The shining eye of this thy neighbouring monster ! CHORUS. Soon a crab the throat will seize Of him who feeds upon his guest,— Come, Maron, come! Raging let him fix the doom, Oh! I long to dance and revel With sweet Bromian, long desired, In loved ivy-wreaths attired, Leaving this abandoned home !— Will the moment ever come? Ulysses. Be silent, ye wild things! Nay, hold your peace, And keep your lips quite close; dare not to breathe, Or spit, or e'en wink, lest ye wake the monster, Until his eye be tortured out with fire. Chorus. Nay, we are silent, and we chaw the air. Ulysses. Come now, and lend a hand to the great stake Within-it is delightfully red-hot. Chorus. You then command who first should seize the stake To burn the Cyclops' eye, that all may share In the great enterprise. Semichorus I. We are too far ;1 We cannot at this distance from the door Thrust fire into his eye. Semichorus II. And we just now Have become lame; cannot move hand or foot. Chorus. The same thing has occurred to us ;-our ankles Ulysses. What, sprained with standing still? Or ashes in our eyes, I know not whence. And there is dust Ulysses. Cowardly dogs! ye will not aid me, then ? Chorus. With pitying my own back and my back-bone, And with not wishing all my teeth knocked out This cowardice comes of itself. But stay! I know a famous Orphic incantation To make the brand stick of its own accord Into the skull of this one-eyed Son of Earth. Ulysses. Of old I knew ye thus by nature; now Of my own comrades.-Yet, though weak of hand, The courage of my friends with your blithe words. Hasten and thrust ! Who feeds on his guest. Burn and blind The Etnean hind! Scoop and draw! But beware lest he claw Your limbs near his maw. Cyclops. Ah me! my eyesight is parched up to cinders! Chorus. What a sweet pæan! Sing me that again! Cyclops. Ah me! indeed, what woe has fallen upon me? But, wretched Nothings, think ye not to flee Out of this rock! I, standing at the outlet, Will bar the way, and catch you as you pass. Chorus. For you are wicked. I perish! And besides miserable. Chorus. What, did you fall into the fire when drunk? Cyclops. I wish you were as blind as I am! Chorus. It cannot be that no one made you blind. Nay, Cyclops. You jeer me; where, I ask, is Nobody? Cyclops. It was that stranger ruined me !—the wretch First gave me wine, and then burnt out my eye, For wine is strong and hard to struggle with. Have they escaped, or are they yet within? Chorus. They stand under the darkness of the rock, And cling to it. Cyclops. At my right hand or left? Where? Chorus. Near the rock itself. You have them. Oh misfortune on misfortune! Now they escape you there. Not on that side. They creep about you on your left. Chorus. Cyclops. Not there, although you say so. Cyclops. Where then? Cyclops. Ah! I am mocked! They jeer me in my ills. I keep with care this body of Ulysses. Far from you Cyclops. What do you say? You proffer a new name. A full revenge for your unnatural feast; I should have done ill to have burned down Troy, And not revenged the murder of my comrades. Cyclops. Ai! ai! the ancient oracle is accomplished; It said that I should have my eyesight blinded By you coming from Troy; yet it foretold 1819. That you should pay the penalty for this Ulysses. I bid thee weep!-Consider what I say; I go towards the shore, to drive my ship To mine own land o'er the Sicilian wave. Cyclops. Not so, if whelming you with this huge stone I can crush you and all your men together! I will descend upon the shore, though blind, Groping my way adown the steep ravine. Chorus. And we, the shipmates of Ulysses now, EPIGRAMS FROM THE GREEK. 1.-SPIRIT OF PLATO. "EAGLE! why soarest thou above that tomb? To what sublime and star-ypaven home Floatest thou?" "I am the image of swift Plato's spirit, Ascending heaven :-Athens doth inherit His corpse below." II. CIRCUMSTANCE. A MAN who was about to hang himself, The halter found, and used it. So is hope FROM PLATO. I. TO STELLA. THOU wert the Morning Star among the living, Ere thy fair light had fled ; Now, having died, thou art as Hesperus, giving New splendour to the dead. II. KISSING Helena, together With my kiss, my soul beside it Came to my lips, and there I kept it,— For the poor thing had wandered thither, To follow where the kiss should guide it. Oh cruel I to intercept it ! |