The suitor’s death, unknown, till we remove

Far from the court, and act inspired by Jove.”


Thus spoke the king: the observant train obey,

At once they bathe, and dress in proud array:

The lyrist strikes the string; gay youths advance,

And fair-zoned damsels form the sprightly dance.

The voice, attuned to instrumental sounds,

Ascends the roof, the vaulted roof rebounds;

Not unobserved: the Greeks eluded say,

“Lo! the queen weds, we hear the spousal lay!

Inconstant! to admit the bridal hour.”

Thus they—but nobly chaste she weds no more.


Meanwhile the wearied king the bath ascends;

With faithful cares Eurynome attends,

O’er every limb a shower of fragrance sheds;

Then, dress’d in pomp, magnificent he treads.

The warrior-goddess gives his frame to shine

With majesty enlarged, and grace divine.

Back from his brows in wavy ringlets fly

His thick large locks of hyacinthine dye.

As by some artist to whom Vulcan gives

His heavenly skill, a breathing image lives;

By Pallas taught, he frames the wondrous mould,

And the pale silver glows with fusile gold:

So Pallas his heroic form improves

With bloom divine, and like a god he moves!

More high he treads, and issuing forth in state,

Radiant before his gazing consort sate.

“And, O my queen! (he cries) what power above

Has steel’d that heart, averse to spousal love?

Canst thou, Penelope, when heaven restores

Thy lost Ulysses to his native shores,

Canst thou, O cruel! unconcern’d survey

Thy lost Ulysses, on this signal day?

Haste, Euryclea, and despatchful spread

For me, and me alone, the imperial bed,

My weary nature craves the balm of rest.

But Heaven with adamant has arm’d her breast.”


“Ah no! (she cries) a tender heart I bear,

A foe to pride: no adamant is there;

And now, e’en now it melts! for sure I see

Once more Ulysses my beloved in thee!

Fix’d in my soul, as when he sailed to Troy,

His image dwells: then haste the bed of joy,