Fall’n e’en below the rights to woman due!

Careless to please, with insolence ye woo!

The generous lovers, studious to succeed,

Bid their whole herds and flocks in banquets bleed;

By precious gifts the vow sincere display:

You, only you, make her ye love your prey.”


Well-pleased Ulysses hears his queen deceive

The suitor-train, and raise a thirst to give:

False hopes she kindles, but those hopes betray,

And promise, yet elude, the bridal day.


While yet she speaks, the gay Antinous cries:

“Offspring of kings, and more than woman wise!

’Tis right; ’tis man’s prerogative to give,

And custom bids thee without shame receive;

Yet never, never, from thy dome we move,

Till Hymen lights the torch of spousal love.”


The peers despatch’d their heralds to convey

The gifts of love; with speed they take the way.

A robe Antinous gives of shining dyes,

The varying hues in gay confusion rise

Rich from the artist’s hand! Twelve clasps of gold

Close to the lessening waist the vest infold!

Down from the swelling loins the vest unbound

Floats in bright waves redundant o’er the ground,

A bracelet rich with gold, with amber gay,

That shot effulgence like the solar ray,

Eurymachus presents: and ear-rings bright,

With triple stars, that cast a trembling light.

Pisander bears a necklace wrought with art:

And every peer, expressive of his heart,

A gift bestows: this done, the queen ascends,

And slow behind her damsel train attends.


Then to the dance they form the vocal strain,

Till Hesperus leads forth the starry train;

And now he raises, as the daylight fades,

His golden circlet in the deepening shades:

Three vases heap’d with copious fires display

O’er all the palace a fictitious day;

From space to space the torch wide-beaming burns,

And sprightly damsels trim the rays by turns.


To whom the king: “Ill suits your sex to stay

Alone with men! ye modest maids, away!