The whistling winds already waked the sky;

Before the whistling winds the vessels fly,

With rapid swiftness cut the liquid way,

And reach Gerestus at the point of day.

There hecatombs of bulls, to Neptune slain,

High-flaming please the monarch of the main.

The fourth day shone, when all their labours o’er,

Tydides’ vessels touched the wish’d-for shore.

But I to Pylos scud before the gales,

The god still breathing on my swelling sails;

Separate from all, I safely landed here;

Their fates or fortunes never reach’d my ear.

Yet what I learn’d, attend; as here I sat,

And ask’d each voyager each hero’s fate;

Curious to know, and willing to relate.


“Safe reach’d the Myrmidons their native land,

Beneath Achilles’ warlike son’s command.

Those, whom the heir of great Apollo’s art,

Brave Philoctetes, taught to wing the dart;

And those whom Idomen from Ilion’s plain

Had led, securely cross’d the dreadful main

How Agamemnon touch’d his Argive coast,

And how his life by fraud and force he lost,

And how the murderer, paid his forfeit breath;

What lands so distant from that scene of death

But trembling heard the fame? and heard, admire.

How well the son appeased his slaughter’d sire!

Ev’n to the unhappy, that unjustly bleed,

Heaven gives posterity, to avenge the deed.

So fell Ægysthus; and mayest thou, my friend,

(On whom the virtues of thy sire descend,)

Make future times thy equal act adore,

And be what brave Orestes was before!”


The prudent youth replied: “O thou the grace

And lasting glory of the Grecian race!

Just was the vengeance, and to latest days

Shall long posterity resound the praise.

Some god this arm with equal prowess bless!

And the proud suitors shall its force confess;

Injurious men! who while my soul is sore

Of fresh affronts, are meditating more.

But Heaven denies this honour to my hand,

Nor shall my father repossess the land;

The father’s fortune never to return,