.

1

Rear but the mast, the spacious fail display, (600
The northern winds fhall wing thee on thy way.
Soon fhalt thou reach old Ocean's utmost ends,
Where to the main the shelving shore defcends;
The barren trees of Proferpine's black woods,
Poplars and willows trembling o'er the floods: 605
There fix thy veffel in the lonely bay,
540 And enter there the kingdoms void of day:
Where Phlegethon's loud torrents, rushing down,
Hifs in the flaming gulf of Acheron;

The bath, the feaft, their fainting foul renews;
Rich in refulgent robes, and dropping balmy dews:
Brightening with joy their eager eyes behold 535
Each other's face, and each his story told;
Then gushing tears the narrative confound,
And with their fobs the vaulted roofs refound.
When hufh'd their paffion, thus the Goddess
Ulyffes, taught by lahours to b wife, (cries:
Let this fhort memory of grief fnffice.
To me are known the various woes ye bore,
In ftorms by fea, in perils on the fhore;
Forget whatever was in Fortune's power.
And share the leafares of this genial hour.
Such be your minds as ere ye left your coaft,
Or learn'd to forrow for a country loft.
Exiles and wanderers now, where-c'er ye go
Too faithful memory renews your wor;
The caule remov'd, habitual griefs remain,
And the foul faddens by the ufe of pain.

And where, flow-rolling from the Stygian bed, 6io
Cocytus lamentable waters fpread:

Where the dark rocks o'erhang th' infernal lake,
And mingling streams eternal murmurs make.
First draw thy faulchion, and on every fide
Trench the black earth a cubit long and wide:615
To all the fhades around libations pour,

550 And o'er th' ingredients frew the hallow'd
flour:

625

Her kind entreaty mov'd the general breast; New wine and milk, with honey temper'd, bring; Tir'd with long toil, we willing funk to teft. And living waters from the crystal spring. We ply'd the banquet, and the bowl we crown'd, Then the wan fhades and feeble ghofts implore, 620 Till the full circle of the year came round. 555 With promis'd offerings on thy native shore; But when the fecafons, following in their train, A barren cow, the statelieft of the isle, Brought back the months, the days, and hours And, heap'd with various wealth, a blazing pile: As from a lethargy at once they rife, [again; Thefe to the reft; but to the feer muft bleed And urge their chief with animating cries: A fable ram, the pride of all thy breed. Is this, Ulyffes, our inglorious lot? 560 Thefe folemn vows and holy offerings paid And is the name of Ithaca forgot? To all the phantom-nations of the dead; Shall never the dear land in profpe&t rife, Be next thy care the fable sheep to place Or the lov'd palace glitter in our eyes? Ful! o'er the pit, and hell-ward turn their face: But from th' infernal rite thine eye withdraw, 630 And back to Ocean glance with reverend awe. Sudden fhall fkim along the dusky glades Thin airy fhoals, and visionary fhides, Then give command the facrifice to hate, Let the flay'd victims in the flame be caft, 570 And facred vows and mystic fong apply'd To grify Pluto and his gloomy bride. Wide o'er the pool, thy faulchion wav'd around Shall drive the spectres from forbidden ground: The facred draught fhall all the dead forbear, 640 Till aw ul from the fhades arife the feer. Let him, oraculous, the end, the way, The turns of all thy future fate, display, Thy pilgrimage to come, and remnant of thy day.

Melting I heard; yet till the fun's decline
Prolong'd the feaft, and quaff'd the rofy wine: 565
But when the fhades came on at evening hour,
And all lay flumbering in the dufky bower;
I came a fuppliant to fair Circe's bed,
The tender moment feiz'd, and thus I said:
Be mindful, Goddess, of thy promise made;
Muft fad Ulylles ever be delay'd?

580

Around their lord my fad companions mourn,
Each breast beats homeward, anxious to return:
If but a moment parted from thy eyes,
Their tears flow round me, and my heart complies.
Go then, (fhe cry'd) ah, go! yet think, not I,
Not Circe, but the Fates, your wifh deny.
Ah, hope not yet to breathe thy native air!
Far other journey firtt demands thy care;
To tread th' uncomfortable paths beneath,
And view the realms of darkness and of death.
There feck the Theban bard, depriv'd of fight:
Within, irradiate with prophetic light;
To whom Perfephone, entire and whole,
Gave to retain th' unfeparated foul;
The reft are forms, of empty æther made;
Impaffive femblance, and a flitting fhade.
Struck at the word, my very heart was dead:
Penfive I fate; my tears bedew'd the bed;
To hate the light and life my foul begun,
And faw that all was grief beneath the fun.
Compos'd at length, the gushing tears fuppreft,
And my toft limbs now weary'd into rest:
How fhall I tread (I cry'd) ah, Circe! fay,
The dark defcent, and who shall guide the way?
Can living eyes behold the realms below?
What bark to waft me, and what wind to blow ?
Thy fated road (the magic power reply'd)
Divine Ulyffes! afks no mortal guide.

590

So fpeaking, from the ruddy orient fhone
The morn, confpicuous on her golden throne.
The Goddess with a radiant tunic drefs'd
My limbs, and o'er me caft a filken velt.
Long flowing robes of pureft white array

635

645

650

585 The nymph, that added luftre to the day:
A tiar wreath'd her head with many a fold;
Her wait was circled with a zone of gold.
Forth iffuing then, from place to place I flew;
Rouze man by man, and animate my crew.
Rife, rife, my mates! 'tis Circe givescommand: 655
Our journey calls us; hafte, and quit the land.
All rife and follow, yet depart not all,
For Fate decreed one wretched man to fall.
A youth there was, Elpenor was he nam'd,
Not much for fenfe, nor much for couragelam'd. 660
The youngest of cur band, a vulgar foul,
Born but to banquet, and to drain the bowl.
He, hot and carelefs, on a turret's height
With deep repair'd the long debauch of hight-

596

The ready victims at our bark we found, The fable ewe and ram, together bound, For fwift as thought the Goddess had been there, 675 And thence had glided viewless as the air: The paths of Gods what mortal can furvey? Who eyes their motion? who fhall trace their way?

BOOK Xİ.

THE ARGUMENT.

The Defcent into Hell.

Ulyffes continues his narration, How be arrived at the land of the Cimmerians, and what ceremonies be performed to invoke the dead. The manner of bis defcent, and the apparition of the fbades: his converfation with Elpenor, and with Tirefas, who informs him in a prophetic manner of bis fortunes to come. He meets bis mother Anticlea, from whom be learns the fate of bis family. He fees the fades of the ancient heroines, ofterwards of the beroes, and converfes in particular with Agamemnon and Achilles. Ajax keeps at a fullen diftance, and difdains to answer him. He then beholds Tityus, Tantalus, Sifyphus, Hercules; till he is deterred from further curiofity by the apparition of borrid specres, and the cries of the wicked in torments.

N Climb the tall bark, and launch into the main: A cavern form,d, a cubit long and wide.

At once the maft we rear, at once unbind
The fpacious fheet, and ftretch it to the wind:
Then pale and penfive ftand, with cares oppreft,
And folemn horror faddens every breast.

1

And mutter'd vows, and myftic fong applied
To grilly Pluto, and his gloomy bride.

60

Now fwift I wave my faulchion o'er the blood;
Back ftarted the pale throngs, and trembling flood.
Round the black trench the gore untasted flows,
Till awful from the fhades Tirefias rofe.
There wandering through the gloom I firft fur-
vey'd,

New to the realms of death, Elpenor's fhade :
His cold remains all naked to the sky,
De diftant fhores unwept, unburied lie.
Sad at the fight I ftand, deep fix'd in woe,
Andere I fpoke the tears began to flow:
Ofay what angry power Elpenor led

65

To glide in fhades, and wander with the dead?
How could thy foul, by realms and feas disjoin'd,
Ou-fy the nimble fail, and leave the lagging
wind ?

The ghoft replied: To hell my doom I owe,
Demons accurft, dire minifters of woe!

73

My feet, through wine unfaithful to their weight,
Betray'd me tumbling from a towery height,
Staggering I reel'd, and as I reel'd I fell,

While yet he spoke, the Prophet I obey'd,
And in the feabbard plung'd the glittering blade:
Eager he quaff'd the gore, and then expreft
Dark things to come, the counfels of his breaft: 125
Weary of light, Ulyffes here explores

A profperous voyage to his native shores;
But know-by me unerring Fates difclofe
New trains of dangers, and new fcenes of woes;
I fee! 1 fee thy bark by Neptune toft,

For injur'd Cyclop, and his eye-ball loft!
Yet to thy woes the Gods decree an end,

139

If Heaven thou please, and how to pleafe attend!
Where on Trinacrian rocks the ocean roars,
Graze numerous herds along the verdant shores; 135
Though hunger prefs, yet fly the dangerous prey,
The herds are facred to the God of Day,
Who all furveys with his extenfive eye
Above, below, on earth, and in the sky!
Rob not the God; and so propitious gales
Attend thy voyage, and impel thy fails:
But, if his herds ye feize, beneath the waves
I fee thy friends o'erwhelm'd in liquid graves!
The direful wreck Ulyffes fcarce furvives!

Lur'd the neck-joint-my foul defcends to hell. 8c Ulyffes at his country scarce arrives!

But lend me aid, I now conjure thee lend
By the foft tie and facred name of friend!
By thy fond confort! by thy father's cares!
By lov'd Telemachus's blooming years!

140

145

155

Strangers thy guides! nor there thy labours end,
New foes arife, domestic ends attend!
l'here foul adulterers to thy bride refort,
And lordly gluttons riot in thy court!
But vengeance haftes amain! These eyes behold
The deathful scene, princes on princes roll'd!
That done, a people far from fea explere,
Who ne'er knew falt, or heard the billows roar,
Or faw gay veffel ftem the watery plain,
90 A painted wonder flying on the main !
Bear on thy back an ear: with ftrange amaze
A fhepherd meeting thee, the oar furveys,
And names a vari: there fix it on the plain,
To calm the God that holds the watery reign;
A three-fold offering to his altar bring,
A bull, a ranı, a boar; and hail the Ocean-King.
But, home return'd, to each æthereal power
Slay the due victim in the genial hour
So peaceful fhalt thou end thy blissful days,
And steal thyself from life by flow decays:
Unknown to pain, in age refign thy breath,
When late ftern Neptune points the fhaft with
death a

For well I know that foon the heavenly Powers 85
Will give thee back to day, and Circe's fhores:
There picus on my cold remains attend,
There call to mind thy poor departed friend.
The tribute of a tear is all crave,
And the poffeflion of a peaceful grave.
But if, unheard, in vain compaffion plead,
Revere the Gods, the Gods avenge the dead!
A tomb along the watery margin raife,
The tomb with manly arms and trophies grace,
To fhew pofterity Elpenor was.
There high in air, memorial of my name,
Fix the fmooth oar, and bid me live to fame.
To whom with tears: Thefe rites, O mournful
fhade,

Due to thy ghoft, fhall to thy ghost be paid.

95

105

Still as 1 fpoke, the phantom feem'd to moan, 100
Tear follow'd tear, and groan fucceeded groan.
But, as my waving fword the blood furrounds,
The fhade withdrew, and mutter'd empty founds.
There as the wondrous vifions i furvey'd,
All pale afcends my royal mother's fhade:
A queen, to Troy the faw our legions pass;
Now a thin form is all Anticlea was!
Struck at the fight, I melt with filial woe,
And down my cheek the pious forrows flow,
Yet as I thook my faulchion o'er the blood,
Regardless of her fon the parent flood.

J

To the dark grave retiring as to rest,
Thy people bleffing, by thy people bleft!

Unerring truths, Oman, my lips relate;
This is thy life to come, and this is fate.

To whom unmov'd: If this the Gods prepare;
What Heaven ordain, the wife with courage beat.
But fay, why yonder on the lonely strands,
11 Unmindful of her fon, Anticlea slands ?
Why to the ground the bends her downcaft eye?
Why is the filent, while her fon is nigh?
The latent caufe, O facred feer, reveal!

When lo! the mighty Theban i behold;
To guide his fteps he bore a staff of gold;
Awful he trod! majestic was his look!
And from his holy lips these accents broke :
Why, mortal, wandereft thou from cheerfu

11

But faeathe thy poignard, while my tongue relate;
Heaven's fedfelt purpul, and thy future fates.

Nor this, replies the feer, will I conceal.

175

Straight all the mother in her foul awakes,
And, owning her Ulyffes, thus fhe speaks:
Com't thou, my, fon, alive, to realms beneath, 190
The dolesome realms of darkness and of death;
Com'st thou alive from pure, æthereal day?
Dire is the region, difmal is the way!
Here lakes profound, there floods oppose their

waves,

'There the wide fea with all his billows raves!
Or (fince to duft proud Troy submits her towers)
Com'st thou a wanderer from the Phrygian fhores?
Or fay, fince honour call'd thee to the field,
Haft thou thy Ithaca, thy bride beheld?

Source of my life, I cry'd, from earth I fly, 200
To feek Tirefias in the nether sky,
To learn my doom; for, toft from woe to woe,
In every land Ulyffes finds a foe;

Fly't thou, lov'd fhade, while I thus fondly
mcurn?

Turn to my arms, to my embraces turn!
Is it, ye powers that fmile at human harms! 255
Too great a blifs to weep within her arms?
Or has hell's Queen an empty image fent,

250

265

270

| That wretched I might ev'n my joys lament?
O fon of woe, the penfive fhade rejoin'd,
Oh most inur'd to grief of all mankind!
'Tis not the Queen of hell who thee deceives:
All, all are fuch, when life the body leaves;
No more the fubitance of the man remains,
Nor bounds the blood along the purple veins:
These the funereal flames in atoms bear,
To wander with the wind in empty air;
While the impaffive foul reluctant flies,
Like a vain dream to these infernal fkies.
But from the dark dominions speed thy way,
And climb the steep afcent to upper day;
To thy chafte bride the wondrous story tell,
The woes, the horrors, and the laws of hell.
Thus while the fpoke, in fwarms hell's Empres
brings
210 Daughters and wives of heroes and of kings;
Thick and more thick they gather round the blood,
Ghost throng'd on ghost (a dire affembly) ftood!
Dauntless my fwordt feize: the airy crew,
Swift as it flash'd along the gloom, withdrew:
215 Then shade to fhade in mutual forms fucceeds,
Her race recounts, and their illuftrious deeds. 280
Tyro began, whom great Salmoncus.bred;
The royal partner of fam'd Cretheus' bed.
For fair Enipeus, as from fruitful urns
He pours his watery ftore, the virgin burns;
Smooth flows the gentle ftream with wanton pride,
And in foft mazes rolls a filver tide.

Nor have thefe eyes beheld my native fhores,
Since in the duft proud Troy submits her towers,
But, when thy foul from her fwect manfion fled,
Say what diftemper gave thee to the dead?
Has life's fair lamp declin'd by flow decays,
Or fwift expir'd it in a fudden blaze?
Say it my fire, good old Laertes, lives?
If yet Telemachus, my fon, furvives?
Say, by his rule is my dominion aw'd,
Or crush'd by traitors with an iron rod?
Say if my spouse maintains her royal trust ;
Though tempted, chafte, and obftinately just!
Or if no more her abfent lord fhe wails,
But the falle woman o'er the wife prevails?

Thus, and thus the parent-fhade returns:
Thee, ever thee, thy faithful confort mourns:
Whether the night defcends, or day prevails,
Thee the by night, and thee by day bewails,
Thee in Telemachus thy realm obeys;
In facred groves celestial rites he pays;
And shares the banquet in fuperio ftate,

220

As an his banks the maid enamour'd roves,
The monarch of the deep beholds and loves!

Grac'd with fuch honours as become the great. 225 In her Enipeus' form and borrow'd charms,

240

For thee, my fon, I wept my life away;
For thee through hell's eternal dungeons stray :
Nor came my fate by lingering pains and flow,
Nor bent the filver-fhafted Queen her bow;
No dire disease bereav'd me of my breath;
Thou, thou, my son, wert my disease and death; 245
Unkindly with my love my fon confpir'd,
For thee I liv'd, for abfent thee expir'd.

Thrice in my arms I ftrove her fhade to bind, Thrice through my arms she flipp'd like empty wind,

Or dreams, the vain illufions of the mind.
Wild with defpair, I fhed a copious tide
Of flowing tears, and thus with fighs reply'd ;

295

The amorous God defcends into her arms:
Around, a fpacious arch of waves he throws,
And high in air the liquid mountain rofe:
Thus in furrounding floods conceal'd he proves
The pleafing transport, and completes his loves.
Then, foftly fighing, he the fair addrefs'd,
And as he spoke, her tender hand he prefl'd:
Hail, happy nymph! no vulgar births are ow'd
To the prolifie raptures of a God:
Lo! when nine times the moon renews her horn,
Two brother heroes fhall from thee be-born:
Thy early care the future worthies claim,
To point them to the arduous paths of fame;
But in thy breaft th' important truth conceal,
Nor dare the fecret of a God reveal:
For know, thou Neptune view'ft! and at my nod 305
Earth trembles, and the waves confefs their God.
He added not, but mounting spurn'd the plain,
Then plung'd into the chambers of the main.

Now in the time's full procefs forth fhe brings
Jove's dread vicegerents, in two future kings; 310
O'er proud Icolos Pelias ftretch'd his reign,
And godlike Neleus rul'd the Pylian plain;
Then, fruitful, to her Cretheus' royal bed
She gallant Pheres and fam'd Æfon bred
From the fame fountain Amythaon rofe,
Pleas'd with the din of war, and noble out of

focs.

And with a generous hand reward his stay;
For, fince kind Heaven with wealth our realm has
bleit,

Give it to Heaven, by aiding the diftreft.

Then fage Echeneus, whofe grave reverend brow The hand of time had filver'd o'er with fnow, Mature in wisdom rofe: Your words, he cries, 430 Demand obedience, for your words are wife. 370 But let our king direct the glorious way