No More Learning

Meantime the queen, without reflection due,
Heart-wounded, to the bed of state withdrew:
In her sad breast the prince's fortunes roll,
And hope and doubt alternate seize her soul.
So when the woodman's toil her cave surrounds,
And with the hunter's cry the grove resounds,
With grief and rage the mother-lion stung.
Fearless herself, yet trembles for her young
While pensive in the silent slumberous shade,
Sleep's gentle powers her drooping eyes invade;
Minerva, life-like, on embodied air
Impress'd the form of Iphthima the fair;
(Icarius' daughter she, whose blooming charms
Allured Eumelus to her virgin arms;
A sceptred lord, who o'er the fruitful plain
Of Thessaly wide stretched his ample reign:)
As Pallas will'd, along the sable skies,
To calm the queen, the phantom sister flies.
Swift on the regal dome, descending right,
The bolted valves are pervious to her flight.
Close to her head the pleasing vision stands,
And thus performs Minerva's high commands

"O why, Penelope, this causeless fear,
To render sleep's soft blessing unsincere?
Alike devote to sorrow's dire extreme
The day-reflection, and the midnight-dream!
Thy son the gods propitious will restore,
And bid thee cease his absence to deplore. "

To whom the queen (whilst yet in pensive mind
Was in the silent gates of sleep confined):
"O sister to my soul forever dear,
Why this first visit to reprove my fear?
How in a realm so distant should you know
From what deep source ceaseless sorrows flow?
To all my hope my royal lord is lost,
His country's buckler, and the Grecian boast;
And with consummate woe to weigh me down,
The heir of all his honours and his crown,
My darling son is fled! an easy prey
To the fierce storms, or men more fierce than they;
Who, in a league of blood associates sworn,
Will intercept the unwary youth's return. "

"Courage resume (the shadowy form replied);
In the protecting care of Heaven confide;
On him attends the blue eyed martial maid:
What earthly can implore a surer aid?
Me now the guardian goddess deigns to send,
To bid thee patient his return attend. "

The queen replies: "If in the blest abodes,
A goddess, thou hast commerce with the gods;
Say, breathes my lord the blissful realm of light,
Or lies he wrapp'd in ever-during night? "

"Inquire not of his doom, (the phantom cries,)
I speak not all the counsel of the skies;
Nor must indulge with vain discourse, or long,
The windy satisfaction of the tongue.
"

Swift through the valves the visionary fair
Repass'd, and viewless mix'd with common air.
The queen awakes, deliver'd of her woes;
With florid joy her heart dilating glows:
The vision, manifest of future fate,
Makes her with hope her son's arrival wait.

Meantime the suitors plough the watery plain,
Telemachus in thought already slain!
When sight of lessening Ithaca was lost
Their sail directed for the Samian coast
A small but verdant isle appear'd in view,
And Asteris the advancing pilot knew;
An ample port the rocks projected form,
To break the rolling waves and ruffling storm:
That safe recess they gain with happy speed,
And in close ambush wait the murderous deed.



BOOK V.

ARGUMENT

THE DEPARTURE OF ULYSSES FROM CALYPSO

Pallas in a council of the gods complains of the detention of
Ulysses in the Island of Calypso: whereupon Mercury is sent to
command his removal. The seat of Calypso described. She consents
with much difficulty; and Ulysses builds a vessel with his own
hands, in which he embarks. Neptune overtakes him with a terrible
tempest, in which he is shipwrecked, and in the last danger of
death; till Lencothea, a sea-goddess, assists him, and, after
innumerable perils, he gets ashore on Phaeacia.



The saffron morn, with early blushes spread,
Now rose refulgent from Tithonus' bed;
With new-born day to gladden mortal sight,
And gild the courts of heaven with sacred light.
Then met the eternal synod of the sky,
Before the god, who thunders from on high,
Supreme in might, sublime in majesty.
Pallas, to these, deplores the unequal fates
Of wise Ulysses and his toils relates:
Her hero's danger touch'd the pitying power,
The nymph's seducements, and the magic bower.
Thus she began her plaint: "Immortal Jove!
And you who fill the blissful seats above!
Let kings no more with gentle mercy sway,
Or bless a people willing to obey,
But crush the nations with an iron rod,
And every monarch be the scourge of God.
If from your thoughts Ulysses you remove,
Who ruled his subjects with a father's love,
Sole in an isle, encircled by the main,
Abandon'd, banish'd from his native reign,
Unbless'd he sighs, detained by lawless charms,
And press'd unwilling in Calypso's arms.