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THE

SPAWN OF IXION;


OR,

The 'Biter Bit.'


AN

ALLEGORY.


FORGE OF VULCAN.

1846.




THE SPAWN OF IXION.


When Ixion from heaven was hurl'd
To hell, to be for ever whirl'd
In a perpetual damning wheel,
The pit's eternal pains to feel;
'Twas for a bestial, vulgar deed,
Whereby that mortal did succeed
In sinking Juno to the sod--
Seducing e'en that beaut'ous god!
Abomination foul, was this,
To ruin lovely Juno's bliss!--
To raise in heaven domestic strife,
'Twixt Jupiter and his lov'd wife!--
With sins that never were forgiven,
To scandalize the court of heaven!
When Jupiter in pity took
This wretch to heaven, on earth forsook,
He was a vile contempt'ous thing,
Despised by peasant, prince and king;
A wand'ring vagrant, shun'd and curst,
For sending AEneus to the dust.
The aged father of his wife,
Base Ixion deprived of life!
Into a pit of burning fire
He cast poor AEneus to expire!--
And, while this cruel, murd'rous knave,
For sending AEneus to his grave,
From every circle under heaven
With scorn contemptuous, was driven,
This wretched outcast, here forsaken,
By Jupiter, was kindly taken
Into the realms above the skies,
And introduced to deities!
E'en at the tables of the gods
He set this scoundrel of the clods!
Such heavenly condescension should
Inspire a mortal's gratitude:
In Ixion's base and blacken'd breast
Some thankfulness should even rest.
His heart, though steep'd in every deed
Of darkness, in the devil's creed--
In every sin that stains the earth,
Or blackens hell, which gave it birth,
Should now have felt a kindly glow
For what great Jupiter did do.
  But Ixion did only feel
A base desire at once to steal
The heart of Juno, and to tread
On Jupiter's celestial bed!
He had an intrigue with the cloud
Of Juno, which the gods allow'd;
And thus the monstrous Centaur came
From Ixion's and Juno's shame.
But Jupiter with thunder hurl'd
The villain from the heavenly world,--
Sent him to hell fore'er to feel
The ceaseless torments of the wheel.
But his vile offspring stays behind,
The bane and curse of human kind,--
Possessing still the bestial fire,
Which deep disgraced and damn'd the sire:
The same inglorious meanness strays
In the vile veins and verse and lays
Of him, on crutches, devil half,
(At whom his kindred centaurs laugh,)
In that deformity of hell.
On whom its attributes have fell,
In him, whose shameless, wicked life
Is with abomination rife,
Whose works, thrice damn'd and doubly dead,
The produce of conceit and lead,
Possess no other aim nor end
But foul abuse of foe and friend.
His heart, polluted with the dung
Of demons damn'd, from hell out flung,
Is rotten to the core with lies,
From which foul slanders thickly rise.
His soul, most pitiful and mean,
Infected with hell-scorch'd gangrene,
No kind, redeeming trait contains,
But reeks with bestial blots and stains.
His mind, with vulgar vice imbued,
Libidinous and low and lewd,
Deep stained with malice, hate and spleen,
With sentiments supremely mean,
Is bent on mischief, foul as hell,
O'er which the hideous Centaurs yell.
Low was his birth and low his name,
Low is his life, and low his fame;
But lower still the depths of wo,
Where Park, when dead and damn'd, must go.
Friends, foes or fiends, alike he fights,
In all he says, or sings, or writes.
This foul defamer, crawling round
The brink of hell, to catch its sound,
Exsudes it thence, in doleful rhyme,
Debased and reeking rank with crime.
  On this deformity of man,
More monstrous than the bastard Pan,
Pegasus turn'd his nimble feet,
As Park, on crutches, crawl'd the street;
Urging that steed, against his will,
To bear him up Helicon's hill.
But Pegasus, a knowing horse,
Perceived that Park's conceited verse
Was only suited to the stews
Of hell, whence emanates his muse.
He, therefore, with Bellerophon,
Left him behind, well trampled on,
To tune a pilfer'd, broken lyre,
In fields of mud, and muck, and mire;
And there, his song most lowly set,
Winding through marshes, undulcet,
Contending always with the fog,
Unable e'er to flee the bog,
Does