“What shall I do? unhappy me! who knows

But other gods intend me other woes?

Whoe’er thou art, I shall not blindly join

Thy pleaded reason, but consult with mine:

For scarce in ken appears that distant isle

Thy voice foretells me shall conclude my toil.

Thus then I judge: while yet the planks sustain

The wild waves’ fury, here I fix’d remain:

But, when their texture to the tempest yields,

I launch adventurous on the liquid fields,

Join to the help of gods the strength of man,

And take this method, since the best I can.”


While thus his thoughts an anxious council hold,

The raging god a watery mountain roll’d;

Like a black sheet the whelming billows spread,

Burst o’er the float, and thunder’d on his head.

Planks, beams, disparted fly; the scatter’d wood

Rolls diverse, and in fragments strews the flood.

So the rude Boreas, o’er the field new-shorn,

Tosses and drives the scatter’d heaps of corn.

And now a single beam the chief bestrides:

There poised a while above the bounding tides,

His limbs discumbers of the clinging vest,

And binds the sacred cincture round his breast:

Then prone an ocean in a moment flung,

Stretch’d wide his eager arms, and shot the seas along.

All naked now, on heaving billows laid,

Stern Neptune eyed him, and contemptuous said:


“Go, learn’d in woes, and other foes essay!

Go, wander helpless on the watery way;

Thus, thus find out the destined shore, and then

(If Jove ordains it) mix with happier men.

Whate’er thy fate, the ills our wrath could raise

Shall last remember’d in thy best of days.”


This said, his sea-green steeds divide the foam,

And reach high Ægæ and the towery dome.

Now, scarce withdrawn the fierce earth-shaking power,

Jove’s daughter Pallas watch’d the favouring hour.

Back to their caves she bade the winds to fly;

And hush’d the blustering brethren of the sky.

The drier blasts alone of Boreas away,

And bear him soft on broken waves away;