THE GROTTO OF CALYPSO.
THUS o'er the world of waters Hermes flew,
Till now the distant island rose in view;
Then swift ascending from the azure wave,
He took the path that winded to the cave.
Large was the grot in which the nymph he found
(The fair-hair'd nymph with every beauty crown'd),
She sat and sung; the rocks resound her lays :
The cave was brighten'd with a rising blaze:
Cedar and frankincense, an odorous pile,
Flamed on the hearth, and wide perfumed the isle;
While she with work and song the time divides,
And through the loom the golden shuttle guides.
Without the grot, a various silvan scene
Appear'd around, and groves of living green;
Poplars and alders ever quivering play'd,
And nodding cypress form'd a fragrant shade;
On whose high branches, waving with the storm,
The birds of broadest wing their mansion form,
The chough, the seamew, the loquacious crow,
And scream aloft, and skim the deeps below.
Depending vines the shelving cavern screen,
With purple clusters blushing through the green.
Four limpid fountains from the clefts distil,
And every fountain pours a several rill,
In mazy windings wandering down the hill:
Where bloomy meads with vivid greens were
crown'd,
And glowing violets threw odours round.
A scene, where, if a god should cast his sight, A god might gaze, and wander with delight!
THE PALACE OF ALCINOUS.
MEANWHILE Ulysses at the palace waits,
There stops, and anxious with his soul debates,
Fix'd in amaze before the royal gates.
The front appear'd with radiant splendours gay,
Bright as the lamp of night or orb of day.
The walls were massy brass: the cornice high
Blue metals crown'd, in colours of the sky:
Rich plates of gold the folding doors incase;
The pillars silver, on a brazen base;
Silver the lintels deep projecting o'er,
And gold the ringlets that command the door.
Two rows of stately dogs, on either hand,
In sculptured gold and labour'd silver, stand.
These Vulcan form'd with art divine, to wait
Immortal guardians at Alcinoüs' gate;
Alive each animated frame appears,
And still to live beyond the power of years.
Fair thrones within from space to space were
Where various carpets with embroidery blazed,
The work of matrons: these the princes press'd,
Day following day, a long continued feast.
Refulgent pedestals the walls surround,
Which boys of gold with flaming torches crown'd;
The polish'd ore, reflecting every ray,
Blazed on the banquets with a double day.
Full fifty handmaids form the household train;
Some turn the mill, or sift the golden grain;
Some ply the loom; their busy fingers move
Like poplar leaves, when Zephyr fans the grove.
Not more renown'd the men of Scheria's isle,
For sailing arts and all the naval toil,
Than works of female skill their women's pride,
The flying shuttle through the threads to guide:
Pallas to these her double gifts imparts,
Inventive genius and industrious arts.
Close to the gates a spacious garden lies, From storms defended and inclement skies. Four acres was the' allotted space of ground, Fenced with a green enclosure all around: Tall thriving trees confess'd the fruitful mould; The reddening apple ripens here to gold: Here the blue fig with luscious juice o'erflows, With deeper red the full pomegranate glows, The branch here bends beneath the weighty pear, And verdant olives flourish round the year. The balmy spirit of the western gale Eternal breathes on fruits untaught to fail: Each dropping pear a following pear supplies, On apples apples, figs on figs arise:
The same mild season gives the blooms to blow, The buds to harden, and the fruits to grow.
Here order'd vines in equal ranks appear, With all the' united labours of the year. Some to unload the fertile branches run, Some dry the blackening clusters in the sun, Others to tread the liquid harvest join, The groaning presses foam with floods of wine. Here are the vines in early flower descried, Here grapes discolour'd on the sunny side, And there in autumn's richest purple dyed. Beds of all various herbs, for ever green, In beauteous order terminate the scene.
Two plenteous fountains the whole prospect
crown'd;
This through the gardens leads its streams around,
Visits each plant, and waters all the ground;
While that in pipes beneath the palace flows,
And thence its current on the town bestows:
To various use their various streams they bring,
The people one, and one supplies the king.
Such were the glories which the gods ordain'd,
To grace Alcinoüs, and his happy land!
E'en from the chief, who men and nations knew,
The' unwonted scene surprise and rapture drew ;*
In pleasing thought he ran the prospect o'er,
Then hasty enter'd at the lofty door.
Night now approaching, in the palace stand,
With goblets crown'd, the rulers of the land;
Prepared for rest, and offering to the god
Who bears the virtue of the sleepy rod.
Unseen he glided through the joyous crowd,
With darkness circled, and an ambient cloud.
HIGH in the air the rock its summit shrouds
In brooding tempests and in rolling clouds;
Loud storms around and mists eternal rise,
Beat its bleak brow, and intercept the skies.
When all the broad expansion, bright with day,
Glows with the' autumnal or the summer ray,
The summer and the autumn glow in vain,
The sky for ever lours, for ever clouds remain.
Impervious to the step of man it stands,
Though borne by twenty feet, though arm'd with twenty hands;
Smooth as the polish of the mirror, rise
The slippery sides, and shoot into the skies.
Full in the centre of this rock display'd,
A yawning cavern casts a dreadful shade:
Nor the fleet arrow from the twanging bow,
Sent with full force, could reach the depth below.
Wide to the west the horrid gulf extends,
And the dire passage down to hell descends.
O fly the dreadful sight! expand thy sails,
Ply the strong oar, and catch the nimble gales:
Here Scylla bellows from her dire abodes,
Tremendous pest! abhorr'd by man and gods!
Hideous her voice, and with less terrors roar
The whelps of lions in the midnight hour.
Twelve feet, deform'd and foul, the fiend dispreads;
Six horrid necks she rears, and six terrific heads;
Her jaws grin dreadful with three rows of teeth;
Jaggy they stand, the gaping den of death;
Her parts obscene the raging billows hide;
Her bosom terribly o'erlooks the tide.
When stung with hunger she embroils the flood,
The seadog and the dolphin are her food;
She makes the huge leviathan her prey,
And all the monsters of the watery way;
The swiftest racer of the azure plain
Here fills her sails and spreads her oars in vain ;
Fell Scylla rises, in her fury roars,
At once six mouths expands, at once six men de
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