The Destinies sate dancing on the waves,
To see the glorious Winds with mutual braves
Consume each other: O, true glass, to see
How ruinous ambitious statists be
To their own glories Poor Leander cried
For help to sea-born Venus she denied ;*
To Boreas, that, for his Atthæa's sake,t
He would some pity on his Hero take,
And for his own love's sake, on his desires;
But Glory never blows cold Pity's fires.

Then call'd he Neptune, who, through all the noise,

Knew with affright his wreck'd Leander's voice, And up he rose; for haste his forehead hit 'Gainst heaven's hard crystal; his proud waves he

smit

With his fork'd sceptre, that could not obey; Much greater powers than Neptune's gave them sway.

They lov'd Leander so, in groans they brake When they came near him; and such space did take

"Twixt one another, loath to issue on,
That in their shallow furrows earth was shown,
And the poor lover took a little breath:
But the curst Fates sate spinning of his death
On every wave, and with the servile Winds
Tumbled them on him. And now Hero finds,
By that she felt, her dear Leander's state:
She wept, and pray'd for him to every Fate;
And every Wind that whipp'd her with her hair
About the face, she kiss'd and spake it fair,
Kneel'd to it, gave it drink out of her eyes
To quench his thirst: but still their cruelties
Even her poor torch envì'd, and rudely beat
The baiting flame § from that dear food it eat;
Dear, for it nourish'd her Leander's life;
Which with her robe she rescu'd from their strife:
But silk too soft was such hard hearts to break;
And she, dear soul, even as her silk, faint, weak,
Could not preserve it; out, O, out it went!
Leander still call'd Neptune, that now rent
His brackish curls, and tore his wrinkled face,
Where tears in billows did each other chase;

*she denied i. e. which she denied.

for his Atthaa's sake] i. e. for the sake of "Orithyia the fair Athenian princess; 'Attheia' [Atthaa] being formed by Chapman from 'Artis, Attica." Ed. 1821Here Chapman had an eye to a line of the PseudoMuseus.

ΑΤΘΙΔΟΣ οὐ Βορέην ἀμνήμονα κάλλιτι ΝΥΜΦΗΣ. ν. 322. ✰ powers] V. R. "power."

The baiting flame] i. e. the flame taking bait (refreshment), feeding. (In the former edition I retained the spelling of the old copies, "bating," and wrongly explained it to mean "fluttering.")

And, burst with ruth, he hurl'd his marble mace
At the stern Fates: it wounded Lachesis
That drew Leander's thread, and could not miss
The thread itself, as it her hand did hit,
But smote it full, and quite did sunder it.
The more kind Neptune rag'd, the more he raz'd
His love's life's fort, and kill'd as he embrac'd:
Anger doth still his own mishap increase;
If any comfort live, it is in peace.

O thievish Fates, to let blood, flesh, and sense,
Build two fair temples for their excellence,
To rob it with a poison'd influence !
Though souls' gifts starve, the bodies are held

dear

In ugliest things; sense-sport preserves a bear: But here naught serves our turns: O heaven and earth,

How most-most wretched is our human birth! And now did all the tyrannous crew depart, Knowing there was a storm in Hero's heart, Greater than they could make, and scorn'd their

smart.

She bow'd herself so low out of her tower,
That wonder 'twas she fell not ere her hour,
With searching the lamenting waves for him:
Like a poor snail, her gentle supple limb
Hung on her turret's top, so most downright,
As she would dive beneath the darkness quite,
To find her jewel ;-jewel !—her Leander,
A name of all earth's jewels pleas'd not her
Like his dear name: "Leander, still my choice,
Come naught but my Leander ! O my voice,
Turn to Leander! henceforth be all sounds,
Accents, and phrases, that shew all griefs' wounds,
Analyz'd in Leander! O black change!
Trumpets, do you, with thunder of your clange,"
Drive out this change's horror! My voice faints:
Where all joy was, now shriek out all complaints!"
Thus cried she; for her mixèd soul could tell
Her love was dead: and when the Morning fell
Prostrate upon the weeping earth for woe,
Blushes, that bled out of her cheeks, did shew
Leander brought by Neptune, bruis'd and torn
With cities' ruins he to rocks had worn,

To filthy usuring rocks, that would have blood,
Though they could get of him no other good.
She saw him, and the sight was much-much more
Than might have serv'd to kill her: should her

store

Of giant sorrows speak ?-Burst,+t-die,-bleed, And leave poor plaints to us that shall succeed.

* clange] i. e. clang,-so spelt for the rhyme. Burst, &c.] Qy. "No: burst", &c.

She fell on her love's bosom, hugg'd it fast, And with Leander's name she breath'd her last.

Neptune for pity in his arms did take them, Flung them into the air, and did awake them Like two sweet birds, surnam'd th' Acanthides, † Which we call Thistle-warps, that near no seas Dare ever come, but still in couples fly, And feed on thistle-tops, to testify The hardness of their first life in their last; The first, in thorns of love, that sorrows past: And so most beautiful their colours show, As none (so little) like them; her sad brow A sable velvet feather covers quite, Even like the forehead-cloth that, in the night,

into] V. R. "in."

Ed. 1821.