Chor. How dreadful to her foes! Call to re- Rush to encounter with the Persian hosts.
How many Persian dames, wedded in vain,
Hath Athens of their noble husbands widow'd?
Atoss. Astonied with these ills, my voice thus
long
Hath wanted utterance: griefs like these exceed
The power of speech or question: yet ev'n such,
Inflicted by the gods, must mortal man
Constrain'd by hard necessity endure.
But tell me all, without distraction tell me,
All this calamity, though many a groan
Burst from thy labouring heart. Who is not fallen?
What leader must we wail? What sceptred
chief
Dying hath left his troops without a lord?
Mess. Know then, in numbers the barbaric fleet
Was far superior: in ten squadrons, each
Of thirty ships, Greece plough'd the deep; of
One held a distant station. Xerxes led
A thousand ships; their number well I know;
Two hundred more, and seven, that swept the
With speediest sail: this was their full amount.
And in the engagement seem'd we not secure
Of victory? But unequal fortune sunk
Our scale in fight, discomfitting our host.
Atoss. The gods preserve the city of Minerva.
Mess. The walls of Athens are impregnable,
Mess. Xerxes himself lives, and beholds the Their firmest bulwarks her heroic sons.
light.
Atoss. Which navy first advanced to the attack?
Atoss. That word beams comfort on my house, Who led to the onset, tell me; the bold Greeks,
That brightens through the melancholy gloom.
Mess. Artembares, the potent chief that led
Ten thousand horse, lies slaughtered on the rocks
Of rough Silenia. The great Dadaces,
Beneath whose standard march'd a thousand
horse,
Or, glorying in his numerous fleet, my son?
Mess. Our evil genius, lady, or some god
Hostile to Persia, led to ev'ry ill.
Forth from the troops of Athens came a Greek,
And thus address'd thy son, the imperial Xerxes:
"Soon as the shades of night descend, the Gre-
cians
Pierced by a spear, fell headlong from the ship. Shall quit their station; rushing to their oars
Tenagon, bravest of the Bactrians, lies
Roll'd on the wave-worn beach of Ajax' isle.
Lilæus, Arsames, Argestes, dash
With violence in death against the rocks
They mean to separate, and in secret flight
Seek safety." At these words, the royal chief,
Little conceiving of the wiles of Greece
And gods averse, to all the naval leaders
Where nest the silver doves.* Arcteus, that Gave his high charge:-"Soon as yon sun shall
Near to the fountains of the Egyptian Nile,
Adeues, and Pheresba, and Pharnuchus
Fell from one ship. Matallus, Chrysa's chief,
That led his dark'ning squadrons, thrice ten
thousand,
On jet-black steeds, with purple gore distain'd
The yellow of his thick and shaggy beard.
The Magian Arabus, and Artames
From Bactra, mould'ring on the dreary shore
Lie low. Amistris, and Amphistreus there
Grasps his war-wearied spear; there prostrate
The illustrious Ariomardus; long his loss
Shall Sardis weep: thy Mysian Sisames,
And Tharybis, that o'er the burden'd deep
Led five times fifty vessels; Lerna gave
The hero birth, and manly grace adorn'd
His pleasing form, but low in death he lies
Unhappy in his fate. Syennesis,
Cilicia's warlike chief, who dared to front
The foremost dangers, singly to the foes
A terror, there too found a glorious death.
These chieftains to my sad remembrance rise,
Relating but a few of many ills.
To dart his radiant beams, and dark'ning night
Ascends the temple of the sky, arrange
In three divisions your well-ordered ships,
And guard each pass, each outlet of the seas:
Others enring around this rocky isle
Of Salamis. Should Greece escape her fate,
And work her way by secret flight, your heads
Shall answer the neglect." This harsh command
He gave, exulting in his mind, nor knew
What Fate design'd. With martial discipline
And prompt obedience, snatching a repast,
Each mariner fix'd well his ready oar.
Soon as the golden sun was set, and night
Advanced, each train'd to ply the dashing oar,
Assumed his seat; in arms each warrior stood,
Troop cheering troop through all the ships of war.
Each to the appointed station steers his course;
And through the night his naval force each chief
Fix'd to secure the passes. Night advanced,
But not by secret flight did Greece attempt
To escape. The morn, all beauteous to behold,
Drawn by white steeds bounds o'er the enlight-
At once from ev'ry Greek with glad acclaim
Atoss. This is the height of ill, ah me! and Burst forth the song of war, whose lofty notes
To Persia, grief, and lamentation loud.
But tell me this, afresh renew thy tale :
What was the number of the Grecian fleet,
That in fierce conflict their bold barks should dare
The echo of the island rocks return'd,
Spreading dismay through Persia's hosts, thus
From their high hopes; no flight this solemn strain
Portended, but deliberate valour bent
On daring battle; while the trumpet's sound
* Salamis was the birth-place of Ajax, and sacred to Kindled the flames of war. But when their oars The pæan ended, with impetuous force
Venus; hence it was said to abound with doves.
Dash'd the resounding surges, instant all
Rush'd on in view: in orderly array
The squadron on the right first led, behind.
Rode their whole fleet; and now distinct we
heard
From ev'ry part this voice of exhortation:-
"Advance, ye sons of Greece, from thraldom save
Your country,-save your wives, your children
The temples of your gods, the sacred tomb
Where rest your honour'd ancestors; this day
The common cause of all demands your valour."
Meantime from Persia's hosts the deep'ning shout
Answer'd their shout; no time for cold delay;
But ship 'gainst ship its brazen beak impell'd.
First to the charge a Grecian galley rush'd;
Ill the Phoenician bore the rough attack,
Its sculptured prow all shatter'd. Each advanced
Daring an opposite. The deep array
Of Persia at the first sustain'd the encounter;
But their throng'd numbers, in the narrow seas
Confined, want room for action; and, deprived
Of mutual aid, beaks clash with beaks, and each
Breaks all the other's oars: with skill disposed
The Grecian navy circled them around
In fierce assault; and rushing from its height
The inverted vessel sinks: the sea no more
Wears its accustomed aspect, with foul wrecks
And blood disfigured; floating carcasses
Roll on the rocky shores: the poor remains
Of the barbaric armament to flight
Ply every oar inglorious: onward rush
The Greeks amidst the ruins of the fleet,
As through a shoal of fish caught in the net,
Spreading destruction: the wide ocean o'er
Wailings are heard, and loud laments, till night
With darkness on her brow brought grateful
Should I recount each circumstance of woe, Ten times on my unfinished tale the sun Would set; for be assured that not one day Could close the ruin of so vast a host.
The dance to this the monarch sends these chiefs,
That when the Grecians from their shatter'd ships
Should here seek shelter, these might hew them down
An easy conquest, and secure the strand
To their sea-wearied friends; ill-judging what
The event: but when the fav'ring god to Greece
Gave the proud glory of this naval fight,
Instant in all their glitt'ring arms they leap'd
From their light ships, and all the island round
Encompass'd, that our bravest stood dismay'd;
While broken rocks, whirl'd with tempestuous
force,
And storms of arrows crush'd them; then the
Greeks
Rush to the attack at once, and furious spread
The carnage, till each mangled Persian fell.
Deep were the groans of Xerxes when he saw
This havoc; for his seat, a lofty mound
Commanding the wide sea, o'erlooked his hosts."
With rueful cries he rent his royal robes,
And through his troops embattled on the shore
Gave signal of retreat; then started wild,
And fled disorder'd. To the former ills
These are fresh miseries to awake thy sighs.
Atoss. Invidious Fortune, how thy baleful power
Hath sunk the hopes of Persia! Bitter fruit
My son hath tasted from his purposed vengeance
On Athens, famed for arms; the fatal field
Of Marathon, red with barbaric blood,
Sufficed not; that defeat he thought to avenge,
And pull'd this hideous ruin on his head.
But tell me, if thou canst, where didst thou leave
The ships that happily escaped the wreck?
Mess. The poor remains of Persia's scatter'd
Spread ev'ry sail for flight, as the wind drives,
In wild disorder; and on land no less
The ruin'd army; in Boeotia some,
With thirst oppress'd, at Crene's cheerful rills
Atoss. Ah, what a boundless sea of woe hath Were lost; forespent with breathless speed some
On Persia, and the whole barbaric race!
The fields of Phocis, some the, Doric plain,
Mess. These are not half, not half our ills; on And near the gulf of Melia, the rich vale these
Came an assemblage of calamities,
That sunk us with a double weight of woe. Atoss. What fortune can be more unfriendly
Than this? Say on, what dread calamity
Sunk Persia's host with greater weight of woe.
Mess. Whoe'er of Persia's warriors glow'd in
Of vig'rous youth, or felt their generous souls
Expand with courage, or for noble birth
Shone with distinguish'd lustre, or excell'd
In firm and duteous loyalty, all these
Are fall'n, ignobly, miserably fall'n.
Atoss. Alas, their ruthless fate, unhappy friends!
But in what manner, tell me, did they perish?
Mess. Full against Salamis an isle arises,
Of small circumference, to the anchor'd bark
Unfaithful; on the promontory's brow,
That overlooks the sea, Pan loves to lead
Through which Sperchius rolls his friendly stream.
Achaia thence and the Thessalian state
Received our famish'd train; the greater part
Through thirst and hunger perish'd there, oppress'd
At once by both but we our painful steps
Held onwards to Magnesia, and the land
Of Macedonia, o'er the ford of Axius,
And Bolbe's sedgy marches, and the heights
Of steep Pangaos, to the realms of Thrace.
That night, e'er yet the season, breathing frore,
Rush'd winter, and with ice encrusted o'er
The flood of sacred Strymon: Such as own'd
No god till now, awe-struck, with many a prayer
A king sate on the rocky brow
Which looks o'er sea-born Salamis;
And ships, by thousands, lay below,
And men in nations ;-all were his!
He counted them at break of day-
And when the sun set, where were they?
Byron.
Adored the earth and sky. When now the troops
Had ceased their invocations to the gods,
O'er the stream's solid crystal they began
Their march; and we, who took our early way,
Ere the sun darted his warm beams, pass'd safe:
But when his burning orb with fiery rays
Unbound the middle current, down they sunk
Each over other; happiest he who found
The speediest death: the poor remains, that
'scaped,
With pain through Thrace dragg'd on their toilsome march,
A feeble few, and reach'd their native soil;
So Persia sighs through all her states, and mourns
Her dearest youth. This is no feigned tale:
But many of the ills, that burst upon us
In dreadful vengeance, I refrain to utter.
Chor. O Fortune, heavy with affliction's load, How hath thy foot crush'd all the Persian race! Atoss. Ah me, what sorrows for our ruin'd host Oppress my soul! Ye visions of the night, Haunting my dreams, how plainly did you show
These ills!-You set them in too fair a light.
Yet, since your bidding hath in this prevail'd,
First to the gods wish I to pour my prayers,
Then to the mighty dead present my off'rings,
Bringing libations from my house too late,
I know, to change the past; yet for the future,
If haply better fortune may await it,
Behooves you, on this sad event, to guide
Your friends with faithful counsels. Should my
Return ere I have finish'd, let your voice Speak comfort to him; friendly to his house Attend him, nor let sorrow rise on sorrows.
Awful sovereign of the skies,
When now o'er Persia's numerous host
Thou badest the storm with ruin rise,
All her proud vaunts of glory lost,
Ecbatana's imperial head
By thee was wrapt in sorrow's dark'ning shade;
Through Susa's palaces with loud lament,
By their soft hands their veils all rent,
The copious tear the virgins pour,
That trickles their bare bosoms o'er.
From her sweet couch up starts the widow'd bride,
Her lord's loved image rushing on her soul, Throws the rich ornaments of youth aside,
And gives her griefs to flow without control: Her griefs not causeless; for the mighty slain Our melting tears demand, and sorrow-soften'd
Now her wailing's wide despair
Pours these exhausted regions o'er:
Xerxes, ill-fated, led the war;
Xerxes, ill-fated, leads no more;
Xerxes sent forth the unwise command, !
The crowded ships unpeopled all the land;
That land, o'er which Darius held his reign,
Courting the arts of peace, in vain,
O'er all his grateful realms adored, The stately Susa's gentle lord. Black o'er the waves his burden'd vessels sweep, For Greece elate the warlike squadrons fly; Now crush'd, and whelm`d beneath the indignant deep
The shatter'd wrecks and lifeless heroes lie: While, from the arms of Greece escaped, with
The unshelter'd monarch roams o'er Thracia's dreary soil.
The first in battle slain
By Cychrea's craggy shore
Through sad constraint, ah me! forsaken lie,
All pale and smear'd with gore:—
Raise high the mournful strain,
And let the voice of anguish pierce the sky :-
Or roll beneath the roaring tide,
While through the widow'd mansion echoing wide
By monsters rent of touch abhorr'd;
Sounds the deep groan, and wails its slaughter'd
lord:
Pale with his fears the helpless orphan there
Gives the full stream of plaintive grief to flow;
While age its hoary head in deep despair
Bends, list'ning to the shrieks of woe.
With sacred awe
No more shall Asia's realms revere; To their lord's hand
At his command,
No more the exacted tribute bear.
Who now falls prostrate at the monarch's throne?
His regal greatness is no more.
Now no restraint the wanton tongue shall own,
Free from the golden curb of pow'r;
For on the rocks, wash'd by the beating flood,
His awe-commanding nobles lie in blood.
Atoss. Whoe'er, my friends, in the rough stream
Hath struggled with affliction, thence is taught
That, when the flood begins to swell, the heart
Fondly fears all things; when the fav'ring gale
Of Fortune smooths the current, it expands
With unsuspecting confidence, and deems
That gale shall always breathe. So to my eyes
All things now wear a formidable shape,
And threaten from the gods: my ears are pierc'd
With sounds far other than of song. Such ills
Dismay my sick'ning soul: hence from my house
Nor glitt'ring car attends me, nor the train
Of wonted state, while I return, and bear
Libations soothing, charms that soothe the dead:
White milk, and lucid honey, pure-distill'd
By the wild bee-that craftsman of the flowers:
The limpid droppings of the virgin fount,
And this bright liquid from its mountain-mother
Borne fresh-the joy of the time-hallowed vine;-
The pale-green olive's odorous fruit, whose leaves
Live everlastingly-and those wreathed flowers,
The smiling infants of the prodigal earth.
PINDAR.
[Born, 518-Died, 439 B. C.]
Φωνῶντα συνετόισι.—Olymp. II.
'Beneath mine elbow a full quiver lies
Of fleetest arrows, sounding to the wise;
But for the crowd they need interpreters.
His skill is most who learns in Nature's school;
All else, expert by rule,
Mere tongues in vehement gabble idly heard,
Clamoring, like daws, at Jove's celestial bird.'-Cary,
THIS renowned bard was a native either of unequivocal proofs remain. A portion of the peothe Theban city, or of Cynocephalæ, a village in ple's first fruits was appropriated to his use; an its immediate territory and neighbourhood. He iron chair was erected for him in the very temple was by profession a musician and poet, and for of Apollo; his statue stood in the circle of games his early skill as such, is said to have been, in at Thebes; he was courted and enriched, alike some degree, indebted to the beautiful Corinna, by rulers and people, not only of his own, but of a distinguished poetess of the same age and every land in which the Greek tongue was known; country, but of whose compositions we know and in later times, when Thebes was captured, little or nothing. It is related of her, however, first by the Spartans, and subsequently by Alexthat she defeated her pupil in no less than five ander, the very house which he had inhabited, contests, and that, on one occasion, having recom- had the honour of being spared by the victors.* mended him to ornament his productions with Pindar, though precluded by the unhappy cirmythical narrative, and receiving, in return, some cumstance of his country's league with Persia, lines cram-full of Theban mythology, she bade from joining the ranks of Athens and Sparta, in him "sow by hand, and not by sackfulls."-Of the great war of Grecian independence, has not Pindar's numerous compositions, consisting of concealed his admiration of the heroes who did Hymns to the Gods, Funeral songs, and Odes in so. But Pindar's greatest praise is the generally honour of the conquerors at the four great festi- moral and religious tone which pervades his vals of Greece, little besides the latter, have come writings. He maintains the immortality of the down to us; but of the veneration in which he and soul, and distinctly lays down the doctrine of his writings were held by all Greece, the most | future punishments and rewards.
TO HIERO, KING OF SYRACUSE, VICTOR IN THE
SINGLE HORSE RACE.
WITH water nought may vie;
And gold, like fire at midnight blazing,
Glittering heaps outshineth far:
But, if thou tell'st of victory,
Soul, through wastes of ether gazing,
Than the sun no brighter star
Seek; nor deem this earth supplies
A nobler than th' Olympic prize.
Thence doth the many-voiced hymn arise,
Which in their thought wise minstrels frame,
To warble forth the great Saturnian's name
Round Hiero's blest hearth with plenty stor❜d:
Rightful sceptre who retains
O'er Sicilia's pastoral plains;
Culling the top of every flower
That blossometh in Virtue's bower:
Nor less he knows the charms that lie
In the sweet soul of Poesy,
Such Music as around his board
By us, who love him, oft is pour'd.
Reach then the Dorian shell,
On yonder nail, suspended;
If in thee, sweet remembrance grateful dwell
It is to the latter of these captures that Milton has alluded, in a noble sonnet, written when the city of London was threatened with a like calamity.
"Lift not thy spear against the Muses' bower;
The great Emathian conqueror bade spare
The house of Pindarus, when temple and tower
Went to the ground!"
Of Pisa, and the steed
Pherenicus, he whose speed,
As with ungoaded side
He rush'd by Alpheus' tide,
With mighty triumph, blended
His Syracusan lord, the courser-loving king.
For him a light of glory doth upspring
Amid the land with heroes teeming,
Lydian Pelops' colony,
Whom Neptune chose to be his joy;
When from that cauldron pure,
Clotho did him secure,
Deck'd with an ivory shoulder whitely beaming.
Many a wonder is, in sooth,
But sometimes more than truth
On man's beguiled thought
Invention will prevail
With a well-woven tale,
In varied colours, quaintly wrought:
And grace, that can a magic throw
On all that charms the sense below,
By lustre not his own reliev'd,
Hath made th' incredible believed.
But after-days the best convincers are:
And man, should only fair
Speak of the gods, and good :
For so is blame eschew'd.
O son of Tantalus, not as of yore,
Will I record thy story:
That when to gods, invited guests,
At Sipylus, thy sire
Spread in return his ample feasts,
Then, smitten with desire,
Thee the trident-ruler bore
Snatch'd up on golden steeds to Jove's high consistory;
Where Ganymede came after thee
To Jove for equal ministry.
But when thou vanish'd wert; nor sought
Long time, was to thy mother brought,
Some envious neighbour whispering said
That they thy limbs had with a blade,
In seething water, hewn; and set
Upon the board thy sodden flesh, and eat.
That impious thought be far from me
To tax a god with gluttony.
Small gain awaits the slanderer's tongue
If any, mortal tribes among,
In honour high advanced to live,
Th' Olympian watchers e'er did give,
That Tantalus was he.
But the great bliss unable to digest,
And with satiety opprest,
A direful harm he rued, the stone
Enormous o'er him hung by Jove,
Which alway from his head
Endeavouring to remove,
He is to joy a stranger.
Such life he hath; with endless danger,
And toil insufferable, led:
(With other three, not he alone,)
For that from heaven he stole away
The nectar and ambrosia,
Which him incorruptible made;
And to his earthly peers convey'd.
Who hopes that aught he doth may lie
A secret from immortal eye,
Sins 'gainst the power of heaven.
Therefore his son, the gods again
Sent to the short-lived race of men,
From their own mansions driven.
He, soon as duskier down did shade
The bloom upon his cheek display'd,
Of ready nuptials thought;
And from her Pisan sire, the glorious maid
To win, Hippodameia, sought.
He came; and by hoar ocean's flood
Alone in darkness stood,
Then call'd amid the sullen roar
On him whose trident shook the shore.
Straight at his feet the god appear'd,
And thus his suppliant voice was heard.
"Neptune, if thou at all hast held The gifts of Venus dear,
Of brave Enomaus be quell'd
By thee the brazen spear.
In swiftest chariots speed me on
To Elis, and with triumph crown.
Thirteen hero-suitors slain,
His daughter's wedding he delays.
The mighty conquest, ne'er will gain
A man whom fear of peril frays.
And why, of those with death their doom,
Should any, sitting down in gloom,
Without a name his age consume,
Vainly; nor a portion share
In aught that noble is and fair?
Mine is the trial; and thine be
To grant success and victory."
He spoke; nor fail'd of his desire.
And, honouring him, the god
A golden car bestow'd,
And winged steeds that never tire.
Enomaus fell his might before,
And the virgin bride he led.
Six lordly sons to him she bore,
Each in school of virtues bred.
And now by Alpheus' wave he lies,
Mingled with famous obsequies,
That round his tomb they celebrate,
Near the great altar's thronged state.
And far abroad the glory hath look'd out
Of Pelops, in th' Olympic courses,
Where swift feet do try their forces,
And the toils of champions stout.
O'er the victor's life, the balm
Of triumph sheds a holy calm.
The good supreme, that mortal knows,
Still from to-day's contentment flows.
For such behoves me now to breathe
Eolian measures; a fit wreath,
That to the courser's speed belongs.
No other host, expert in lovely lore,
Or in might excelling more,
At least of mortals now,
I e'er shall clothe in folds of dædal songs. God is thy guardian, Hiero; and shares
In these thy princely cares.
And, if he fail not soon,
I trust with yet a sweeter tune,
|