“While yet he spoke, the prophet I obey’d,

And in the scabbard plunged the glittering blade:

Eager he quaff’d the gore, and then express’d

Dark things to come, the counsels of his breast.


“Weary of light, Ulysses here explores

A prosperous voyage to his native shores;

But know—by me unerring Fates disclose

New trains of dangers, and new scenes of woes.

I see, I see, thy bark by Neptune toss’d,

For injured Cyclops, and his eyeball lost!

Yet to thy woes the gods decree an end,

If Heaven thou please: and how to please attend

Where on Trinacrian rocks the ocean roars,

Graze numerous herds along the verdant shores;

Though hunger press, yet fly the dangerous prey,

The herds are sacred to the god of day,

Who all surveys with his extensive eye,

Above, below, on earth, and in the sky!

Rob not the god; and so propitious gales

Attend thy voyage, and impel thy sails:

But, if his herds ye seize, beneath the waves

I see thy friends o’erwhelm’d in liquid graves!

The direful wreck Ulysses scarce survives!

Ulysses at his country scarce arrives!

Strangers thy guides! nor there thy labours end;

New foes arise; domestic ills attend!

There foul adulterers to thy bride resort,

And lordly gluttons riot in thy court.

But vengeance hastes amain! These eyes behold

The deathful scene, princes on princes roll’d!

That done, a people far from sea explore,

Who ne’er knew salt, or heard the billows roar,

Or saw gay vessel stem the watery plain,

A painted wonder flying on the main!

Bear on thy back an oar: with strange amaze

A shepherd meeting thee, the oar surveys,

And names a van: there fix it on the plain,

To calm the god that holds the watery reign;

A threefold offering to his altar bring,

A bull, a ram, a boar; and hail the ocean king.

But home return’d, to each ethereal power

Slay the due victim in the genial hour:

So peaceful shalt thou end thy blissful days,

And steal thyself from life by slow decays: