Ovid - Metamorphoses: Book The SecondOvid - Metamorphoses: Book The Second
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And breathes a burning plague among their walls.
When Athens she beheld, for arts renown`d,
With peace made happy, and with plenty crown`d,
Scarce could the hideous fiend from tears forbear,
To find out nothing that deserv`d a tear.
Th` apartment now she enter`d, where at rest
Aglauros lay, with gentle sleep opprest.
To execute Minerva`s dire command,
She stroak`d the virgin with her canker`d hand,
Then prickly thorns into her breast convey`d,
That stung to madness the devoted maid:
Her subtle venom still improves the smart,
Frets in the blood, and festers in the heart.
To make the work more sure, a scene she drew,
And plac`d before the dreaming virgin`s view
Her sister`s marriage, and her glorious fate:
Th` imaginary bride appears in state;
The bride-groom with unwonted beauty glows:
For envy magnifies what-e`er she shows.
Full of the dream, Aglauros pin`d away
In tears all night, in darkness all the day;
Consum`d like ice, that just begins to run,
When feebly smitten by the distant sun;
Or like unwholsome weeds, that set on fire
Are slowly wasted, and in smoke expire.
Giv`n up to envy (for in ev`ry thought
The thorns, the venom, and the vision wrought)
Oft did she call on death, as oft decreed,
Rather than see her sister`s wish succeed,
To tell her awfull father what had past:
At length before the door her self she cast;
And, sitting on the ground with sullen pride,
A passage to the love-sick God deny`d.
The God caress`d, and for admission pray`d,
And sooth`d in softest words th` envenom`d maid.
In vain he sooth`d: "Begone!" the maid replies,
"Or here I keep my seat, and never rise."
"Then keep thy seat for ever," cries the God,
And touch`d the door, wide op`ning to his rod.
Fain would she rise, and stop him, but she found
Her trunk too heavy to forsake the ground;
Her joynts are all benum`d, her hands are pale,
And marble now appears in ev`ry nail.
As when a cancer in the body feeds,
And gradual death from limb to limb proceeds;
So does the chilness to each vital parte
Spread by degrees, and creeps into her heart;
`Till hard`ning ev`ry where, and speechless grown,
She sits unmov`d, and freezes to a stone.
But still her envious hue and sullen mien
Are in the sedentary figure seen.
Europa`s Rape When now the God his fury had allay`d,
And taken vengeance of the stubborn maid,
From where the bright Athenian turrets rise
He mounts aloft, and re-ascends the skies.
Jove saw him enter the sublime abodes,
And, as he mix`d among the crowd of Gods,
Beckon`d him out, and drew him from the rest,
And in soft whispers thus his will exprest.
"My trusty Hermes, by whose ready aid
Thy sire`s commands are through the world convey`d.
Resume thy wings, exert their utmost force,
And to the walls of Sidon speed thy course;
There find a herd of heifers wand`ring o`er
The neighb`ring hill, and drive `em to the shore."
Thus spoke the God, concealing his intent.
The trusty Hermes, on his message went,
And found the herd of heifers wand`ring o`er
A neighb`ring hill, and drove `em to the shore;
Where the king`s daughter, with a lovely train
Of fellow-nymphs, was sporting on the plain.
The dignity of empire laid aside,
(For love but ill agrees with kingly pride)
The ruler of the skies, the thund`ring God,
Who shakes the world`s foundations with a nod,
Among a herd of lowing heifers ran,
Frisk`d in a bull, and bellow`d o`er the plain.
Large rowles of fat about his shoulders clung,
And from his neck the double dewlap hung.
His skin was whiter than the snow that lies
Unsully`d by the breath of southern skies;
Small shining horns on his curl`d forehead stand,
As turn`d and polish`d by the work-man`s hand;
His eye-balls rowl`d, not formidably bright,
But gaz`d and languish`d with a gentle light.
His ev`ry look was peaceful, and exprest
The softness of the lover in the beast.
Agenor`s royal daughter, as she plaid
Among the fields, the milk-white bull survey`d,
And view`d his spotless body with delight,
And at a distance kept him in her sight.
At length she pluck`d the rising flow`rs, and fed
The gentle beast, and fondly stroak`d his head.
He stood well-pleas`d to touch the charming fair,
But hardly could confine his pleasure there.
And now he wantons o`er the neighb`ring strand,
Now rowls his body on the yellow sand;
And, now perceiving all her fears decay`d,
Comes tossing forward to the royal maid;
Gives her his breast to stroke, and downward turns
His grizly brow, and gently stoops his horns.
In flow`ry wreaths the royal virgin drest
His bending horns, and kindly clapt his breast.
`Till now grown wanton and devoid of fear,
Not knowing that she prest the Thunderer,
She plac`d her self upon his back, and rode
O`er fields and meadows, seated on the God.
He gently march`d along, and by degrees
Left the dry meadow, and approach`d the seas;
Where now he dips his hoofs and wets his thighs,
Now plunges in, and carries off the prize.
The frighted nymph looks backward on the shoar,
And hears the tumbling billows round her roar;
But still she holds him fast: one hand is born
Upon his back; the other grasps a horn:
Her train of ruffling garments flies behind,
Swells in the air, and hovers in the wind.
Through storms and tempests he the virgin bore,
And lands her safe on the Dictean shore;
Where now, in his divinest form array`d,
In his true shape he captivates the maid;
Who gazes on him, and with wond`ring eyes
Beholds the new majestick figure rise,
His glowing features, and celestial light,
And all the God discover`d to her sight.
The End of the Second Book.
Translated into English verse under the direction of
Sir Samuel Garth by John Dryden, Alexander Pope, Joseph Addison,
William Congreve and other eminent hands
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