No More Learning

But Menoetes, when at last he rose
struggling from the bottom, heavy with advancing years and wet in his
dripping clothes, makes for the top of the crag, and sits down on a dry
rock. The Teucrians laughed out as he fell and as he swam, and laugh to
see him spitting the salt water from his chest. At this a joyful hope
kindled in the two behind, Sergestus and Mnestheus, of catching up Gyas'
wavering course. Sergestus slips forward as he nears the rock, yet not
all in front, nor leading with his length of keel; part is in front,
part pressed by the Dragon's jealous prow. But striding amidships
between his comrades, Mnestheus cheers them on: 'Now, now swing back,
oarsmen who were Hector's comrades, whom I chose to follow me in Troy's
extremity; now put forth the might and courage you showed in Gaetulian
quicksands, amid Ionian seas and Malea's chasing waves. Not the first
[194-227]place do I now seek for Mnestheus, nor strive for victory;
though ah! --yet let them win, O Neptune, to whom thou givest it. But the
shame of coming in last! Win but this, fellow-citizens, and avert that
disaster! ' His men bend forward, straining every muscle; the brasswork
of the ship quivers to their mighty strokes, and the ground runs from
under her; limbs and parched lips shake with their rapid panting, and
sweat flows in streams all over them. Mere chance brought the crew the
glory they desired. For while Sergestus drives his prow furiously in
towards the rocks and comes up with too scanty room, alas! he caught on
a rock that ran out; the reef ground, the oars struck and shivered on
the jagged teeth, and the bows crashed and hung. The sailors leap up and
hold her with loud cries, and get out iron-shod poles and sharp-pointed
boathooks, and pick up their broken oars out of the eddies. But
Mnestheus, rejoicing and flushed by his triumph, with oars fast-dipping
and winds at his call, issues into the shelving water and runs down the
open sea.
As a pigeon whose house and sweet nestlings are in the rock's
recesses, if suddenly startled from her cavern, wings her flight over
the fields and rushes frightened from her house with loud clapping
pinions; then gliding noiselessly through the air, slides on her liquid
way and moves not her rapid wings; so Mnestheus, so the Dragon under him
swiftly cleaves the last space of sea, so her own speed carries her
flying on. And first Sergestus is left behind, struggling on the steep
rock and shoal water, and shouting in vain for help and learning to race
with broken oars. Next he catches up Gyas and the vast bulk of the
Chimaera; she gives way, without her steersman. And now on the very goal
Cloanthus alone is left; him he pursues and presses hard, straining all
his strength. Then indeed the shouts redouble, as all together eagerly
cheer on the pursuer, and [228-264]the sky echoes their din. These
scorn to lose the honour that is their own, the glory in their grasp,
and would sell life for renown; to these success lends life; power comes
with belief in it. And haply they had carried the prize with prows
abreast, had not Cloanthus, stretching both his open hands over the sea,
poured forth prayers and called the gods to hear his vows: 'Gods who are
sovereign on the sea, over whose waters I run, to your altars on this
beach will I bring a snow-white bull, my vow's glad penalty, and will
cast his entrails into the salt flood and pour liquid wine. ' He spoke,
and far beneath the flood maiden Panopea heard him, with all Phorcus'
choir of Nereids, and lord Portunus with his own mighty hand pushed him
on his way. The ship flies to land swifter than the wind or an arrow's
flight, and shoots into the deep harbour. Then the seed of Anchises,
summoning all in order, declares Cloanthus conqueror by herald's outcry,
and dresses his brows in green bay, and gives gifts to each crew, three
bullocks of their choice, and wine, and a large talent of silver to take
away. For their captains he adds special honours; to the winner a scarf
wrought with gold, encircled by a double border of deep Meliboean
purple; woven in it is the kingly boy on leafy Ida, chasing swift stags
with javelin and racing feet, keen and as one panting; him Jove's
swooping armour-bearer hath caught up from Ida in his talons; his aged
guardians stretch their hands vainly upwards, and the barking of hounds
rings fierce into the air. But to him who, next in merit, held the
second place, he gives to wear a corslet triple-woven with hooks of
polished gold, stripped by his own conquering hand from Demoleos under
tall Troy by the swift Simois, an ornament and safeguard among arms.
Scarce could the straining shoulders of his servants Phegeus and Sagaris
carry its heavy folds; yet with it on, Demoleos at [265-302]full speed
would chase the scattered Trojans. The third prize he makes twin
cauldrons of brass, and bowls wrought in silver and rough with tracery.
And now all moved away in the pride and wealth of their prizes, their
brows bound with scarlet ribbons; when, hardly torn loose by all his art
from the cruel rock, his oars lost, rowing feebly with a single tier,
Sergestus brought in his ship jeered at and unhonoured. Even as often a
serpent caught on a highway, if a brazen wheel hath gone aslant over him
or a wayfarer left him half dead and mangled with the blow of a heavy
stone, wreathes himself slowly in vain effort to escape, in part
undaunted, his eyes ablaze and his hissing throat lifted high; in part
the disabling wound keeps him coiling in knots and twisting back on his
own body; so the ship kept rowing slowly on, yet hoists sail and under
full sail glides into the harbour mouth.