They seize, they kill!—but for the rite divine.

The barley fail’d, and for libations wine.

Swift from the oak they strip the shady pride;

And verdant leaves the flowery cake supplied.


“With prayer they now address the ethereal train,

Slay the selected beeves, and flay the slain;

The thighs, with fat involved, divide with art,

Strew’d o’er with morsels cut from every part.

Water, instead of wine, is brought in urns,

And pour’d profanely as the victim burns.

The thighs thus offer’d, and the entrails dress’d,

They roast the fragments, and prepare the feast.


“‘Twas then soft slumber fled my troubled brain;

Back to the bark I speed along the main.

When lo! an odour from the feast exhales,

Spreads o’er the coast and scents the tainted gales;

A chilly fear congeal’d my vital blood,

And thus, obtesting Heaven, I mourn’d aloud;


“‘O sire of men and gods, immortal Jove!

O all ye blissful powers that reign above!

Why were my cares beguiled in short repose?

O fatal slumber, paid with lasting woes!

A deed so dreadful all the gods alarms,

Vengeance is on the wing, and Heaven in arms!’


“Meantime Lampetie mounts the aërial way,

And kindles into rage the god of day;


“‘Vengeance, ye powers (he cries), and then whose hand

Aims the red bolt, and hurls the writhen brand!

Slain are those herds which I with pride survey,

When through the ports of heaven I pour the day,

Or deep in ocean plunge the burning ray.

Vengeance, ye gods! or I the skies forego,

And bear the lamp of heaven to shades below.’


“To whom the thundering Power: ‘O source of day

Whose radiant lamp adorns the azure way,

Still may thy beams through heaven’s bright portal rise,

The joy of earth, the glory of the skies:

Lo! my red arm I bare, my thunders guide,

To dash the offenders in the whelming tide.’


“To fair Calypso, from the bright abodes,

Hermes convey’d these counsels of the gods.


“Meantime from man to man my tongue exclaims,