Her Hero's danger touch'd the pitying Power,
The nymph's feducements, and the magic bower.
Thus the began her plaint: Immortal Jove!
And you who fill the blissful feats above!
Let kings no more with gentle mercy sway,
Or blefs a people willing to obey,
But crush the nations with an iron rod,
And every monarch be the fcourge of God:
If from your thoughts Ulyffes you remove,
Who rul'd his fubjects with a father's love.
Sole in an ifle, encircled by the main,
Abandon'd, banish'd from his native reign,
Unbleft he fighs, detain'd by lawless charms,
And prefs'd unwilling in Calypfo's arms.
Nor friends are there, nor vellels to convey,
Nor oars to cut th' immeafurable way.
And now fierce traitors, ftudious to destroy
His only fon, their ambush'd fraud employ;
Who, pious, following his great father's fame,
To facred Pylos and to Sparta came.

What words are thefe, (reply'd the Power who forms

The clouds of night, and darkens Heaven with
Is not already in thy foul decreed, [ftorms)
The chief's return fhall make the guilty bleed?
What cannot wisdom do? Thou may'it reftore
The fon in fafety to his native fhore;
While the fell foes, who late in ambush lay,
With fraud defeated, measure back their way.
Then thus to Hermes the command was given
Hermes, thou chofen meffenger of heaven!
Go, to the nymph be thefe our orders borne:
'Tis Jove's decree, Ulyffes fhall return:
The patient man fhall view his old abodes,
Nor help'd by mortal hand, nor guiding Gods:
In twice ten days fhall fertile Sheria find,
Alone, and floating to the wave and wind.
The bold Phracians there, whofe haughty line
Is mix'd with Gods, half human, half divine,
The chief fhall honour as fome heavenly gucft,
And fwift tranfport him to his place of reft.
His veffels loaded with a plenteous store
Of brafs, of veftures, and refplendent ore
A richer prize than if his joyful ifle
Receiv'd him charg'd with Ilion's noble spoil).
His friends, his country, he fhall fee, though late;
Such is our fovereign will, and fuch is fate.
He spoke. The God who mounts the winged
winds

Faft to his feet the golden pinions binds,
That high through fields of air his fight fuftain
O'er the wide earth, and o'er the boundless main.
He grafps the wand that caufes fleep to fly,
Or in foft lumber feals the wakeful eye :
Then fhoots from heaven to high Pieria's steep,
And ftoops incumbent on the rolling deep.
So watery fowl, that feek their fifhy food,
With wings expanded o'er the foaming flood,
Now failing fmooth the level furface sweep,
Now dip their pinions in the briny deep.
Thus o'er the world of waters Hermes flew,
Till now the diftant island rose in view:
Then, fwift afcending from the azure wave,
He took the path that winded to the cave.
Large was the grot, in which the nymph he
found
[crown'd);
The fair-hair'd nymph with every beauty

She fate, and fung: the rocks refound her lays;
The cave was brighten'd with a rifing blaze:
Cedar and frankincenfe, an odorous pile,
Flam'd on the hearth, and wide perfum'd the isle;
While fhe with work and fong the time divides,
And through the loom the golden fhuttle guides.
Without the grot a various fylvan scene
Appear'd around, and groves of living green;
Poplars and alders ever quivering play'd,
And nodding cyprefs form'd a fragrant shade;
On whofe high branches, waving with the ftorm,
The birds of broadeft wing their mansion form,
The chough, the fea-mew, the loquacious crow,
And scream aloft, and fkim the deeps below.
Depending vines the shelving caverns fcreen,
With purple clusters blushing through the green.
Four limpid fountains from the clefts diftil;
And every fountain pours a feveral rill,

า

In mazy windings wandering down the hill: S Where bloomy meads with vivid greens were crown'd,

And glowing violets threw odours round.
A fcene, where if a God fhould caft his fight,
A God might gaze; and wander with delight!
Joy touch'd the meffenger of heaven: he itay'd
Entranc'd, and all the blissful haunt furvey'd.
Him, entering in the cave, Calypfo knew;
For Powers celeftial to each other's view
Stand still confeft, though distant far they lie
To habitants of earth, or fea, or sky.
But fad Ulyffes, by himself apart,
Pour'd the big forrows of his fwelling heart;
All on the lonely fhore he fate to weep,
And roll'd his eyes around the restless deep;
Tow'rd his lov'd coast he roll'd his eyes in vain,
Till, dimm'd with rising grief, they stream'd 3-
gain.

Now graceful feated on her fhining throne,
To Hermes thus the nymph divine begun :

God of the golden wand! on what beheft Arriv'st thou here, an unexpected gueft? Lov'd as thou art, thy free injunctions lay; 'Tis mine with joy and duty to obey. Till now a ftranger, in a happy hour Approach, and taste the dainties of my bower. Thus having fpoke, the nymph the table ipread (Ambrosial cates, with nectar rofy-red); Hermes the hofpitable rite partook, Divine refection! then, recruited, spoke :

What mov'd this journey from my native sky,
A Goddess asks, nor can a God deny :
Hear then the truth. By mighty Jove's command,
Unwilling, have I trod this pleasing land;
For who, felf-mov'd, with weary wing would
sweep

Such length of ocean and unmeasur'd deep:
A world of waters far from all the ways
Where men frequent, or facred altars blaze?
But to Jove's will fubmiftion we must pay;
What power fo great, to dare to difobey?
A man, he fays, a man refides with thee,
Of all his kind moft worn with mifery:
The Greeks (whofe arms for nine long years en-
ploy'd

Their force in Ilion, in the tenth deftroy'd)
At length embarking in a luckless hour,
With conqueft proud, incens'd Minerva's power:

Hence on the guilty race her vengeance huri'd, With forms purfued them through the liquid world.

There all his veffels funk beneath the wave!
There all his dear companions found their grave!
Sav'd from the jaws of death by Heaven's decree,
The tempeft drove him to these shores and thee.
Him Jove now orders to his native lands
Straight to difmifs; so destiny commands:
Impatient Fate his near return attends,
And calls him to his country and his friends.
Ev'n to her inmoft foul the Goddess shook;
Then thus her anguish and her passion broke:
Ungracious Gods! with fpite and envy curft!
Still to your own ethereal race the worst!
Ye envy mortal and nmortal joy,
And love, the only iweet of life, destroy.
Did ever Goddess by her charms engage
A favour'd mortal, and not feel your rage?
So when Aurora fought Orion's love,
Her joys difturb'd your blissful hours above,
Till, in Ortygia, Dian's winged dart
Had pierc'd the hapless hunter to the heart.
So when the covert of the thrice-ear'd field
Saw ftately Ceres to her paffion yield,
Scarce could Täfion tafte her heavenly charms,
But Jove's fwift lightning fcorch'd him in her

arms.

And is it now my turn, ye mighty Powers!
Am I the envy of your biifsful bowers?
A man, an outcaft to the ftorm and wave,
It was my crime to pity, and to fave;

When he who thunders rent his bark in twain,
And funk his brave companions in the main.
Alone, abandon'd, in mid ocean toft,

The fport of winds, and driven from every coast,
Hither this man of miferies I led,
Receiv'd the friendlefs, and the hungry fed;
Nay promis'd (vainly promis'd) to bestow
Immortal life, exempt from age and woe.
'Tis paft-and Jove decrees he fhall remove;
Gods as we are, we are but flaves to Jove.
Go then he may (he muft, if He ordain,
Try all thofe dangers, all thofe deeps, again):
But never, never shall Calypfo fend

To toils like thefe, her husband and her friend.
What fhips have I, what failors to convey,
What oars to cut the long laborious way?
Yet, I'll direct the fafeft means to go:
That laft advice is all I can beftow.

To her, the Power who bears the charming
rod:

Difmifs the man, nor irritate the God;
Prevent the rage of him who reigns above,
For what fo dreadful as the wrath of Jove?
Thus having faid, he cut the cleaving sky,
And in a moment vanifh'd from her eye.
The nymph, obedient to divine command,
To feek Ulyffes, pac'd along the fand.
Him penfive on the lonely beach the found,
With ftreaming eyes in briny torrents drown'd,
And inly pining for his native shore:

For now the foft enchantress pleas'd no more:
For now, reluctant, and constrain'd by charms,
Abfent he lay in her defiring arms,

In fumber wore the heavy night away,
On rocks and thores confum'd the tedious day;

There fate all defolate, and figh'd alone,
With echoing forrows made the mountains groan
And roll'd his eyes o'er all the restless main,
Till, dimm'd with rifing grief, they stream'd a
gain.

Here, on his mufing mood the Goddess preft,
Approaching foft; and thus the chief addreft:
Unhappy man! to waiting woes a prey,
No more in forrows languish life away:
Free as the winds I give thee now to rove--
Go, fell the timber of yon lofty grove,
And form a raft, and build the rifing fhip,
Sublime to bear thee o'er the gloomy deep.
To store the veffel, let the care be mine,
With water from the rock, and rofy wine,
And life-fuftaining bread, and fair array,
And profperous gales to waft thee on the way.
Thefe, if the Gods with my defires comply,
(The Gods, alas! more mighty far than L,
And better fkill'd in dark events to come)
In peace fhall land thee at thy native home.

With fighs, Ulyffes heard the words the spoke
Then thus his melancholy filence broke:
Some other motive, Goddefs! fways thy mind,
(Some clofe defign, or turn of womankind)
Nor my return the end, nor this the way,
On a flight raft to pafs the fwelling fea,
Huge, horrid, vaft! where scarce in fafety fails
The beft-built fhip, though Jove infpire the gales
The bold propofal how fhall I fulfil,
Dark as I am, unconscious of thy will?
Swear then thou mean'ft not what my foul fore-
bodes;

Swear by the folemu oath that binds the Gods.

Him, while he fpoke, with fmiles Calypfo ey'd, And gently grafp'd his hand, and thus reply'd: This shows thee, friend, by old experience taught And learn'd in all the wiles of human thought, How prone to doubt, how cautious are the wife? But hear, O earth and hear ye facred skies? And thou, O Styx! whose formidable floods Glide through the fhades, and bind th' attefting Gods!

No form'd defign, no meditated end,
Lurks in the counsel of thy faithful friend;
Kind the perfuafion, and fincere my aim;
The fame my practice, were my fate the fame.
Heaven has not curft me with a heart of steel,
But given the fenfe, to pity and to feel.

Thus having faid, the Goddess march'd before:
He trod her footsteps in the fandy fhore.
At the cool cave arriv'd, they took their state;
He fill'd the throne where Mercury had fate.
For him the nymph a rich repaft ordains,
Such as the mortal life of man fuftains;
Before herself were plac'd the cates divine,
Ambrofial banquet, and celeftial wine.
Their hunger fatiate, and their thirst repreft,
Thus fpoke Calypfo to her godlike guest:

Ulyffes! (with a figh fhe thus began)

O fprung from Gods! in wifdom more than man;
Is then thy home the paffion of thy heart?
Thus wilt thou leave me, are we thus to part?
Farewell! and ever joyful may'it thou be,
Nor break the transport with one thought of me.
But ah, Ulyffes! wert thou given to know
What Fate yet dooms thee, yet, to undergo

Thy heart might fettle in this fcene of eafe,
And ev'n thefe flighted charms might learn to
pleafe.

A willing Goddess and immortal life
Might banish from thy mind an abfent wife.
Am I inferior to a mortal dame?

Lefs foft my feature, lefs auguft my frame?
Or fhall the daughters of mankind compare
Their earth-born beauties with the heavenly fair?
Alas! for this (the prudent man replies)
Against Ulyffes fhall thy anger rife?
Lov'd and ador'd, oh Goddefs! as thou art,
Forgive the weakness of a human heart.
Though well I fee thy graces far above
The dear, though mortal, object of my love,
Of youth eternal well the difference know,
And the short date of fading charms below;
Yet every day, while abfent thus I roam,
I languish to return and die at home.
Whate'er the Gods fhall deftine me to bear
In the black ocean, or the watery war,
'Tis mine to master with a constant mind;
Enur'd to perils, to the worst refign'd.
By feas, by wars, so many dangers run,
Still I can fuffer: their high will be done!

Thus while he spoke, the beamy fun defcends
And rifing night her friendly shade extends.
To the clofe grot the lonely pair remove,
And slept delighted with the gifts of love.
When rofy morning call'd them from their rest,
Ulyffes rob'd him in the cloak and veft.
The nymph's fair head a veil transparent grac'd,
Her fwelling loins a radiant zone embrac'd
With flowers of gold: an under robe, unbound,
In fnowy waves flow'd glittering on the ground.
Forth iffuing thus, the gave him first to wield
A weighty axe with trueft temper steel'd,
And double edg'd; the handle smooth and plain,
Wrought of the clouded olive's easy grain;
And next, a wedge to drive with iweepy fway:
Then to the neighbouring forest led the way.
On the lone ifland's utmost verge there stood
Of poplars, pines, and firs, a lofty wood,
Whofe leaflefs fummits to the skies afpire,
Scorch'd by the fun, or fear'd by heavenly fire
(Already dry'd). These pointing out to view,
The nymph juft fhow'd him, and with tears with-
drew.

Now toils the hero; trees on trees o'erthrown
Fall crackling round him, and the foreft groan:
Sudden, full twenty on the plain are strow'd,
And lopp'd, and lighten'd of their branchy load.
At equal angles thefe difpos'd to join, [line.
He fmooth'd and fquar'd them, by the rule and
(The wimbles for the work Calypfo found)
With thofe he pierc'd them, and with clinchers
bound.

Long and capacious as a shipwright forms
Some bark's broad bottom to out-ride the ftorms,
So large he built the raft: then ribb'd it strong
From space to space, and nail'd the planks along;
These form'd the fides: the deck he fashion'd laft;
Then o'er the veffel rais'd the taper mast,
With croffing fail-yards dancing in the wind;
And to the helm the guiding rudder join'd
(With yielding ofiers fenc'd, to break the force
Of turging waves, and Beer the steady courfe),

Thy loom, Calypfo! for the future fails
Supply'd the cloth, capacious of the gales.
With stays and cordage laft he rigg'd the flip,
And, roll'd on levers, launch'd her in the deep.
Four days were paft, and now the work com-
plete,

Shone the fifth morn: when from her facred feat
The nymph dismiss'd him, (odorous garments giv
en)
[Heaven:
And bath'd in fragrant oils that breath'd of
Then fill'd two goat-skins with her hands divine,
With water one, and one with sable wine:
Of every kind, provifions heav'd aboard;
And the full decks with copious viands stor❜d.
The Goddess, laft, a gentle breeze supplies,
To curl old ocean, and to warm the skies.

And now, rejoicing in the profperous gales,
With beating heart, Ulyffes fpreads his fails;
Plac'd at the helm he fate, and mark'd the skies,
Nor clos'd in fleep his ever-watchful eyes.
There view'd the Pleiads, and the Northern Team,
And great Orion's more refulgent beam,
To which, around the axle of the sky
The Bear, revolving, points his golden eye:
Who fhines exalted on th' ætherial plain,
Nor bathes his blazing forehead in the main.
Far on the left thofe radiant fires to keep
The nymph directed, as he fail'd the deep.
Full feventeen nights he cut the foamy way:
The diftant land appear'd the following day:
Then fwell'd to fight Phæacia's dusky coaft,
And woody mountains, half in vapours loft:
That lay before him, indiftinct and vast,
Like a broad fhield amid the watery wafte.

But him, thus voyaging the deeps below, From far, on Solyme's aërial brow, The King of Ocean faw, and seeing burn'd (From Ethiopia's happy climes return'd ;) The raging monarch fhook his azure head, And thus in fecret to his foul he faid: Heavens! how uncertain are the Powers oa

high?

Is then revers'd the fentence of the sky,
In one man's favour; while a distant guest
I fhar'd fecure the Ethiopian feast?
Behold how near Phæacia's land he draws!

The land, affix'd by Fate's eternal laws
To end his toils. Is then our anger vain?
No; if this fceptre yet commands the main.

He fpoke, and high the forky trident hurl'd
Rolls clouds on clouds, and ftirs the watery world,
At once the face of earth the fea deforms,
Swells all the winds, and roufes all the ftorms.
Down rush'd the night: east, weft, together roar;
And fouth, and north, roll mountains to the shore;
Then hook the hero, to despair refign'd,
And question'd thus his yet unconquer'd mind:

Wretch that I am! what farther fates attend This life of toils, and what my deftin'd end? Too well, alas! the Iland Goddess knew, On the black fea what perils fhould enfue. New horrors now this deitin'd head enclose; Unfill'd is yet the meafure of my woes; With what a cloud the brows of heaven are crown'd; What raging winds! what roaring waters round! 'Tis Jove himself the fwelling tempefts rears; Death, prefent death, on every fide appears.

Happy! thrice happy! who, in battle flain,
Preft, in Atrides' caufe, the Trojan plain :
Oh! had I dy'd before that well-fought wall;
Had fome diftinguish'd day renown'd my fall
(Such as was that, when thowers of javelins fled
From conquering Troy around Achilles dead);
All Greece had paid me folemn funerals then,
And spread my glory with the fons of men.
A fhameful fate now hides my hapless head,
Un-wept, un-noted, and for ever dead!

A mighty wave rush'd o'er him as he spoke,
The raft it cover'd, and the maft it broke;
Swept from the deck, and from the rudder torn,
Far on the fwelling furge the chief was borne:
While by the howling tempeft rent in twain
Flew fail and fail-yards rattling o'er the main.
Long prefs'd, he heav'd beneath the weighty wave,
Clogg'd by the cumbrous veft Calypfo gave:
At length, emerging from his noftrils wide
And gushing mouth, effus'd the briny tide,
Ev'n then not mindlefs of his last retreat,
He feiz'd the raft, and leapt into his feat,
Strong with the fear of death. The rolling flood
Now here, now there, impell'd the floating woed.
As when a heap of gather'd thorns is caft
Now to, now fro, before th' autumnal blaft;
Together clung, it rolls around the field;
So roll'd the float, and so its texture held :
And now the fouth, and now the north, bear
And now the eaft the foamy floods obey, [fway,
And now the weft-wind whirls it o'er the fea.
The wandering chief, with toils on toils oppreft,
Leucothea faw, and pity touch'd her breast
(Herself a mortal once, of Cadmus' ftrain,
But now an azure fifter of the main).
Swift as a Tea-mew fpringing from the flood,
All radiant on the raft the Goddess stood:
Then thus addrefs'd him: Thou, whom Heaven
decrees

To Neptune's wrath, ftern tyrant of the feas, (Unequal conteft! not his rage and power, Great as he is, fuch virtue shall devour. What I fuggeft, thy wildom will perform; Forfake thy float, and leave it to the ftorm; Strip off thy garments; Neptune's fury brave With naked frength, and plunge into the wave. To reach Phacia all thy nerves extend, There Fate decrees thy miseries shall end. This heavenly scarf beneath thy bosom bind, And live; give all thy terrors to the wind. Soon as thy arms the happy fhore shall gain, Return the gift, and caft it in the main; Obferve my orders, and with heed obey, Caft it far off, and turn thy eyes away.

With that, her hand the facred veil bestows, Then down the deeps the div'd from whence the

Thus then I judge; while yet the planks fustain
The wild waves fury, here I fix'd remain :
But when their texture to the tempefts yields,
I launch adventurous on the liquid fields,
Join to the help of Gods the ftrength of man,
And take this method, fince the best I can.

While thus his thoughts an anxious council hold.
The raging God a watery mountain roll'd;
Like a black fheet the whelming billow spread
Burfts o'er the float, and thunder'd on his head.
Planks, beams, difparted fly: the scatter'd wood
Rolls diverse, and in fragments ftrows the flood.
So the rude Boreas, o'er the fields new-fhorn,
Toffes and drives the fcatter'd heaps of corn.
And now a fingle beam the chief bestrides;
There pois'd a while above the bounding tides,
His limbs difcumbers of the clinging vest,
And binds the facred cincture round his breast :
Then prone on ocean in a moment flung,
Stretch'd wide his eager arms, and fhot the feas
All naked now, on heaving billows laid, [along.
Stern Neptune ey'd him, and contemptuous faid:
Go, learn'd in woes, and other woes effay!
Go, wander helpless on the watery way:
Thus, thus find out the deftin'd shore, and then
(If Jove ordains it) mix with happier men.
Whate'er thy fate, the ills our wrath could raise
Shall laft remember'd in thy beft of days.

This faid, his fea-green steeds divide the foam, And reach high Æge and the towery dome. Now, fcarce withdrawn the fierce earth fhak

ing power,

Jove's daughter, Pallas, watch'd the favouring hour,
Back to their caves the bade the winds to fly,
And hufh'd the bluftering brethren of the sky.
The drier blafts alone of Boreas fway,
And bear him foft on broken waves away;
With gentle force impelling to that shore,
Where Fate has deftin'd he shall toil no more,
And now two nights, and now two days were past,
Since wide he wander'd on the watery waste :
Heav'd on the furge with intermitting breath,
And hourly pantingan the arms of death.
The third fair morn now blaz'd upon the main;
Then glaffy fmooth lay all the liquid plain :
The winds were hush'd, the billows fcarcely curl'd,
And a dead filence ftill'd the watery world;
When lifted on a ridgy wave he 'Ipies
The land at diftance, and with fharpen'd eyes,
As pious children joy with vaft delight
When a lov'd fire revives before their fight
(Who, lingering long has call'd on death in vain,
Fix'd by fome dæmon to his bed of pain,
Till Heaven by miracle his life restore);
So joys Ulyffes at th' appearing fhore,
And fees, (and labours onward as he fees)
The rising forefts and the tufted trees.
And now, as near approaching as the found
Of human voice the liftening ear may wound,
Amidst the rocks he hears a hollow roar
Of murmuring furges breaking on the shore;
Nor peaceful port was there, nor winding bay,
To fhield the veffel from the rolling fea,
But cliffs, and fhaggy hores, a dreadful fight!
All-rough with rocks, with foaming billows white,
Fear feiz'd his flacken'd limbs and beating heart;
As thus commun'd he with his foul apart :