieve;
But ever for my lord in secret grieve! —
This art, instinct by some celestial Power,
I tried, elusive of the bridal hour:
" " Ye peers," I cry, " who press to gain a heart,
Where dead Ulysses claims no future part;
Rebate your loves, each rival suit suspend,
Till this funereal web my labours end:
Cease, till to good Lairtes I bequeath
A pall of state, the ornament of death.
For when to fate he bows, each Grecian dame
With just reproach were licensed to defame,
Should he, long-honoured in supreme command,
Want the last duties of a daughter's hand."
The fiction pleased; their loves I long elude;
The night still ravelled what the day renewed;
Three years successful in my heart concealed,
My ineffectual fraud the fourth revealed:
Befriended by my own domestic spies,
The woof unwrought the suitor-train surprise.
From nuptial rites they now no more recede,
And fear forbids to falsify the breed.
My anxious parents urge a speedy choice,
And to their suffrage gain the filial voice.
For rule mature, Telemachus deplores
His dome dishonoured, and exhausted stores.
But, stranger, as thy days seem full of fate,
Divide discourse, in turn thy birth relate:
Thy port asserts thee of distinguished race;
No poor unfathered product of disgrace. "
" Princess! " he cries, " renewed by your command,
The dear remembrance of my native land
Of secret grief unseals the fruitful source:
Fond tears repeat their long-forgotten course:
So pays the wretch, whom fate constrains to roam,
The dues of nature to his natal home —
But inward on my soul let sorrow prey:
Your sovereign will my duty bids obey.
" Crete awes the circling waves, a fruitful soil,
And ninety cities crown the sea-born isle:
Mixed with her genuine sons, adopted names
In various tongues avow their various claims:
Cydonians, dreadful with the bended yew,
And bold Pelasgi boast a native's due:
The Dorians, plumed amid the files of war,
Her foodful glebe with fierce Achaians share;
Cnossus, her capital of high command,
Where sceptred Minos with impartial hand
Divided right; each ninth revolving year,
By Jove received in council to confer.
His son Deucalion bore successive sway;
His son, who gave me first to view the day;
The royal bed an elder issue blessed,
Idomeneus, whom Ilian fields attest
Of matchless deeds: untrained to martial toil
I lived inglorious in my native isle,
Studious of peace; and Æthon is my name.
'Twas then to Crete the great Ulysses came;
For elemental war, and wintry Jove,
From Malea's gusty cape his navy drove
To bright Lucina's fane; the shelfy coast
Where loud Amnisus in the deep is lost.
His vessels moored — an incommodious port —
The hero speeded to the Cnossian court:
Ardent the partner of his arms to find,
In leagues of long commutual friendship joined.
Vain hope! ten suns had warmed the western strand,
Since my brave brother with his Cretan band
Had sailed for Troy: but to the genial feast
My honoured roof received the royal guest;
Beeves for his train the Cnossian peers assign,
A public treat, with jars of generous wine.
Twelve days, while Boreas vexed the airial space,
My hospitable dome he deigned to grace;
And when the north had ceased the stormy roar,
He winged his voyage to the Phrygian shore. "
Thus the famed hero, perfected in wiles,
With fair similitude of truth beguiles
The queen's attentive ear; dissolved in woe,
From her bright eyes the tears unbounded flow.
As snows collected on the mountain freeze,
When milder regions breathe a vernal breeze,
The fleecy pile obeys the whispering gales,
Ends in a stream, and murmurs through the vales:
So, melted with the pleasing tale he told.
Down her fair cheek the copious torrent rolled:
She to her present lord laments him lost,
And views that object which she wants the most!
Withering at heart to see the weeping fair,
His eyes look stern, and east a gloomy stare;
Of horn the stiff relentless balls appear,
Or globes of iron fixed in either sphere;
Firm wisdom interdicts the softening tear,
A speechless interval of grief ensues,
Till thus the queen the tender theme renews:
" Stranger! that e'er thy hospitable roof
Ulysses graced, confirm by faithful proof;
Delineate to my view my warlike lord,
His form, his habit, and his train record. "
" 'Tis hard, " he cries, " to bring to sudden sight
Ideas that have winged their distant flight;
Rare on the mind those images are traced,
Whose footsteps twenty winters have defaced:
But what I can, receive. — In ample mode,
A robe of military purple flowed
O'er all his frame: illustrious on his breast,
The double-clasping gold the king confessed.
In the rich woof a hound, mosaic drawn,
Bore on full stretch, and seized a dappled fawn:
Deep in the neck his fangs indent their hold;
They pant and struggle in the moving gold.
Fine as a filmy web beneath it shone
A vest, that dazzled like a cloudless sun:
The female train who round him thronged to gaze,
In silent wonder sighed unwilling praise.
A sabre, when the warrior pressed to part,
I gave, enamelled with Vulcanian art:
A mantle purple-tinged, and radiant vest,
Dimensioned equal to his size, expressed
Affection grateful to my honoured guest.
A favourite herald in his train I knew,
His visage solemn sad, of sable hue:
Short woolly curls o'erfleeced his bending head,
O'er which a promontory shoulder spread;
Eurybates! in whose large soul alone
Ulysses viewed an image of his own. "
His speech the tempest of her grief restored;
In all he told she recognised her lord:
But when the storm was spent in plenteous showers,
A pause inspiriting her languished powers,
" O thou, " she cried, " whom first inclement Fate
Made welcome to my hospitable gate;
With all thy wants the name of poor shall end:
Henceforth live honoured, my domestic friend!
The vest much envied on your native coast,
And regal robe with figured gold embossed,
In happier hours my artful hand employed,
When my loved lord this blissful bower enjoyed:
The fall of Troy, erroneous and forlorn,
Doomed to survive, and never to return! "
Then he, with pity touched: " O royal dame!
Your ever-anxious mind, and beauteous frame,
From the devouring rage of grief reclaim.
I not the fondness of your soul reprove
For such a lord! who crowned your virgin-love
With the dear blessing of a fair increase;
Himself adorned with more than mortal grace:
Yet, while I speak, the mighty woe suspend;
Truth forms my tale; to pleasing truth attend.
The royal object of your dearest care
Breathes in no distant clime the vital air:
In rich Thesprotia and the nearer bound
Of Thessaly his name I heard renowned:
Without retinue, to that friendly shore
Welcomed with gifts of price, a sumless store!
His sacrilegious train, who dared to prey
On herds devoted to the god of day,
Were doomed by Jove, and Phaebus' just decree,
To perish in the rough Trinacrian sea.
To better fate the blameless chief ordained,
A floating fragment of the wreck regained,
And rode the storm; till, by the billows tossed,
He landed on the fair Phaeacian coast.
That race, who emulate the life of gods,
Receive him joyous to their blessed abodes;
Large gifts confer, a ready sail command,
To speed his voyage to the Grecian strand.
But your wise lord, in whose capacious soul
High schemes of power in just succession roll,
His Ithaca refused from favouring Fate,
Till copious wealth might guard his regal state.
Phedon the fact affirmed, whose sovereign sway
Thesprotian tribes, a duteous race, obey:
And bade the gods this added truth attest,
While pure libations crowned the genial feast,
That anchored in his port the vessels stand,
To waft the hero to his natal land.
I for Dulichium urge the watery way,
But first the Ulyssean wealth survey:
So rich the value of a store so vast
Demands the pomp of centuries to waste.
The darling object of your royal love
Was journeyed thence to Dodonean Jove;
By the sure precept of the sylvan shrine,
To form the conduct of his great design:
Irresolute of soul, his state to shroud
In dark disguise, or come a king avowed!
Thus lives your lord; nor longer doomed to roam:
Soon will he grace this dear paternal dome.
By Jove, the source of good, supreme in power,
By the blessed genius of this friendly bower,
I ratify my speech; before the sun
His annual longitude of heaven shall run;
When the pale empress of yon starry train
In the next month renews her faded wane,
Ulysses will assert his rightful reign. "
" What thanks, what boon, " replied the queen, " are due,
When time shall prove the storied blessing true!
My lord's return should Fate no more retard,
Envy shall sicken at thy vast reward.
But my prophetic fears, alas! presage
The wounds of Destiny's relentless rage.
I long must weep, nor will Ulysses come,
With royal gifts to send you honoured home! —
Your other task, ye menial train, forbear:
Now wash the stranger, and the bed prepare:
With splendid palls the downy fleece adorn:
Uprising early with the purple morn,
His sinews shrunk with age, and stiff with toil,
In the warm bath foment with fragrant oil.
Then with Telemachus the social feast
Partaking free, my sole invited guest,
Whoe'er neglects to pay distinction due,
The breach of hospitable right may rue.
The vulgar of my sex I most exceed
In real fame, when most humane my deed;
And vainly to the praise of queen aspire,
If, stranger, I permit that mean attire
Beneath the feastful bower. A narrow space
Confines the circle of our destined race;
'Tis ours with good the scanty round to grace.
Those who to cruel wrong their state abuse,
Dreaded in life, the muttered curse pursues;
By death disrobed of all their savage powers,
Then licensed rage her hateful prey devours.
But he whose inborn worth his acts commend,
Of gentle soul, to human race a friend,
The wretched he relieves diffuse his fame,
And distant tongues extol the patron-name. "
" Princess! " he cried, " in vain your bounties flow
On me, confirmed and obstinate in woe.
When my loved Crete received my final view,
And from my weeping eyes her cliffs withdrew,
These tattered weeds, my decent robe resigned,
I chose, the livery of a woeful mind;
Nor will my heart-corroding cares abate
With splendid palls and canopies of state:
Low-couched on earth, the gift of sleep I scorn,
And catch the glances of the waking morn.
The delicacy of your courtly train
To wash a wretched wanderer would disdain;
But if, in tract of long experience tried,
And sad similitude of woes allied,
Some wretch reluctant views airial light,
To her mean hand assign the friendly rite. "
Pleased with his wise reply, the queen rejoined:
" Such gentle manners, and so sage a mind,
In all who graced this hospitable bower
I ne'er discerned, before this social hour.
Such servant as your humble choice requires,
To light received the lord of my desires,
New from the birth; and with a mother's hand
His tender bloom to manly growth sustained:
Of matchless prudence, and a duteous mind,
Though now to life's extremest verge declined,
Of strength superior to the toil assigned.
Rise, Euryclea! with officious care
For the poor friend the cleansing bath prepare:
This debt his correspondent fortunes claim,
Too like Ulysses, and perhaps the same;
Thus old with woes my fancy paints him now:
For age untimely marks the careful brow. "
Instant, obsequious to the mild command,
Sad Euryclea rose: with trembling hand
She veils the torrent of her tearful eyes;
And thus impassioned to herself replies:
" Son of my love, and monarch of my cares,
What pangs for thee this wretched bosom bears!
Are thus by Jove who constant beg his aid
With pious deed and pure devotion, paid?
He never dared defraud the sacred fane
Of perfect hecatombs in order slain:
There oft implored his tutelary Power,
Long to protract the sad sepulchral hour;
That, formed for empire with paternal care,
His realm might recognise an equal heir.
O destined head! The pious vows are lost;
His God forgets him on a foreign coast! —
Perhaps, like thee, poor guest, in wanton pride
The rich insult him, and the young deride,
Conscious of worth reviled, thy generous mind
The friendly rite of purity declined;
My will concurring with my queen's command,
Accept the bath from this obsequious hand.
A strong emotion shakes my anguished breast:
In thy whole form Ulysses seems expressed:
Of all the wretched harboured on our coast,
None imaged e'er like thee my master lost. "
Thus half discovered through the dark disguise,
With cool composure feigned, the chief replies:
" You join your suffrage to the public vote;
The same you think have all beholders thought. "
He said: replenished from the purest springs,
The laver straight with busy care she brings:
In the deep vase, that shone like burnished gold,
The boiling fluid temperates the cold.
Meantime revolving in his thoughtful mind
The scar with which his manly knee was signed;
His face averting from the crackling blaze,
His shoulders intercept the unfriendly rays:
Thus cautious in the obscure he hoped to fly
The curious search of Euryclea's eye;
Cautious in vain, nor ceased the dame to find
The scar with which his manly knee was signed.
This on Parnassus, combating the boar,
With glancing rage the tusky savage tore.
Attended by his brave maternal race,
His grandsire sent him to the sylvan chase,
Autolycus the bold — a mighty name
For spotless faith and deeds of martial fame:
Hermes, his patron-god, those gifts bestowed,
Whose shrine with weanling lambs he wont to load.
His course to Ithaca this hero sped,
When the first product of Lairtes' bed
Was new disclosed to birth: the banquet ends,
When Euryclea from the queen descends,
And to his fond embrace the babe commends:
" Receive, " she cries, " your royal daughter's son,
And name the blessing that your prayers have won. "
Then thus the hoary chief: " My victor arms
Have awed the realms around with dire alarms:
A sure memorial of my dreaded fame
The boy shall bear: Ulysses be his name!
And when with filial love the youth shall come
To view his mother's soil, my Delphic dome
With gifts of price shall send him joyous home. "
Lured with the promised boon, when youthful prime
Ended in man, his mother's natal clime
Ulysses sought; with fond affection dear
Amphithea's arms received the royal heir:
Her ancient lord an equal joy possessed;
Instant he bade prepare the genial feast:
A steer to form the sumptuous banquet bled,
Whose stately growth five flowery summers fed:
His sons divide, and roast with artful care
The limbs: then all the tasteful viands share.
Nor ceased discourse, the banquet of the soul,
Till Phaebus wheeling to the western goal
Resigned the skies, and night involved the pole;
Their drooping eyes the slumberous shade oppressed,
Sated they rose, and all retired to rest.
Soon as the morn, new robed in purple light,
Pierced with her golden shafts the rear of night,
Ulysses, and his brave maternal race
The young Autolyci, essay the chase.
Parnassus, thick-perplexed with horrid shades,
With deep-mouthed hounds the hunter-troop invades,
What time the sun, from ocean's peaceful stream,
Darts o'er the lawn his horizontal beam.
The pack impatient snuff the tainted gale;
The thorny wilds the woodmen fierce assail:
And, foremost of the train, his cornel spear
Ulysses waved, to rouse the savage war.
Deep in the rough recesses of the wood,
A lofty copse, the growth of ages, stood;
Nor winter's boreal blast, nor thunderous shower,
Nor solar ray, could pierce the shady bower;
With withered foliage strewed, a heapy store,
The warm pavilion of a dreadful boar.
Roused by the hounds' and hunters' mingling cries,
The savage from his leafy shelter flies;
With fiery glare his sanguine eye-balls shine,
And bristles high impale his horrid chine.
Young Ithacus advanced, defies the foe,
Poising his lifted lance in act to throw;
The savage renders vain the wound decreed,
And springs impetuous with opponent speed;
His tusks oblique he aimed, the knee to gore;
Aslope they glanced, the sinewy fibres tore,
And bared the bone; Ulysses, undismayed,
Soon with redoubled force the wound repaid;
To the right shoulder-joint the spear applied,
His further flank with streaming purple dyed:
On earth he rushed with agonising pain;
With joy and vast surprise, the applauding train
Viewed his enormous bulk extended on the plain.
With bandage firm Ulysses' knee they bound;
Then, chanting mystic lays, the closing wound
Of sacred melody confessed the force;
The tides of life regained their azure course.
Then back they led the youth with loud acclaim:
Autolycus, enamoured with his fame,
Confirmed the cure, and from the Delphic dome
With added gifts returned him glorious home.
He, safe at Ithaca with joy received,
Relates the chase, and early praise achieved.
Deep o'er his knee inseamed, remained the scar:
Which noted token of the woodland war
When Euryclea found, the ablution ceased;
Down dropped the leg, from her slack hand released;
The mingled fluids from the vase redound;
The vase reclining floats the floor around.
Smiles dewed with tears the pleasing strife expressed
Of grief and joy, alternate in her breast.
Her fluttering words in melting murmurs died;
At length abrupt — " My son! — my king! " — she cried;
His neck with fond embrace infolding fast,
Full on the queen her raptured eye she cast,
Ardent to speak the monarch safe restored:
But, studious to conceal her royal lord,
Minerva fixed her mind on views remote,
And from the present bliss abstracts her thought.
His hand to Euryclea's mouth applied,
" Art thou foredoomed my pest? " the hero cried;
" Thy milky founts my infant lips have drained:
And have the Fates thy babbling age ordained
To violate the life thy youth sustained?
An exile have I told, with weeping eyes,
Full twenty annual suns in distant skies:
At length returned, some god inspires thy breast
To know thy king, and here I stand confessed.
This heaven-discovered truth to thee consigned,
Reserve the treasure of thy inmost mind:
Else, if the gods my vengeful arm sustain,
And prostrate to my sword the suitor train;
With their lewd mates, thy undistinguished age
Shall bleed a victim to vindictive rage. "
Then thus rejoined the dame, devoid of fear:
" What words, my son, have passed thy lips severe?
Deep in my soul the trust shall lodge secured,
With ribs of steel, and marble heart, immured.
When Heaven, auspicious to thy right avowed,
Shall prostrate to thy sword the suitor-crowd,
The deeds I'll blazon of the menial fair;
The lewd to death devote, the virtuous spare. "
" Thy aid avails me not; " the chief replied;
" My own experience shall their doom decide;
A witness-judge precludes a long appeal:
Suffice it thee thy monarch to conceal. "
He said: obsequious, with redoubled pace,
She to the fount conveys the exhausted vase:
The bath renewed, she ends the pleasing toil
With plenteous unction of ambrosial oil.
Adjusting to his limbs the tattered vest,
His former seat received the stranger-guest,
Whom thus with pensive air the queen addressed:
" Though night, dissolving grief in grateful ease,
Your drooping eyes with soft oppression seize,
Awhile, reluctant to her pleasing force,
Suspend the restful hour with sweet discourse.
The day, ne'er brightened with a beam of joy,
My menials, and domestic cares employ:
And, unattended by sincere repose,
The night assists my ever-wakeful woes:
When nature's hushed beneath her brooding shade,
My echoing griefs the starry vault invade.
As when the months are clad in flowery green,
Sad Philomel, in bowery shades unseen,
To vernal airs attunes her varied strains,
And Itylus sounds warbling o'er the plains:
Young Itylus, his parents' darling joy!
Whom chance misled the mother to destroy;
Now doomed a wakeful bird to wail the beauteous boy.
So in nocturnal solitude forlorn,
A sad variety of woes I mourn;
My mind, reflective, in a thorny maze
Devious from care to care incessant strays.
Now, wavering doubt succeeds to long despair;
Shall I my virgin nuptial vow revere;
And, joining to my son's my menial train,
Partake his counsels, and assist his reign?
Or since, mature in manhood, he deplores
His dome dishonoured, and exhausted stores;
Shall I, reluctant, to his will accord,
And from the peers select the noblest lord;
So, by my choice avowed, at length decide
These wasteful love debates, a mourning bride.
A visionary thought I'll now relate:
Illustrate, if you know, the shadowed fate:
" A team of twenty geese, a snow-white train,
Fed near the limpid lake with golden grain,
Amuse my pensive hours. The bird of Jove
Fierce from his mountain-eyrie downward drove;
Each favourite fowl he pounced with deathful sway,
And back triumphant winged his airy way.
My pitying eyes effused a plenteous stream,
To view their death thus imaged in a dream:
With tender sympathy to soothe my soul,
A troop of matrons, fancy-formed, condole.
But whilst with grief and rage my bosom burned,
Sudden the tyrant of the skies returned:
Perched on the battlements he thus began,
In form an eagle, but in voice a man:
" O queen! no vulgar vision of the sky
I come, prophetic of approaching joy:
View in this plumy form thy victor-lord;
The geese, a glutton race, by thee deplored,
Portend the suitors fated to my sword."
This said, the pleasing feathered omen ceased.
When, from the downy bands of sleep released,
Fast by the limpid lake my swan-like train
I found, insatiate of the golden grain. "
" The vision self-explained, " the chief replies,
" Sincere reveals the sanction of the skies:
Ulysses speaks his own return decreed,
And by his sword the suitors sure to bleed. "
" Hard is the task, and rare, " the queen rejoined,
" Impending destinies in dreams to find:
Immured within the silent bower of sleep,
Two portals firm the various phantoms keep:
Of ivory one, whence flit, to mock the brain,
Of winged lies a light fantastic train:
The gate opposed pellucid valves adorn,
And columns fair incased with polished horn;
Where images of truth for passage wait,
With visions manifest of future fate.
Not to this troop, I fear, that phantom soared,
Which spoke Ulysses to this realm restored:
Delusive semblance: but my remnant life
Heaven shall determine in a gameful strife:
With that famed bow Ulysses taught to bend,
For me the rival archers shall contend.
As on the listed field he used to place
Six beams, opposed to six in equal space;
Elanced afar by his unerring art,
Sure through six circlets flew the whizzing dart:
So, when the sun restores the purple day,
Their strength and skill the suitors shall assay:
To him the spousal honour is decreed,
Who through the rings directs the feathered reed.
Torn from these walls, where long the kinder powers
With joy and pomp have winged my youthful hours,
On this poor breast no dawn of bliss shall beam;
The pleasure past supplies a copious theme
For many a dreary thought, and many a doleful dream! "
" Propose the sportive lot, " the chief replies,
" Nor dread to name yourself the bowyer's prize:
Ulysses will surprise the unfinished game,
Avowed, and falsify the suitors' claim. "
To whom with grace serene the queen rejoined:
" In all thy speech what pleasing force I find!
O'er my suspended woe thy words prevail;
I part reluctant from the pleasing tale.
But Heaven, that knows what all terrestrials need,
Repose to night, and toil to day decreed;
Grateful vicissitudes! Yet me withdrawn,
Wakeful to weep and watch the tardy dawn
Established use enjoins, to rest and joy
Estranged, since dear Ulysses sailed to Troy.
Meantime instructed is the menial tribe
Your couch to fashion as yourself prescribe. "
Thus affable, her bower the queen ascends;
The sovereign step a beauteous train attends:
There imaged to her soul Ulysses rose;
Down her pale cheek new-streaming sorrow flows:
Till soft oblivious shade Minerva spread,
And o'er her eyes ambrosial slumber shed.