But I, of mind elate, and scorning fear,
Thus with new taunts insult the monster's ear:
Cyclop! if any, pitying thy disgrace,
Ask, who disfigur'd thus that eyeless face?
Say 'twas Ulysses; 'twas his deed, declare,
Laertes' son, of Ithaca the fair;
Ulysses, far in fighting fields renown'd,
Before whose arm Troy tumbled to the ground.
Th' astonish'd savage with a roar replies:
Oh heavens! oh faith of ancient prophecies!
This, Telemus Eurymides foretold,
(The mighty seer who on these hills grew old;
Skill'd the dark fates of mortals to declare,
And learn'd in all wing'd omens of the air)
Long since he menac'd, such was fate's command;
And nam'd Ulysses as the destin'd hand.
I deem'd some godlike giant to behold,
Or lofty hero, haughty, brave, and bold;
Not this weak pigmy-wretch, of mean design,
Who not by strength subdued me, but by wine.
But come, accept our gifts, and join to pray
Great Neptune' blessing on the wat'ry way:
For his I am, and I the lineage own;
Th' immortal father no less boasts the son.
His power can heal me, and relight my eye;
And only his, of all the gods on high.
Oh! could this arm (I thus aloud rejoin'd) From that vast bulk dislodge thy bloody mind, And send thee howling to the realms of night! As sure, as Neptune cannot give thee sight.
Thus I: while raging he repeats his cries,
With hands uplifted to the starry skies.
Hear me, oh Neptune! thou whose arms are
hurl'd
From shore to shore, and gird the solid world.
If thine I am, nor thou my birth disown,
And if th' unhappy Cyclop be thy son;
Let not Ulysses breathe his native air,
Laertes' of Ithaca the fair.
son,
If to review his country be his fate,
Be it through toils and suff'rings, long and late,
His lost companions let him first deplore;
Some vessel, not his own, transport him o'er;
And when at home from foreign suff'rings freed,
More near and deep, domestic woes succeed!
With imprecations thus he fill'd the air,
And angry Neptune heard th' unrighteous prayer.
A larger rock then heaving from the plain,
He whirl'd it round: it sung across the main:
It fell, and brush'd the stern: the billows roar,
Shake at the weight, and refluent beat the shore.
With all our force we kept aloof to sea,
And gain'd the island where our vessels lay.
Our sight the whole collected navy cheer'd,
Who waiting long, by turns had hop'd and fear'd,
There disembarking on the green seaside,
We land our cattle, and the spoil divide:
Of these due shares to every sailor fall;
The master ram was voted mine by all:
And him (the guardian of Ulysses' fate,)
With pious mind to heaven I consecrate.
*This incident sufficiently shows the use of that dissimulation which enters into the character of Ulysses: if he had discovered his name, the Cyclops had destroyed him as his most dangerous enemy.
But the great god, whose thunder rends the skies,
Averse, beholds the smoking sacrifice;
And sees me wand'ring still from coast to coast;
And all my vessels, all my people, lost!
While thoughtless we indulge the genial rite,
As plenteous cates and flowing bowls invite;
Till evening Phoebus roll'd away the light:
Stretch'd on the shore in careless ease we rest,
Till ruddy morning purpled o'er the east.
Then from their anchors all our ships unbind,
And mount the decks, and call the willing wind.
Now rang'd in order on our banks, we sweep
With hasty strokes the hoarse-resounding deep;
Blind to the future, pensive with our fears,
Glad for the living, for the dead in tears.
FROM ULYSSES' NARRATION OF HIS DESCENT INTO
THUS in a tide of tears our sorrows flow, And add new horror to the realms of woe; Till, side by side, along the weary coast, Advanc'd Achilles' and Patroclus' ghost, A friendly pair! near these the Pylian* stray'd, And towering Ajax, an illustrious shade! War was his joy, and pleas'd with loud alarms, None but Pelides brighter shone in arms.
Through the thick gloom his friend Achilles
And, as he speaks, the tears descend in dew. "Com'st thou alive to view the Stygian bounds, Where the wan spectres walk eternal rounds; Nor fear'st the dark and dismal waste to tread, Throng'd with pale ghosts, familiar with the dead?"
To whom with sighs: "I pass these dreadful gates
To seek the Theban,† and consult the fates:
For still distress'd I rove from coast to coast,
Lost to my friends, and to my country lost.
But sure the eye of time beholds no name
So blest as thine in all the rolls of fame:
Alive we hail'd thee with our guardian gods,
And dead, thou rul'st a king in these abodes."
"Talk not of ruling in this dolorous gloom,
Nor think vain words" (he cried) "can ease my
doom.
Rather I choose laboriously to bear
A weight of woes, and breathe the vital air,
A slave to some poor hind that toils for bread,
Than reign the scepter'd monarch of the dead."
Now, without number, ghost by ghost arose,
All wailing with unutterable woes.
Alone, apart, in discontented mood,
A gloomy shade, the sullen Ajax stood;
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+ Contrast this gloomy picture with that of the Elysian plain in the fourth book:
Thee to the Elysian plain, earth's farthest end,
Where Rhadamanthus dwells, the gods shall send;
Where mortals easiest pass the careless hour;
No lingering winters there, nor snow, nor shower;
But ocean ever, to refresh mankind,
Breathes the shrill spirit of the western wind.
A. Moore.
For ever sad, with proud disdain he pin'd,
And the lost arms for ever stung his mind;
Though to the contest Thetis gave the laws,
And Pallas, by the Trojans, judg'd the cause.
O why was I victorious in the strife?
O dear-bought honour with so brave a life!
With him the strength of war, the soldier's pride,
Our second hope the great Achilles died.
Touch'd at the sight, I scarce my tears repress'd,
And thus, with soothing words, the ghost ad-
dress'd:
There dangling pears exalted scents unfold,
And yellow apples ripen into gold;
The fruit he strives to seize: but blasts arise,
Toss it on high, and whirl it to the skies.
I turn'd my eye, and as I turn'd survey'd
A mournful vision! the Sisyphian shade;
With many a weary step, and many a groan,
Up the high hill he heaves a huge round stone;
The huge round stone, resulting with a bound,
Thunders impetuous down, and smokes along
the ground.
"Still burns thy rage? And can brave souls Again the restless orb his toil renews,
E'en after death? Relent, great shade, relent!
Perish those arms, which, by the gods' decree,
Accurs'd our army with the loss of thee!
With thee we fell; Greece wept thy hapless
fates,
And shook, astonish'd, through her hundred states.
O deem thy fall not owed to man's decree;
Jove hated Greece, and punish'd Greece in thee!
Turn then, oh peaceful turn, thy wrath control,
And calm the raging tempest of thy soul."
While yet I speak, the shade disdains to stay,
In silence turns, and sullen stalks away.
Touch'd at his sour retreat, through deepest
night,
Dust mounts in clouds, and sweat descends in
dews.
Now I the strength of Hercules behold,
A towering spectre of gigantic mould,
A shadowy form! for high in heaven's abodes
Himself resides, a god among the gods;
There in the bright assemblies of the skies,
The nectar quaffs, and Hebe crowns his joys.
Here hovering ghosts, like fowl, his shade sur-
round,
And clang their pinions with terrific sound;
Gloomy as night he stands, in act to throw
Th' aerial arrow from the twanging bow.
Around his breast a wondrous zone is roll'd,
Where woodland monsters grin in fretted gold;
Through hell's black bounds, I had pursued his There sullen lions sternly seem to roar,
And forc'd the stubborn spectre to reply;
But other visions drew my curious eye.
High on a throne, tremendous to behold,
Stern Minos waves a mace of burnish'd gold;
Around ten thousand thousand spectres stand,
Through the wide dome of Dis, a trembling
band;
Whilst, as they plead, the fatal lots he rolls,
Absolves the just, and dooms the guilty souls.
There huge Orion, of portentous size,
Swift through the gloom, a giant-hunter, flies.
A ponderous mace of brass, with direful sway,
Aloft he whirls, to crush his savage prey;
Stern beasts, in trains, that by his truncheon fell,
Now grisly forms, shoot o'er the lawns of hell.
There Tityus large and long, in fetters bound,
O'erspreads nine acres of infernal ground;
Two ravenous vultures, furious for their food,
Scream o'er the fiend, and riot in his blood,
Incessant gore the liver in his breast,
Th immortal liver grows, and gives th' immortal
feast.
For as o'er Panope's enamell'd plains
Latona journey'd to the Pythian fanes,
With haughty love th' audacious monster strove
To force the goddess, and to rival Jove.
There Tantalus along the Stygian bounds
Pours out deep groans; (with groans all hell re-
Even in the circling flood refreshment craves,
And pines with thirst amidst a sea of waves:
When to the water he his lip applies,
Back from his lip the treach'rous water flies.
Above, beneath, around his hapless head,
Trees of all kinds delicious fruitage spread;
There figs sky-dyed, a purple hue disclose,
Green looks the olive, the pomegranate glows,
The bear to growl, to foam the tusky boar,
There war and havoc and destruction stood,
And vengeful murder red with human blood.
Thus terribly adorn'd the figures shine,
Inimitably wrought with skill divine.
The mighty ghost advanc'd with awful look,
And turning his grim visage, sternly spoke.
"O exercis'd in grief! by arts refin'd!
O taught to bear the wrongs of base mankind;
Such, such was I! still toss'd from care to care,
While in your world I drew the vital air;
Even I who from the lord of thunders rose,
Bore toils and dangers, and a weight of woes;
To a base monarch still a slave confin'd,
(The hardest bondage to a gen'rous mind!)
Down to these worlds I trod the dismal way,
And dragg'd the three-mouth'd dog to upper
day;
Even hell I conquer'd, through the friendly aid
Of Maia's offspring and the martial maid."
Thus he, nor deign'd for our reply to stay,
But turning stalk'd with giant strides away,
Curious to view the kings of ancient days,
The mighty dead that live in endless praise,
Resolv'd I stand; and haply had survey'd
The godlike Theseus, and Perithous' shade;
But swarms of spectres rose from deepest hell,
With bloodless visage, and with hideous yell,
sounds
They scream, they shriek; sad groans and dismal
Stun my scar'd ears, and pierce hell's utmost
bounds.
No more my heart the dismal din sustains,
And my cold blood hangs shivering in my veins;
Lest Gorgon rising from th' infernal lakes,
With horrors arm'd, and curls of hissing snakes,
Should fix me, stiffen'd at the monstrous sight,
A stony image, in eternal night!
THUS, near the gates, conferring as they drew, Argus, the dog, his ancient master knew; He, not unconscious of the voice, and tread, Lifts to the sound his ear, and rears his head; Bred by Ulysses, nourish'd at his board, But ah! not fated long to please his lord! To him his swiftness and his strength were vain;
The voice of glory call'd him o'er the main. Till then, in every sylvan chase renown'd, With Argus, Argus, rung the woods around; With him the youth pursued the goat or fawn, Or traced the mazy leveret o'er the lawn. Now left to man's ingratitude, he lay Unhoused, neglected, in the public way;
And where on heaps the rich manure was
Obscene with reptiles, took his sordid bed.
PENELOPE LAMENTING THE ABSENCE OF HER
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 doom'd a wakeful bird to wail the beaute-
ous boy-
So, in nocturnal solitude forlorn,
A sad variety of woes I mourn.
THE HOMERIC HYMNS.
THE Homeric Hymns have been considered by almost all modern critics-with the eminent exception of Hermann-as the productions of an age subsequent to that of Homer. Nevertheless
He knew his lord; he knew, and strove to it is certain that they are of very high antiquity,
In vain he strove, to crawl, and kiss his feet;
Soft pity touch'd the mighty master's soul;
Adown his cheek a tear unbidden stole,
Stole unperceiv'd; he turn'd his head, and
The drop humane, and thus impassion'd cried;
"What noble beast, in this abandon'd state,
Lies here all-helpless at Ulysses' gate?
His bulk and beauty speak no vulgar praise;
If, as he seems, he was in better days,
Some care his age deserves: or was he priz'd
For worthless beauty? therefore now despis'd!
Such dogs, and men, there are, mere things of
and were attributed to Homer by the ancients with almost as much confidence as the Iliad and Odyssey themselves. Thucydides, Diodorus Siculus, Pausanias, and many other old authors cite different verses from these Hymns, and treat them in every respect as genuine Homeric remains. Nor is it improbable that some of them, if not actually the works of Homer or of his age, yield only to them in remoteness of date.-See H. N. Coleridge's Introduction to Homer.
"THE Hymn to Mercury," (says Mr. Coleridge,) And always cherish'd by their friends, the great." "is one of the most diverting poems in the Greek
"Not Argus so," (Eumæus thus rejoin'd) "But serv'd a master of a nobler kind, Who never, never shall behold him more! Long, long since perish'd on a distant shore! Oh, had you seen him, vigorous, bold, and young,
Swift as a stag, and as a lion strong;
Him no fell savage on the plain withstood,
None 'scap'd him, bosom'd in the gloomy wood;
His eye how piercing, and his scent how true,
To winde the vapour in the tainted dew!
Such, when Ulysses left his natal coast,
Now years unnerve him and his lord is lost!
The women keep the generous creature bare,
A sleek and idle race is all their care:
The master gone, the servants what restrains?
Or dwells Humanity where Riot reigns?
Jove fix'd it certain that whatever day
Makes man a slave, takes half his worth away."
This said, the honest herdsman strode before: The musing monarch pauses at the door: The Dog, whom Fate had granted to behold His Lord, when twenty tedious years had roll'd, Takes a last look, and,-having seen him,-dies: -So closed for ever faithful Argus' eyes!
literature. It is pre-eminently humorous in the best sense of the word, and therefore essentially different from the wit and comic license of Aristophanes. This hymn is perfectly regular and connected throughout, and tells the whole story of Mercury's famous felony on the oxen of Apollo, the altercation of the two gods, their reference to Jupiter, and final compromise. That it should be honourable to a deity to be celebrated for such thieving and such ineffable lying as Mercury here plays off against the sagacious and truthloving Apollo, is a very curious characteristic of the popular religion of the Greeks; and, indeed, the matter is so managed by the poet, that most readers get fonder of this little born-rogue than of any other of the ancient dwellers on Olympus.
In this hymn Hermes is gifted with the character of a perfect Spanish Picaro, a sort of Lazarillo de Tormes amongst the gods, stealing their goods, playing them tricks, and telling such enormous, such immortal, lies to screen himself from detection, that certainly no human thief could ever have the vanity to think of rivalling them on earth.
Mercury was the son of Jupiter and Maia, and was born in a cave about day-break; by noon he
had made a lyre out of the shell of a tortoise which he caught crawling at the entrance of the cavern, and had learnt to play upon it; and that same evening he stole and drove away a matter of fifty cows belonging to Apollo and grazing on the Pierian hills. The description of the ancient lyre in this hymn, has been followed by almost all writers in mentioning the subject:
And through the stone-shell'd tortoise's strong
skin,
At proper distances small holes he made,
And fasten'd the cut stems of reeds within,
And with a piece of leather overlaid
The open space, and fixed the cubits in,
Fitting the bridge to both, and stretched o'er all
Symphonious chords of sheep-gut rythmical.
When he had wrought the lovely instrument,
He tried the chords, and made division meet,
Preluding with the plectrum, and there went
Up from beneath his hand a tumult sweet
Of mighty sounds, and from his lips he sent
A strain of unpremeditated wit
Joyous, and wild, and wanton-such you may
Hear among revellers on a holiday, &c. &c.
As to the cows, he makes them walk backward and does so himself, taking the additional precaution of throwing away his sandals and wrapping up his feet in the leafy twigs of shrubs. He meets one old labouring man, and recommends him to be blind and deaf to present objects, or he may suffer for it. When he comes to the Alpheus, he turns the cows into a meadow to feed, and kills and dresses two of them; and after extinguishing the fire, he creeps about the dawn into his cradle again. The whole description is very graphic and spirited.
Seeing, see not-and hearing, hear not-and-
If you have understanding-understand."
All night he worked in the serene moonshine;
But when the light of day was spread abroad,
He sought his natal mountain peaks divine.
On his long wandering, neither man nor god
Had met him, since he killed Apollo's kine,
Now he obliquely through the key-hole pass'd
Nor had a house-dog barked upon his road,
Like a thin mist, or an autumnal blast.
Right through the temple of the spacious cave
He went with soft light feet-as if his tread
Fell not on earth-no sound their falling gave;
Then to his cradle he crept quick, and spread
The swaddling clothes about him and the knave
Lay playing with the covering of his bed
With his right hand about his knees-the left
Held his beloved lyre.
His mother suspects him of some roguish adventure, and predicts that Apollo will discover and punish him severely; to all which expostulation he answers that he is determined to provide, by a due exercise of his talents, for the comfortable maintenance of his mother and himdisturbance about the cows, Mercury declares he self; and as for Apollo, if he should make any will immediately go and commit a burglary on the Pythian temple, and steal twice the value in tripods, and robes, and gold; and adds, that his mother might come and see him do it if she liked.
Meantime Apollo goes about in search of his cattle, and meeting with the old labouring man,
The author of this theft
Has stolen the fatted heifers every one;
But the four dogs and the black bull are left:-
He drove them wandering o'er the sandy Stolen last night they were at set of sun."
But, being ever mindful of his craft,
Backward and forward drove he them astray,
So that the tracks, which seemed before, went
His sandals then he threw to the ocean spray,
And for each foot he wrought a kind of raft
Of tamarisk, and tamarisk-like sprigs,
And bound them in a lump with withy twigs,
And on his feet he tied these sandals light,
He then, by inquiries and help of auguries, discovers that his brother of the half blood is the thief. He flies to Cyllene, though he is something puzzled by the extraordinary foot-marks in the sand at Pylos, and enters the cave. Mercury rolls himself up into a little ball, puts his head under the clothes, and pretends to be asleep. However, Apollo, after searching every hole and corner in the cave, and looking into Maia's ward
The trail of whose wide leaves might not robe and store-room, lights upon our little friend.
Where like an infant who had sucked his fill,
And now was newly washed, and put to bed,
Awake, but courting sleep with weary will,
And gathered in a lump, hands, feet, and head,
His track; and then, a self-sufficing wight,
Like a man hastening on some distant way,
He from Pieria's mountain bent his flight;
But an old man perceived the infant pass
Down green Orchestus, heaped like beds with He lay.
The old man stood dressing his sunny vine:
LL Halloo! old fellow with the crooked shoulder!
You grub those stumps! Before they will bear
wine
Methinks even you must grow a little older:
Attend, I pray, to this advice of mine,
Apollo taxes him with the theft, saying,
"Little cradled rogue declare
Of my illustrious heifers-where they are!
Speak quickly! or a quarrel straight 'twixt us
Must rise; and the event will be that I
Shall hurl you into dismal Tartarus,
As you would 'scape what might appal a In fiery gloom to dwell eternally:
Nor shall your father, nor your mother loose
The bars of that black dungeon-utterly
You shall be cast out from the light of day
To rule the ghosts of men-unblest as they!"
To whom thus Hermes slily answered:-"Son
Of great Latona, what a speech is this!
Why come you here to ask me what is done
With the wild oxen which it seems you miss?
I have not seen them, nor from any one
Have heard a word of the whole business;
If you should promise an immense reward,
I could not tell more than you now have heard.
An ox-stealer should be both tall and strong,
And I am but a little new-born thing,
Who, yet at least, can think of nothing wrong:
My business is to suck, and sleep, and fling
The cradle clothes about me all day long,
Or, half asleep, hear my sweet mother sing,
And to be washed in water clear and warm,
And hushed, and kissed, and kept secure from
O! let not e'er this quarrel be averred!
Th' astounded gods would laugh at you if e'er
You should allege a story so absurd,
As that a new-born infant forth could fare
Out of his house after a savage herd!
I was born yesterday; my small feet are
Too tender for the roads so hard and rough;
And if you think that this is not enough,
I swear a great oath, by my father's head,
That I stole not your cows, and that I know
Of no one else who might, or could, or did;
Whatever things cows are, I do not know,
For I have only heard the name." This said,
He winked as fast as could be, and his brow
Was wrinkled, and a whistle loud gave he,
Like one who hears some strange absurdity.
Apollo gently smiled and said:"Aye, aye,-
You cunning little rascal, you will bore
Many a rich man's house, and your array
Of thieves will lay their siege before his door
Silent as night, in night; and many a day
In the wild glens rough shepherds will deplore
That you or yours, having an appetite,
Met with their cattle, comrade of the night!
And this among the gods shall be your gift,
To be considered as the lord of those
Round both his ears, up from his shoulders drew His swaddling clothes, and-"What mean you to do
With me, you unkind god?" said Mercury:
"Is it about these cows you tease me so?
I wish the race of cows were perished I
Stole not your cows-I do not even know
What things cows are."
They both go to Olympus, where Apollo lays his complaint before Jupiter, and where Mercury makes the following defence:
"Great Father! you know clearly beforehand,
That all which I shall say to you is soothe;
I am a most veracious person, and
Totally unacquainted with untruth.
At sun-rise Phœbus came, but with no band
Of gods to bear him witness, in great ruth,
To my abode, seeking his heifers there,
And saying I must show him where they are,—
Or he would hurl me down the dask abyss!
I know that every Apollonian limb
Is clothed with speed, and might, and manliness.
As a green bank with flowers: but unlike him,
I was born yesterday, and you may guess
He well knew this, when he indulged the whim
Of bullying a poor little new-born thing
That slept, and never thought of cow-driving.
Am I like a strong fellow that steals kine?
Believe me, dearest father! (such you are)
This driving of the herds is none of mine;
Across my threshold did I wander ne'er,
So may I thrive! I reverence the divine
Sun and the gods, and I love you, and care
Even for this hard accuser, who must know
I am as innocent as they or you!
I swear by these most gloriously-wrought portals,
(It is, you will allow, an oath of might!)
Through which the multitude of the immortals
Pass and repass for ever, day and night,
Devising schemes for the affairs of worlds-
That I am guiltless; and I will requite,
Although my enemy be great and strong,
His cruel threat! Do thou defend the young!"
Mercury accompanies this speech with divers
winkings of the eye, and nods of the head to
Who swindle, house-break, sheep-steal, and shop- Jupiter, to let him know the exact state of the
But now if you would not your last sleep doze,
Crawl out!"-Thus saying, Phoebus did uplift
The subtle infant in his swaddling clothes,
And in his arms, according to his wont,
A scheme devised the illustrious Argiphont,
And sneezed and shuddered-Phœbus on the
Him threw, and whilst all that he had designed
He did perform-eager although to pass,
Apollo darted from his mighty mind
Towards the subtle babe the following scoff:
"Do not imagine this will get you off,
You little swaddled child of Jove and May!"
And seized him:-"By this omen I shall trace
My noble herds, and you shall lead the way."
Cyllenian Hermes from the grassy place,
Like one in earnest haste to get away,
Rose, and with hands lifted towards his face.
The end is, that Jove bursts into a violent fit of laughter, at hearing the roguish child "give such a plausible account, and every word a lie;" but intimates by a sign to Hermes, that he has done enough to establish his reputation, and that it is time he should now really discover the truth. Mercury obeys, leads Apollo to the place where the cows were concealed, and gratifies him with the gift of the lyre. Apollo is transported with delight at the possession of this instrument, and thereupon they swear eternal friendship.
"By far the most beautiful of the Homeric Hymns, (says Mr. Coleridge)—indeed for its length equal in beauty to any part of the Homeric poems-is the Hymn to Venus. No poet ever
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