To Jove the Eternal (power above all powers!

Who wings the winds, and darkens heaven with showers)

The flames ascend: till evening they prolong

The rites, more sacred made by heavenly song;

For in the midst, with public honours graced,

Thy lyre divine, Demodocus! was placed.

All, but Ulysses, heard with fix’d delight;

He sate, and eyed the sun, and wish’d the night;

Slow seem’d the sun to move, the hours to roll,

His native home deep-imaged in his soul.

As the tired ploughman, spent with stubborn toil,

Whose oxen long have torn the furrow’d soil,

Sees with delight the sun’s declining ray,

When home with feeble knees he bends his way

To late repast (the day’s hard labour done);

So to Ulysses welcome set the sun;

Then instant to Alcinous and the rest

(The Scherian states) he turn’d, and thus address’d:


“O thou, the first in merit and command!

And you the peers and princes of the land!

May every joy be yours! nor this the least,

When due libation shall have crown’d the feast,

Safe to my home to send your happy guest.

Complete are now the bounties you have given,

Be all those bounties but confirm’d by Heaven!

So may I find, when all my wanderings cease,

My consort blameless, and my friends in peace.

On you be every bliss; and every day,

In home-felt joys, delighted roll away;

Yourselves, your wives, your long-descending race,

May every god enrich with every grace!

Sure fix’d on virtue may your nation stand,

And public evil never touch the land!”


His words well weigh’d, the general voice approved

Benign, and instant his dismission moved,

The monarch to Pontonus gave the sign.

To fill the goblet high with rosy wine;

“Great Jove the Father first (he cried) implore;

Then send the stranger to his native shore.”


The luscious wine the obedient herald brought;

Around the mansion flow’d the purple draught;

Each from his seat to each immortal pours,

Whom glory circles in the Olympian bowers