Inspir'd by love, thus spoke the gentle dame; And he, thus answering, fann'd the rising flame: "If e'er recording fame, illustrious maid, Hath to thine ear great Ilion's name convey'd, Ilion, whose walls on Phrygian frontiers stand, Rear'd by Apollo's and by Neptune's hand; 341 Him if thou know'st, most opulent of kings, Who reigns o'er Ilion, and from Saturn springs; I to hereditary worth aspire; 351 The wealthy Priam is my honour'd sire. For well thou know'st, how dastardly and base 360 Aud well I know, that Græcia's ample coast 380 He said; on earth her sparkling eyes she cast, Embarrass'd paus'd awhile, and spoke at last: 371 "To visit Ilion, and her towers survey, Rear'd by the god of ocean and of day, (Stupendous labours by celestials wrought) Hath oft, illustrious guest, employ'd my thought. Oft have I wish'd to saunter o'er the vales, Whose flowery pasture Phoebus' flocks regales; Where, beneath Ilion's walls, along the meads, The shepherd-god his lowing oxen feeds. To Ilion I'll attend thee: haste, away; For beauty's queen forbids our long delay. No husband's threats, no husband's search I dread, Though he to Troy suspect his Helen fled." The Spartandame, of matchless charms possess'd, Proffer'd these terms to her consenting guest. Night, which relieves our toils, when the bright In ocean sunk, his daily course has run, [Sun, Now gives her softest slumbers, ere the ray Of rising mon proclaims th' approach of day. Two gates of airy dreams she opens wide; Of polish'd horn is this, where truths abide: Voices divine through this mysterious gate Proclaim th' unalterable will of fate. But through the ivory gate incessant troop Of vain, delusive dreams a faithless group. Helen, seduc'd from Menelaus' bed, Th' adventurous shepherd to his navy led; To Troy with speed he bears the fatal freight; For Venus' proff rs confidence create. 390 400 At morning's dawn Hermione appears, With tresses discompos'd and bath'd in tears. She rous'd her menia! train; and thus express'd The boding sorrows of her troubled breast: "Where, fair attendants, is my mother fled, Who left me sleeping in her lonely bed? For yesternight she took her trusty key, 410 Unhappy princess, check the rising tear; Thy mother, absent now, will soon appear. Soon as thy sorrow's bitter source she knows, Her speedy presence will dispel thy woes. The virgin-cheek, with sorrow's weight o'ercome, Sinks languid down and loses half its bloom. Deep in the head the tearful eye retires, There sullen sits, nor darts its wonted fires. Eager, perchance, the band of nymphs to meet, She saunters devious from her favourite seat, 421 And, of some flowery mead at length possess'd, Sinks on the dew-bespangled lawn to rest. Or to some kindred stream perchance she strays, Bathes in Eurotas' streams, and round its margin plays." "Why talk ye thus?" the pensive maid replies, Or art thou fallen from some steep mountain's brow, Beneath each shrivel'd leaf that strews the ground, Thus spoke she sorrowing, and reclin'd her 451 And sleeping seem'd to mingle with the dead. "Last night, far distant from your daughter fled, You left me slumbering in my father's bed. What dangerous steeps have not I strove to gain? And stroll'd o'er hills and dales for thee in vain?" "Condemn me not," replied the wandering dame; 460 Pity my sufferings, nor augment my shame. Me yesterday a lawless guest beguil'd, And distant tore me from my darling child. At Cytherea's high command I rove; And once more revel in the walks of love." She said: her voice the sleeping maid alarms; She springs to clasp her mother in her arms. In vain: no mother meets her wistful eyes; And now her tears redouble and her cries: "Ye feathery race, inhabitants of light, To Crete's fam'd isle direct your rapid flight. 470 There to my sire th' unwelcome truth proclaim, or Discord, in whose presence agreement and harmony could not long subsist. See on this subject Catullus de Nupt. Pel. & Thet. and Valerius Flaccus, 1. i. v. 129. 42. His loose locks] The correspondent lines in the original ought to be placed after v. 33, as Lennep rightly observes: to that place (immediately after the poet's mention of Diana) the The bridegroom now his natal coast descry'd, 480 translator has restored them. NOTES TO THE RAPE OF HELEN. COLUTHUS LYCOPOLITES, a Theban poet, flourished in the reign of the emperor Anastasius, about five hundred years after Christ. He is said to have been the author of several poems; none of which have come down to us except this, which in many passages is corrupt and mutilated. There is an excellent edition of this poem by Lennep. There is also an old translation of it by sir Edward Sherburne; to whom I acknowledge myself indebted for some of his useful annotations. Did the insertion of this little poem stand in need of an apology, it might be made by observing, that the subjects of the two poems are not wholly dissimilar. In the one is celebrated the rape of Medea, in the other the rape of Helen; two events of equal celebrity in ancient story. It On the title of this poem sir Edward Sherburne makes the following not unpleasant remark: "The word rape must not be taken in the common acceptation of the expression. For Paris was more courtly than to offer, and Helen more kind-hearted than to suffer, such a violence. must be taken rather for a transporting of her with her consent from her own country to Troy: which Virgil seems to insinuate in the first book of his Æneid, where, speaking of Helen, he says, Pergama cum peteret, The word peteret implies that the quitting of her country, and going along with Paris, was an act she desired, as well as consented to; and thus much the ensuing poem makes good." V. 2. From Xanthus' fertile streains] The most celebrated river in Troas: it derived its source from Mount Ida. 10. Clown] The ancients esteemed the art of husbandry to be of all others the most honourable. The hands of princes sustained at the same time the crook and the sceptre. Paris, the son of Priam, king of Troy, is represented in this poem under the character of a shepherd. In our times the care of flocks and herds is committed to the lowest orders of the people. Shepherd and clown are terms with us nearly synonymous. But we must endeavour to separate from them the ideas of churlishness and ill-breeding, when applied, as the ancients applied them, to heroes and kings. 24. With hymeneal songs for Peleus sung] It was a fiction of the poets, that Peleus, the son of Facus, and pupil of Chiron, married Thetis the daughter of Nereus, and that ail the gods attended at their nuptials on Mount Pelion, except Eris 56. With desperate hand] The conjectural reading of Vossius is here preferred; as it seems to contain more sense and more poetry than any other. He reads, χειρὶ δὲ λαιη Ονδὲ τὸ κόλλοπ ̓ ἔρυξε, και ἣν ἐφυράσσατο πίτρην. 79. For 'tis the prize of beauty and of love] Apples were esteemed the symbol of love, and dedicated to Venus. They were also considered as allurements of love, and were distributed as hoov, and malo petere, in Theocritus and Hence the expressions presents among lovers. Virgil. 89. The close-arch'd eyebrow] The ancients looked upon such eyebrows, which our poet calls Bápur ouvoy, as essential to form a beautiful face. See Anacreon's description of his mistress, and Theocr. Id. viii. 72. 99. Summon'd her little Loves] They were supposed to be very numerous : volucrumque exercitus omnis amorum. Val. Flac. vi. 457. 116. My bow this cestus] The cestus of Venus, of which Homer makes particular mention, I. xiv. 216. derives its name and Tỡ xv. To which stimulating quality our poet alludes in the following line, And with this cestus I infix my sting. 205. Beauty, their best defence, their strongest mail] 267 and 268. Ismarus-Pangræa] Mountains in Thrace. The former is also the name of a lake.. 269. Now Phillis' rising tomb] Demophoon, son of Theseus, on his return from Troy passed through Thrace, where he was hospitably received by Phillis, its queen, who fell in love with and married him. He having expressed his desire to visit Athens, his native country, Phillis consented to his departure, upon condition that he would return on a certain day which she should appoint. Demophoon promised to be with her on the appointed day. When the day came, Phillis, tortured with the pangs of an impatient lover, ran nine times to the shore, which from this circumstance was called in Greek Enneados: but unable any longer to support his absence, she in a fit of despair hanged herself. See Ovid's Epist. ii. Phillis to Demoph. 274. Phthia] A province and city of Thessaly; the birth-place of Achilles. But, for a more particular account of Coluthus's geography, the reader may consult Lennep's note on v. 215, where he shows, (to make use of his own words) quam fuerit in Geographicis hospes Coluthus. 296. Him with delight] Hyacinthus was a story of the gates of Sleep may have had a real young prince of the city Amyclæ, in Laconia. foundation, and have been built upon the customs He had made so extraordinary a progress in lite- of the Egyptians. See the note on v. 656, rature, that he was considered as a favourite of b. xix. of Pope's Odyss. Our poet has representApollo. As he was playing with his fellows, heed these fanciful gates as opened by Night; and was unfortunately struck on the head by a quoit, with great propriety. and died of the blow. The poets have enlarged on this simple story in the following manner. The wind which blew the quoit aside, and gave it the fatal direction, they have called Zephyrus; whom they have represented as the rival of Apollo. Zephyrus, having received for his kindnesses to Hyacinthus the most ungrateful returns, was resolved to punish him for his insolence: and having challenged him one day to a game of quoits, he struck the unfortunate youth a blow on the temples. The inhabitants of Amycle, says the poet, δη δ' ἀήτου Σκυζόμενος, καὶ τοῦτον ἀνήγαγεν.— were displeased with the contest proposed by Zephyrus, and withdrew Hyacinthus from the fight; or, perhaps (still better to connect this with the following sentence) they brought him out, and spirited him on to the fight, presuming that his favourite god would enable him to come off victorious;-αυτας Απόλλων, &c. This is Lennep's conjectural reading; which, whether the true one or not, must be allowed to affix a tolerable meaning to a passage that was before very unintelligible. 302. Earth with compassion] From the blood that was spilt on the ground Apollo produced a flower, called after the name of his favourite youth. See Ovid. Metam. 1. x. 331. Nestor's son] Antilochus, mentioned frequently in Hom. II. 333. acid] The descendants of acus. He was the son of Jupiter and Ægina: his offspring were Phocus, Peleus, Teucer, and Telamon. 390. Two gates of airy dreams she opens wide] The fiction to which our author in this place, and Virgil in Eneid vi. allude, is borrowed from b. xix, of Hom. Odyss. It is imagined, that this "The ancients," says sir Edward Sherburne, "painted Sleep like a man heavy with slumber, his under garment white, his upper black, thereby expressing day and night; holding in his hand a horn, sometimes really such, sometimes of ivory in the likeness of one; through which they feigned that he conveyed dreams: true when the same was of horn, false when of ivory." Some have assigned as a reason, why true dreams pass through the gate of horn, and false ones through the gate of ivory; that horn is a fit emblem of truth, as being transparent, and ivory of falsehood, as being impenetrable. 448. For Sleep his elder brother's aspect wears] Virgil, Æn. vi. 278. calls sleep consanguineus lethi. 450. Hence the swoln eyes of females] Hence, i. e. by reason of the likeness there is betwixt these two affections. 464. At Cytherea's] The line in the original is obscure, and usually misplaced. It is given to Hermione, but without the least reason. It is here restored to its proper place; and is an observation which comes naturally enough from the mouth of Helen. See Lennep's note on the passage. 482. Cassandra from her tower] Cassandra was the daughter of Priam, and priestess of Apollo. Apollo gave her the gift of prophecy; but, on her refusing to comply with the conditions on which it was given her, he rendered it ineffectual, by ordaining that her predictions should never be believed. Hence it was, that, when Paris set sail for Greece in pursuit of Helen, her prophecy, that he should bring home a flame, which should consume his country, was not regarded. Her appearance therefore on the present occasion is quite in character; and our poet has shown his judgment by the representation he has given of her. |