No More Learning

BOOK XXIV.

ARGUMENT.

The souls of the suitors are conducted by Mercury to the infernal
shades. Ulysses in the country goes to the retirement of his
father, Laertes; he finds him busied in his garden all alone; the
manner of his discovery to him is beautifully described. They
return together to his lodge, and the king is acknowledged by
Dolius and the servants. The Ithacensians, led by Eupithes, the
father of Antinous, rise against Ulysses, who gives them battle in
which Eupithes is killed by Laertes: and the goddess Pallas makes
a lasting peace between Ulysses and his subjects, which concludes
the Odyssey.



Cylenius now to Pluto's dreary reign
Conveys the dead, a lamentable train!
The golden wand, that causes sleep to fly,
Or in soft slumber seals the wakeful eye,
That drives the ghosts to realms of night or day,
Points out the long uncomfortable way.
Trembling the spectres glide, and plaintive vent
Thin, hollow screams, along the deep descent.
As in the cavern of some rifted den,
Where flock nocturnal bats, and birds obscene;
Cluster'd they hang, till at some sudden shock
They move, and murmurs run through all the rock!
So cowering fled the sable heaps of ghosts,
And such a scream fill'd all the dismal coasts.
And now they reach'd the earth's remotest ends,
And now the gates where evening Sol descends,
And Leucas' rock, and Ocean's utmost streams,
And now pervade the dusky land of dreams,
And rest at last, where souls unbodied dwell
In ever-flowing meads of asphodel.
The empty forms of men inhabit there,
Impassive semblance, images of air!
Naught else are all that shined on earth before:
Ajax and great Achilles are no more!
Yet still a master ghost, the rest he awed,
The rest adored him, towering as he trod;
Still at his side is Nestor's son survey'd,
And loved Patroclus still attends his shade.
New as they were to that infernal shore,
The suitors stopp'd, and gazed the hero o'er.
When, moving slow, the regal form they view'd
Of great Atrides: him in pomp pursued
And solemn sadness through the gloom of hell,
The train of those who by AEgysthus fell:

"O mighty chief! (Pelides thus began)
Honour'd by Jove above the lot of man!
King of a hundred kings! to whom resign'd
The strongest, bravest, greatest of mankind
Comest thou the first, to view this dreary state?
And was the noblest, the first mark of Fate,
Condemn'd to pay the great arrear so soon,
The lot, which all lament, and none can shun!
Oh! better hadst thou sunk in Trojan ground,
With all thy full-blown honours cover'd round;
Then grateful Greece with streaming eyes might raise
Historic marbles to record thy praise:
Thy praise eternal on the faithful stone
Had with transmissive glories graced thy son.
But heavier fates were destined to attend:
What man is happy, till he knows his end? "

"O son of Peleus! greater than mankind!
(Thus Agamemnon's kingly shade rejoin'd)
Thrice happy thou, to press the martial plain
'Midst heaps of heroes in thy quarrel slain:
In clouds of smoke raised by the noble fray,
Great and terrific e'en in death you lay,
And deluges of blood flow'd round you every way.
Nor ceased the strife till Jove himself opposed,
And all in Tempests the dire evening closed.
Then to the fleet we bore thy honour'd load,
And decent on the funeral bed bestow'd;
Then unguents sweet and tepid streams we shed;
Tears flow'd from every eye, and o'er the dead
Each clipp'd the curling honours of his head.
Struck at the news, thy azure mother came,
The sea-green sisters waited on the dame:
A voice of loud lament through all the main
Was heard; and terror seized the Grecian train:
Back to their ships the frighted host had fled;
But Nestor spoke, they listen'd and obey'd
(From old experience Nestor's counsel springs,
And long vicissitudes of human things):
'Forbear your flight: fair Thetis from the main
To mourn Achilles leads her azure train. '
Around thee stand the daughters of the deep,
Robe thee in heavenly vests, and round thee weep:
Round thee, the Muses, with alternate strain,
In ever-consecrating verse, complain.