As ghastly pale he groans, and faints and dies;

Close to his breast she grovels on the ground,

And bathes with floods of tears the gaping wound;

She cries, she shrieks: the fierce insulting foe

Relentless mocks her violence of woe:

To chains condemn’d, as wildly she deplores;

A widow, and a slave on foreign shores.


So from the sluices of Ulysses’ eyes

Fast fell the tears, and sighs succeeded sighs:

Conceal’d he grieved: the king observed alone

The silent tear, and heard the secret groan;

Then to the bard aloud: “O cease to sing,

Dumb be thy voice, and mute the tuneful string;

To every note his tears responsive flow,

And his great heart heaves with tumultuous woe;

Thy lay too deeply moves: then cease the lay,

And o’er the banquet every heart be gay:

This social right demands: for him the sails,

Floating in air, invite the impelling gales:

His are the gifts of love: the wise and good

Receive the stranger as a brother’s blood.


“But, friend, discover faithful what I crave;

Artful concealment ill becomes the brave:

Say what thy birth, and what the name you bore,

Imposed by parents in the natal hour?

(For from the natal hour distinctive names,

One common right, the great and lowly claims:)

Say from what city, from what regions toss’d,

And what inhabitants those regions boast?

So shalt thou instant reach the realm assign’d,

In wondrous ships, self-moved, instinct with mind;

No helm secures their course, no pilot guides;

Like man intelligent, they plough the tides,

Conscious of every coast, and every bay,

That lies beneath the sun’s all-seeing ray;

Though clouds and darkness veil the encumber’d sky,

Fearless through darkness and through clouds they fly;

Though tempests rage, though rolls the swelling main,

The seas may roll, the tempests rage in vain;

E’en the stern god that o’er the waves presides,

Safe as they pass, and safe repass the tides,

With fury burns; while careless they convey