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ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 AND 
 
 ERECHTHEUS 
 
THE GOLDEN PINE EDITION 
 
 Cloth $s 6d net, leather 6s net 
 
 POEMS AND BAI^LADS. 
 (First Series.) 
 
 POEMS AND BALIrADS. 
 (Second and Third Series.) 
 
 TRISTRAM OF LYONESSE. 
 
 ATALANTA DJ CAI,YDON 
 AND ERECHTHEUS. 
 
 SONGS BEFORE SUNRISE. 
 LONDON: WII^LIAM HEINEMANN 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 AND 
 
 ERECHTHEUS ''^ ^ 
 
 AC 
 
 Algernon Charles Swinburne 
 
 LONDON: WILLIAM HEINEMANN 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 First published (Moxon), 1865. New impressions, 
 '65, '66, '68. (Chatto), 1875, '79, '82, "85, '89, '92, 
 •93, '96, '98, 1901, '05, '07, '09, '10, '12, '13, 'i7- 
 
 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 First published, 1875. iV^if impresstons, '76 
 '80, '93. 
 
 TA* Golden Pine Edition (Heinemann), 1917 
 
 Included in Collected Poems (Chatto), 1904 (twice), 
 '09, '10, '12. (Heinemann), 1917 
 
 London: William Heinemann, ^<i\^ 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 ATALANTA IN CALYDON . . . . i 
 ERECHTHEUS 8g 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 A TRAGEDY 
 
 Tais (aivras eS Spav • Kar9avi>v 8e was i.vhp 
 r^ KoX (TKiA • ri /uT^Sei/ els ovStv ^ewei 
 
 Fur. /^r. Mel. 20 (537) 
 
TO THE MEMORY 
 
 OF 
 
 WALTER SAVAGE LANDOR 
 
 I NOW DEDICATE, WITH EQUAL AFFECTION, REVERENCE, AND REGRET, A 
 POEM INSCRIBED TO HIM WHILE YET ALIVE IN WORDS WHICH ARE NOW 
 RETAINED BECAUSE THEY WERE LAID BEFORE HIM ; AND TO WHICH, RATHKS 
 THAN CANCEL THEM, I HAVE ADDED SUCH OTHERS AS WERE EVOKED BY 
 THE NEWS OF HIS DEATH : THAT THOUGH LOSING THE PLEASURE I MAY 
 NOT LOSE THE HONOUR OF INSCRIBING IN FRONT OF MY WORK THE HIGHESl 
 OF CONTEMPORARY NAMES. 
 
iyyayov affitaffiav 'f}Sinrvooi Kaff aXa, 
 Tr\7\powraL fifXiTOS dedQev ar6fia, fir) rt TloaeiSHv 
 
 jSXaif/r;, eV axrlv l^o'i' (f^y /xfAiyripvv oira. 
 rotos aoilihs f<pvs' rj^eTs S' «tj K\aiofiev, o" crov 
 
 SevSfieO' ol^Ofievov, Kai ere voOovuev ael. 
 elite Se TltepiSecv tis a.vaffTpe<p6el<ra vphs &AAij»/- 
 
 ^\0€v, iSoii, irivToiv (piXruTOs ^\0€ fiporav, 
 (TTefifiaTa Spfxpaixeuos veoQT)\ta x^pc^ yf paiais, 
 
 Kol iro\ibv Sd,<l>vats aiJL<l>fKd\u\fie Kapa, 
 f}Sv ri 2<Kc\iKa<s eirl ittikt'ktiv, t]Sv ri x^pSais, 
 
 dff6fievos' iroAA^i' yap /iereffaWf \vpav, 
 •voWdKi 5' eV fiiiffffaiffi KaO'fifievoy evpev ^AirSWur, 
 
 &v0f(Ti S' eaTTfipev, rfpirva 5' eSaiKe \eyftv, 
 Tlava t' aelfiyrjffrSy re Uirvy K6pv66y t€ SvtreSpov, 
 
 ^y t' ipl\7]<re 6edi,y Byrirhs 'AfiaSpvaSa • 
 rr6vTov S' iv tuyipoiaiv fKolfiiae Kv/xoSdfietav, 
 
 riiv t' 'Ayafi€fivoyi(w ttoIS' aircSa)K€ irarpJ, 
 irpbs 5" itpovs Ae\(povs 0e6ir\j}KTov tireftA^ev 'OpfarTp^ 
 
 reipiifieyov crrvyepais evOa Kai ev6a Beats. 
 
^X^"' i^ovK tr' ftre<, /cou/c o5 iroTe crot iropeSoi'/.iat 
 
 o^o^evoy, x^'P^" X^P"'^ 6tydiv 6<rjois" 
 vOv 5' au fivTjard/xevov yKvKviriKpos virfiKvOev aiSiis, 
 
 oia Tvx^v o'iov wphs atOfv oTos ^X""' 
 oVnore (Tols, -/ipov, ufifxa <pi\ois <pi\ov ofifjutri T(pif>«. 
 
 fff/s, jfpov, aipdu(yos, (piKrare, Se^irepas. 
 ■^ ^{upapa Kons, ?i \pa<paphs 0i6s itrrr tj rovrtav 
 
 Helov e0ri/j,(pLaiv ; oil kovis aWa fitos. 
 oAAo fioi riSvTfpos ye ir€'A<«y iroAu ray er' tSyruv, 
 
 eTr\eo yip' col firjv ravra dav6i>Ti <pfp<i>, 
 •Kaxipa fiiv, d\A' anh Krjpjs frriTvfj.a' /u.7j5' airoTpe<pd'ps, 
 
 TTphs 5e fia\ccv (ti vvv ^(tvxov ofj,/j.a Sfxov. 
 ov yap ex^i M*7<* ^Vj tj 6f\(iiv, criQev &^m Sovvat, 
 
 PaTTTOudiov irep airdv ov yap eveanv tfiov 
 oiiVt /j.(\tKpiiTov irape'xetJ' ydyos ' el yap eveiif 
 
 Kai ae x^polv xf/aiKTat Kai ae tot' aZdis iSe7v, 
 Sdxpvffi T€ fftrovSats re Kapa <pi\ov aiKpiiroXeiieiv 
 
 d<p9a\fJU)vs 0' iepovs aoi/s iepov re Se/xas. 
 eiS" o<pe\ov pid\a yap rdS" tiu ajxTraixTeie fj.ep'.uvi]S' 
 
 vvv Sf ■irp6ffw6ev livev arifiaros oIktov &yw 
 ovi' eirtrvfipiSiov Oprivo) /ueAos, aA.A' airafxvvdels, 
 
 dXA' dicdveuttev ex<^v afX(piSaKpvra. irddrj. 
 oKKa iTv X°-^P^ Bavuv, Kai exfuv yepas faSi Tpiv uvSpwP 
 
 vpos re Oewv, evipois et ris eireffTi Ot6s. 
 XoTps yepov, <pi\e X'^'iP* "ft^rep, 7ro\v (peprar aoiSwi' 
 
 vv 'iSofiev, tro\v S^ <peprar' deiffo/xevoov 
 Xo^'^P^t f 'i^ oAjSoj/ exois, oTov ye davovres exoviTW, 
 
 rjtrvxiav ex^F"^ "*' <t>i\6rT]Tos &rep. 
 
(T'fifiaTos oixofxfvov croi fivii/xar' is varfpov tarai, 
 
 aol Tf (t>t\^ /xvfjfiri /Uf7JyU.OT0S olxofifvov 
 
 tv XdpiTfs KKaiovffi deal, K\aUi 5' 'A(ppoS'iTrj 
 
 KaWixdpots Movffciv Tff^afi.4in] <TTe(pdvois. 
 oh yap 07ra| lepovs irore yripas erpiyf/fv aoiSois- 
 
 T'fjvSe Tb ffhv <paivfi fj-vrjiiia t6S' ayXaiav. 
 ^ <f>l\os ris fjLaKapecTcn fiporhs, ffol 5' eif rivt Nu/i<J>ot 
 
 Swpa TToOfiva v4fM(tv, ijarara Swp^ , eSoffav. 
 ras vvv xO'^f fs vxvos e/877 Kal avf^vefios aliiv, 
 
 Kal (Tvv6aiTT0iJ.fyai jxolpav exovffi fiiav. 
 eSSeis Kal crv, Ka\6v koI a.y6.K\vrov ev x^ovl Kol\r) 
 
 virvov i(piK6fjLevos, (Tr\s airdvocrcpi vdrpas, 
 TTjAe irapa ^avOov TvpariviKhv oiS/jLa nadevSeis 
 
 vd/xaros, ri 5' Irt <tt] fiatd (re ya7a iroQel, 
 oAA' airexeis, Kal irpocrBe (pt\67rTo\ts S>v Trep aTruirav 
 
 eliSe- fidKap 5' rjixiy ouS' a/xeyapros etrei. 
 Baihs eirixQoviwv ye xP^vos Kal fxoipa Kparr.aei, 
 
 Tovs Se itot' eiicppocrvvri roiis 5e ttot' &Ayos ex^ 
 ■KoWaKi 5' y) ^Kdirrei (t>dos f) (TKdros a'ttpiKaXvirrei 
 
 /xvpofxevovs, SdKvet 5' vtti'os eyp-rfyoporas' 
 oiiV eff '6r' 4v rvn^oiffi KareSpaOeu on/xa 6av6vTwv 
 
 t) (TkStos ^ Ti <pdos Scleral ijeXiov 
 ovS' ovap evvvx^ov Kal evvirviov ov5' virap ecrrai 
 
 ¥> irore repirofievois fi ttot'' dSvpo/xevoLS' 
 a\\' eva irdvres ael daKov crvvexovai koI eSpap 
 
 ivTl BpoT^s &0poToy, KdWiuov &vri Kaiais. 
 
THE ARGUMENT 
 
 Althtea, daug-hter of Thestius and Eurythemis, 
 queen of Calydon, being- with child of Meleager her 
 first-born son, dreamed that she brought forth a brand 
 burning ; and upon his birth came the three Fates and 
 prophesied of him three things, namely these ; that 
 he should have great strength of his hands, and good 
 fortune in this life, and that he should live no longer 
 when the brand then in the fire were consumed : 
 wherefore his mother plucked it forth and kept it by 
 her. And the child being a man grown sailed with 
 jason after the fleece of gold, and won himself great 
 praise of all men living ; and when the tribes of the 
 north and west made war upon ^tolia, he fought 
 against their army and scattered it. But Artemis, 
 having at the first stirred up these tribes to war 
 against CEneus king of Calydon, because he had 
 offered sacrifice to all the gods saving her alone, but 
 her he had forgotten to honour, was yet more wroth 
 because of the destruction of this army, and sent 
 upon the land of Calydon a wild boar which slew 
 many and wasted all their increase, but him could 
 aone slay, and many went against him and perished. 
 Then were all the chief men of Greece gathered 
 together, and among them Atalanta daughter of 
 lasius the Arcadian, a virgin ; for whose sake 
 Artemis let slay the boar, seeing she favoured the 
 
THE ARGUMENT 
 
 maiden greatly ; and Meleager having despatched it 
 gave the spoil thereof to Atalanta, as one beyond 
 measure enamoured of her ; but the brethren of 
 Althaea his mother, Toxeus and Plexippus, with such 
 others as misliked that she only should bear oif the 
 praise whereas many had borne the labour, laid wait 
 for her to take away her spoil ; but Meleager fought 
 against them and slew them : whom when Althaea 
 their sister beheld and knew to be slain of her son, 
 she waxed for wrath and sorrow like as one mad, 
 and taking- the brand whereby the measure of her 
 son's life was meted to him, she cast it upon a fire ; 
 and with the wasting thereof his life likewise wasted 
 away, that being- brought back to his father's house 
 he died in a brief space ; and his mother also endured 
 not long- after for very sorrow ; and this was his end, 
 and the end of that hunting. 
 
THE PERSONS 
 
 CHIEF HUNTSMAN 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 CENEUS 
 
 ATALANTA 
 
 TOXEUS 
 
 PLEXIPPUS 
 
 HERALD 
 
 MESSENGER 
 
 SECOND MESSENGER 
 
ioTu 5' 8<rris ovx inr&wrtpos 
 
 <ppovTiffiv Saus, 
 
 rav a TratSo\vfj.as riKaiva BeoTt^ fiififfaro 
 
 mtpZari riva irpdvoiav, 
 
 KUTaiOovcra iraiShs Scujtoivhv 
 
 Sa\hv ?iKiK, iirfl fwKwv 
 
 Harpddtv Ke\d5r)(Tf ; 
 
 avfifi.€Tp6v T6 Stoi $Lov 
 
 {laipdKpavTov is i/Mip. 
 
 /EscH. C/io. 602-612. 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 CHIEF HUNTSMAN 
 
 Maiden, and mistress of the months and stars 
 
 Now folded in the flowerless fields of heaven, 
 
 Goddess whom all g-ods love with threefold heart, 
 
 Being- treble in thy divided deity, 
 
 A light for dead men and dark hours, a foot 
 
 Swift on the hills as morning-, and a hand 
 
 To all things fierce and fleet that roar and rang-e 
 
 Mortal, with gentler shafts than snow or sleep ; 
 
 Hear now and help and lift no violent hand, 
 
 But favourable and fair as thine eye's beam 
 
 Hidden and shown in heaven ; for 1 all night 
 
 Amid the king's hounds and the huntings men 
 
 Have wrought and worshipped toward thee ; nor 
 
 shall man 
 See goodlier hounds or deadlier edge of spears ; 
 But for the end, that lies unreached at yet 
 Between the hands and on the knees of gods. 
 O fair-faced sun, killing- the stars and dews 
 And dreams and desolation of the night ! 
 Rise up, shine, stretch thine hand out, with thy bow 
 Touch the most dimmest height of trembling heaven, 
 And burn and break the dark about thy ways, 
 Shot through and through with arrows ; let thine hair 
 Lighten as flame above that flameless shell 
 Which was the moon, and thine eyes fill the world 
 
 VOL. IV. 
 
2 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 And thy lips kindle with swift beams ; let earth 
 
 Laugh, and the long- sea fiery from thy feet 
 
 Through all the roar and ripple of streaming springs 
 
 And foam in reddening flakes and flying flowers 
 
 Shaken from hands and blown from lips of nymphs 
 
 Whose hair or breast divides the wandering wave 
 
 With salt close tresses cleaving lock to lock, 
 
 All gold, or shuddering and unfurrowed snow ; 
 
 And all the winds about thee with their wings, 
 
 And fountain-heads of all the watered world ; 
 
 Each horn of Acheloiis, and the green 
 
 Euenus, wedded with the straitening sea. 
 
 For in fair time thou comest ; come also thou, 
 
 Twin-born with him, and virgin, Artemis, 
 
 And give our spears their spoil, the wild boar's hide, 
 
 Sent in thine anger against us for sin done 
 
 And bloodless altars without wine or fire. 
 
 Him now consume thou ; for thy sacrifice 
 
 With sanguine-shining steam divides the dawn, 
 
 And one, the maiden rose of all thy maids, 
 
 Arcadian Atalanta, snowy-souled, 
 
 Fair as the snow and footed as the wind, 
 
 From Ladon and well-wooded Maenalus 
 
 Over the firm hills and the fleeting sea 
 
 Hast thou drawn hither, and many an arm^d king, 
 
 Heroes, the crown of men, like gods in fight. 
 
 Moreover out of all the vEtolian land. 
 
 From the full-flowered Lelantian pasturage 
 
 To what of fruitful field the son of Zeus 
 
 Won from the roaring river and labouring sea 
 
 When the wild god shrank in his horn and fled 
 
 And foamed and lessened through his wrathful fords, 
 
 Leaving clear lands that steamed with sudden sun. 
 
 These virgins with the lightening of the day 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 3 
 
 Bringf thee fresh wreaths and their own sweeter hair, 
 Luxurious locks and flower-like mixed with flowers, 
 Clean off'ering-, and chaste hymns ; but me the time 
 Divides from these thingfs ; whom do thou not less 
 Help and give honour, and to mine hounds good speed. 
 And edge to spears, and luck to each man's hand. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 When the hounds of spring are on winter's traces. 
 The mother of months in meadow or plain 
 
 Fills the shadows and windy places 
 With lisp of leaves and ripple of rain ; 
 
 And the brown bright nightingale amorous 
 
 Is half assuaged for Itylus, 
 
 For the Thracian ships and the foreign faces, 
 The tongueless vigil, and all the pain. 
 
 Come with bows bent and with emptying of quivers, 
 
 Maiden most perfect, lady of light, 
 With a noise of winds and many rivers, 
 
 With a clamour of waters, and with might ; 
 Bind on thy sandals, O thou most fleet, 
 Over the splendour and speed of thy feet ; 
 For the faint east quickens, the wan west shivers, 
 
 Round the feet of the day and the feet of the night. 
 
 Where shall we find her, how shall we sing to her, 
 Fold our hands round her knees, and cling ? 
 
 O that man's heart were as fire and could spring to her. 
 Fire, or the strength of the streams that spring ! 
 
 For the stars and the winds are unto her 
 
 As raiment, as songs of the harp-player ; 
 
 For the risen stars and the fallen cling to her. 
 And the southwest-wind and the west-wind sing. 
 
4 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 For winter's rains and ruins are over, 
 And all the season of snows and sins ; 
 
 The days dividing lover and lover, 
 
 The light that loses, the night that wins ; 
 
 And time remembered is grief forgotten, 
 
 And frosts are slain and flowers begotten. 
 
 And in green underwood and cover 
 
 Blossom by blossom the spring begins. 
 
 The full streams feed on flower of rushes, 
 Ripe grasses trammel a travelling foot. 
 
 The faint fresh flame of the young year flushes 
 From leaf to flower and flower to fruit ; 
 
 And fruit and leaf are as gold and fire, 
 
 And the oat is heard above the lyre, 
 
 And the hoofed heel of a satyr crushes 
 The chestnut-husk at the chestnut-root. 
 
 And Pan by noon and Bacchus by night, 
 Fleeter of foot than the fleet-foot kid. 
 Follows with dancing and fills with delight 
 
 The Maenad and the Bassarid ; 
 And soft as lips that laugh and hide 
 The laughing leaves of the trees divide, 
 And screen from seeing and leave in sight 
 The god pursuing, the maiden hid. 
 
 The ivy falls with the Bacchanal's hair 
 Over her eyebrows hiding her eyes ; 
 The wild vine slipping down leaves bare 
 
 Her bright breast shortening into sighs ; 
 The wild vine slips with the weight of its leaves, 
 But the berried ivy catches and cleaves 
 To the limbs that glitter, the feet that scare 
 The wolf that follows, the fawn that flies. 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 5 
 
 ALTHiEA 
 
 What do ye sing"ing ? what is this ye singf ? 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Flowers bring we, and pure lips that please the gfods, 
 And raiment meet for service : lest the day 
 Turn sharp with all its honey in our lips. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 Nig-ht, a black hound, follows the white fawn day, 
 Swifter than dreams the white flown feet of sleep ; 
 Will ye pray back the night with any prayers ? 
 And though the spring put back a little while 
 Winter, and snows that plague all men for sin, 
 And the iron time of cursing, yet I know 
 Spring shall be ruined with the rain, and storm 
 Eat up like fire the ashen autumn days. 
 I marvel what men do with prayers awake 
 Who dream and die with dreaming ; any god, 
 Yea the least god of all things called divine. 
 Is more than sleep and waking ; yet we say, 
 Perchance by praying a man shall match his god. 
 For if sleep have no mercy, and man's dreams 
 Bite to the blood and burn into the bone, 
 What shall this man do waking ? By the gods, 
 He shall not pray to dream sweet things to-night. 
 Having dreamt once more bitter things than death. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Queen, but what is it that hath burnt thine heart ? 
 For thy speech flickers like a blown-out flame. 
 
6 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 Look, ye say well, and know not what ye say ; 
 For all my sleep is turned into a fire, 
 ' And all my di earns to stuff that kindles it. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Yet one doth well being patient of the gods. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 Yea, lest they smite us with some four-foot plague. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 But when time spreads find out some herb for it. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 And with their healing herbs infect our blood. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 What ails thee to be jealous of their ways ? 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 What if they give us poisonous drinks for wine ? 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 They have their will ; much talking mends it not. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 And gall for milk, and cursing for a prayer ? 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Have they not given life, and the end of life ? 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 Lo, where they heal, they help not ; thus they do, 
 They mock us with a little piteousness, 
 And we say prayers, and weep ; but at the last. 
 Sparing awhile, they smite and spare no whit. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Small praise man gets dispraising the high gods : 
 What have they done that thou dishonourest them ? 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 First Artemis for all this harried land 
 I praise not, and for wasting of the boar 
 That mars with tooth and tusk and fiery feet 
 Green pasturage and the grace of standing corn 
 And meadow and marsh with springs and unblown 
 
 leaves, 
 Flocks and swift herds and all that bite sweet grass, 
 I praise her not ; what things are these to praise ? 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 But when the king did sacrifice, and gave 
 Each god fair dues of wheat and blood and wine, 
 Her not with bloodshed nor burnt-offering 
 Revered he, nor with salt or cloven cake ; 
 Wherefore being wroth she plagued the land ; but 
 
 now 
 Takes off from us fate and her heavy things. 
 Which deed of these twain were not good to praise ? 
 For a just deed looks always either way 
 With blameless eyes, and mercy is no fault. 
 
8 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 Yea, but a curse she hath sent above all these 
 To hurt us where she healed us ; and hath lit 
 Fire where the old fire went out, and where the wind. 
 Slackened, hath blown on us with deadlier air. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 What storm is this that tightens all our sail ? 
 
 ALTHAEA 
 
 Love, a thwart sea-wind full of rain and foam. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Whence blown, and born under what stormier star ? 
 
 ALTHiEA 
 
 Southward across Euenus from the sea. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Thy speech turns toward Arcadia like blown wind. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 Sharp as the north sets when the snows are out. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Way, for this maiden hath no touch of love. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 I would she had sought in some cold gulf of sea 
 Love, or in dens where strange beasts lurk, or fire, 
 Or snows on the extreme hills, or iron land 
 Where no spring is ; I would she had sought therein 
 And found, or ever love had found her here. 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 9 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 She Is holier than all holy days or thing's, 
 
 The sprinkled water or fume of perfect fire ; 
 
 Chaste, dedicated to pure prayers, and filled 
 
 With higher thoughts than heaven ; a maiden clean^ 
 
 Pure iron, fashioned for a sword ; and man 
 
 She loves not ; what should one such do with love ? 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 Look you, I speak not as one light of wit, 
 
 But as a queen speaks, being heart-vexed ; for oft 
 
 I hear my brothers wrangling- in mid hall, 
 
 And am not moved ; and my son chiding- them. 
 
 And these things nowise move me, but I know 
 
 Foolish and wise men must be to the end, 
 
 And feed myself with patience ; but this most, 
 
 This moves me, that for wise men as for fools 
 
 Love is one thing, an evil thing-, and turns 
 
 Choice words and wisdom into fire and air. 
 
 And in the end shall no joy come, but g-rief, 
 
 Sharp words and soul's division and fresh tears 
 
 Flower-wise upon the old root of tears brought forth» 
 
 Fruit-wise upon the old flower of tears sprung- up, 
 
 Pitiful sighs, and much regrafted pain. 
 
 These things are in my presage, and myself 
 
 Am part of them and know not ; but in dreams 
 
 The g-ods are heavy on me, and all the fates 
 
 Shed fire across my eyelids mixed with night, 
 
 And burn me blind, and disilluminate 
 
 My sense of seeing, and my perspicuous soul 
 
 Darken with vision ; seeing I see not, hear 
 
 And hearing am not holpen, but mine eyes 
 
 Stain many tender broideries in the bed 
 
 VOL. IV. c 
 
10 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 Drawn up about my face that I may weep 
 And the king" wake not ; and my brows and lips 
 Tremble and sob in sleeping-, like swift flames 
 That tremble, or water when it sobs with heat 
 Kindled from under ; and my tears fill my breast 
 And speck the fair dyed pillows round the king" 
 With barren showers and salter than the sea. 
 Such dreams divide me dreaming" ; for long" since 
 I dreamed that out of this my womb had sprung" 
 Fire and a firebrand ; this was ere my son, 
 Meleagfer, a goodly flower in fields of fig"ht, 
 Felt the lig"ht touch him coming" forth, and wailed 
 Childlike ; but yet he was not ; and in 'time 
 I bare him, and my heart was great ; for yet 
 So royally was never strong" man born. 
 Nor queen so nobly bore as noble a thing 
 As this my son was : such a birth God sent 
 And such a grace to bear it. Then came in 
 Three weaving women, and span each a threau. 
 Saying This for strength and That for luck, and one 
 Saying Till the brand upon the hearth burn down, 
 So long shall this man see good days and live. 
 And I with gathered raiment from the bed 
 Sprang, and drew forth the brand, and cast on it 
 Water, and trod the flame bare-foot, and crushed 
 With naked hand spark beaten out of spark 
 And blew against and quenched it ; for I said, 
 These are the most high Fates that dwell with us, 
 And we find favour a little in their sight, 
 A little, and more we miss of, and much time 
 Foils us ; howbeit they have pitied me, O son, 
 And thee most piteous, thee a tenderer thing 
 Than any flower of fleshly seed alive. 
 Wherefore I kissed and hid him with my hands, 
 And covered under arms and hair, and wept, 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON ii 
 
 And feared to touch him with my tears, and laughed ; 
 
 So light a thing was this man, grown so great 
 
 Men cast their heads back, seeing against the sun 
 
 Blaze the armed man carven on his shield, and hear 
 
 The laughter of little bells along the brace 
 
 Ring, as birds singing or flutes blown, and watch, 
 
 High up, the cloven shadow of either plume 
 
 Divide the bright light of the brass, and make 
 
 His helmet as a windy and wintering moon 
 
 Seen through blown cloud and plume-like drift, when 
 
 ships 
 Drive, and men strive with all the sea, and oars 
 Break, and the beaks dip under, drinking death ; 
 Yet was he then but a span long, and moau-^d 
 With inarticulate mouth inseparate words. 
 And with blind lips and fingers wrung my breast 
 Hard, and thrust out with foolish hands and feet. 
 Murmuring ; but those grey wom^ with bound hair 
 Who fright the gods frighted not him ; he laughed 
 Seeing them, and pushed out hands to feel and haul 
 Distaff and thread, intangible ; but they 
 Passed, and I hid the brand, and in my heart 
 Laughed likewise, having all my will of heaven. 
 But now I know not if to left or right 
 The gods have drawn us hither ; for again 
 I dreamt, and saw the black brand burst on fire 
 As a branch bursts in flower, and saw the flame 
 Fade flower-wise, and Death came and with dry lips 
 Blew the charred ash into my breast ; and Love 
 Trampled the ember and crushed it with swift feet. 
 This I have also at heart ; that not for me, 
 Not for me only or son of mine, O girls. 
 The gods have wrought life, and desire of life, 
 Heart's love and heart's division ; but for all 
 
12 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 There shines one sun and one wind blows till night. 
 
 And when nig-ht comes the wind sinks and the sun, 
 
 And there is no light after, and no storm, 
 
 But sleep and much forgetfulness of things. 
 
 In such wise I gat knowledge of the gods 
 
 Years hence, and heard high sayings of one most wise, 
 
 Eurythemis my mother, who beheld 
 
 With eyes alive and spake with lips of these 
 
 As one on earth disfleshed and disallied 
 
 From breath or blood corruptible ; such gifts 
 
 Time gave her, and an equal soul to these 
 
 And equal face to all things ; thus she said. 
 
 But whatsoever intolerable or glad 
 
 The swift hours weave and unweave, I go hence 
 
 Full of mine own soul, perfect of myself. 
 
 Toward mine and me sufficient ; and what chance 
 
 The gods cast lot,g for and shake out on us, 
 
 That shall we take, and that much bear withal. 
 
 And now, before these gather to the hunt, 
 
 I will go arm my son and bring him forth, 
 
 Lest love or some man's anger work him harm. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Before the beginning of years 
 
 There came to the making of man 
 Time, with a gift of tears ; 
 
 Grief, with a glass that ran ; 
 Pleasure, with pain for leaven ; 
 
 Summer, with flowers that fell ; 
 Remembrance fallen from heaven, 
 
 And madness risen from hell ; 
 Strength without hands to smite ; 
 
 Love that endures for a breath : 
 Night, the shadow of light. 
 
 And life, the shadow of death. 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 13 
 
 And the high g-ods took in hand 
 
 Fire, and the falling- of tears, 
 And a measure of sliding- sand 
 
 From under the feet of the years ; 
 And froth and drift of the sea ; 
 
 And dust of the labouring- earth ; 
 And bodies of thing-s to be 
 
 In the houses of death and of birth ; 
 And wrought with weeping- and laughter, 
 
 And fashioned with loathing and love 
 With life before and after 
 
 And death beneath and above, 
 For a day and a night and a morrow, 
 
 That his strength might endure for a spaa 
 With travail and heavy sorrow, 
 
 The holy spirit of man. 
 
 From the winds of the north and the south 
 
 They gathered as unto strife ; 
 They breathed upon his mouth. 
 
 They filled his body with life ; 
 Eyesight and speech they wrought 
 
 For the veils of the soul therein, 
 A time for labour and thought, 
 
 A time to serve and to sin ; 
 They gave him light in his ways, 
 
 And love, and a space for delight. 
 And beauty and length of days. 
 
 And night, and sleep in the night. 
 His speech is a burning fire ; 
 
 With his lips he travaileth ; 
 In his heart is a blind desire. 
 
 In his eyes foreknowledge of death ; 
 
14 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 He weaves, and is clothed with derision ; 
 
 Sows, and he shall not reap ; 
 His life is a watch or a vision 
 
 Between a sleep and a sleep. 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 O sweet new heaven and air without a star, 
 Fair day, be fair and welcome, as to men 
 With deeds to do and praise to pluck from thee. 
 Come forth a child, born with clear sound and lig^ht, 
 With laug^hter and swift limbs and prosperous looks ; 
 That this great hunt with heroes for the hounds 
 May leave thee memorable and us well sped. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 Son, first I praise thy prayer, then bid thee speed ; 
 But the gods hear men's bands before their lips, 
 And heed beyond all crying and sacrifice 
 Light of things done and noise of labouring men. 
 But thou, being armed and perfect for the deed. 
 Abide ; for like rain-flakes in a wind they grow. 
 The men thy fellows, and the choice of the world, 
 Bound to root out the tusked plague, and leave 
 Thanks and safe days and peace in Calydon. 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 For the whole city and all the low-lying land 
 Flames, and the soft air sounds with them that come ; 
 The gods give all these fruit of all their works. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 Set thine eye thither and fix thy spirit and say 
 Whom there thou knowest ; for sharp mixed shadow 
 and wind 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 15 
 
 Blown up between the mornings and the mist, 
 
 With steam of steeds and flash of bridle or wheel, 
 
 And fire, and parcels of the broken dawn, 
 
 And dust divided by hard light, and spears 
 
 That shine and shift as the edge of wild beasts' eyes, 
 
 Smite upon mine ; so fiery their blind edg-e 
 
 Burns, and bright points break up and baffle day. 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 The first, for many I know not, being far off, 
 Peleus the Larissaean, couched with whom 
 Sleeps the white sea-bred wife and silver-shod. 
 Fair as fled foam, a goddess ; and their son 
 ■ Most swift and splendid of men's children born, 
 Most like a god, full of the future fame. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 Who are these shining like one sundered star ? 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 Thy sister's sons, a double flower of men. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 O sweetest kin to me in all the world, 
 O twin-born blood of Leda, gracious heads 
 Like kindled lights in untempestuous heaven, 
 Fair flower-like stars on the iron foam of fight. 
 With what glad heart and kindliness of soul. 
 Even to the staining of both eyes with tears 
 And kindling of warm eyelids with desire, 
 A great way off" I greet you, and rejoice 
 Seeing you so fair, and moulded like as gods. 
 Far off" ye come, and least in years of these. 
 But lordliest, but worth love to look upon. 
 
l6 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 Even such (for sailing- hither I saw far hence, 
 And where Eurotas hollows his moist rock 
 Nigh Sparta with a strenuous-hearted stream) 
 Even such I saw their sisters ; one swan-white, 
 The little Helen, and less fair than she 
 Fair Clytaemnestra, grave as pasturing fawns 
 Who feed and fear some arrow ; but at whiles, 
 As one smitten with love or wrung with joy. 
 She laughs and lightens with her eyes, and then 
 Weeps ; whereat Helen, having- laughed, weeps too, 
 And the other chides her, and she being chid speaks 
 
 noug-ht, 
 But cheeks and lips and eyelids kisses her. 
 Laughing ; so fare they, as in their bloomless bud 
 And full of unblown life, the blood of gods. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 Sweet days befall them and good loves and lords, 
 And tender and temperate honours of the hearth. 
 Peace, and a perfect life and blameless bed. 
 But who shows next an eagle wrought in gold, 
 That flames and beats broad wing3 against the sun 
 And with void mouth gapes after emptier prey ? 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 Know by that sign the reign of Telamon 
 
 Between the fierce mouths of the encountering brine 
 
 On the strait reefs of twice-washed Salamis. 
 
 ALTHiEA 
 
 For like one great of hand he bears himself, 
 Vine-chapleted, with savours of the sea, 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 17 
 
 Glittering' as wine and moving as a wave. 
 
 But who girt round there roughly follows him ? 
 
 MELEAPER 
 
 Ancaeus, great of hand, an iron bulk, 
 Two-edged for fight as the axe ag'ainst his arm, 
 Who drives against the surge of stormy spears 
 Full-sailed ; him Cepheus follows, his twin-born. 
 Chief name next his of all Arcadian men. 
 
 ALTFLEA 
 
 Praise be with men abroad ; chaste lives with us, 
 Home-keeping days and household reverences. 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 Next by the left unsandalled foot know thou 
 The sail and oar of this vEtolian land. 
 Thy brethren, Toxeus and the violent-souled 
 Plexippus, over-swift with hand and tong-ue ; 
 For hands are fruitful, but the ignorant mouth 
 Blows and corrupts their work with barren breath. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 Speech too bears fruit, being- worthy ; and air blows 
 
 down 
 Things poisonous, and high-seated violences. 
 And with charmed words and song^s have men put 
 
 out 
 Wild evil, and the fire of tyrannies. 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 Yea, all things have they, save the gods and love. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 Love thou the law and cleave to things ordained. 
 
 VOL. IV. D 
 
i8 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 Law lives upon their lips whom these applaud. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 How sayest thou these ? what god applauds new 
 things ? 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 Zeus, who hath fear and custom under foot. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 But loves not laws thrown down and lives awry. 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 Yet is not less himself than his own law. 
 
 ALTH.EA 
 
 Nor shifts and shuffles old things up and down. 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 But what he will remoulds and discreates. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 Much, but not this, that each thing live its life. 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 Nor only live, but lighten and lift up higher. 
 
 ALTH.2EA 
 
 Pride breaks itself, and too much gained is gone. 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 Things gained are gone, but great things done 
 endure. 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 19 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 Child, if a man serve law through all his life 
 And with his whole heart worship, him all gods 
 Praise ; but who loves it only with his lips, 
 And not in heart and deed desiring- it 
 Hides a perverse will with obsequious words, 
 Him heaven infatuates and his twin-born fate 
 Tracks, and gains on him, scenting sins far off, 
 And the swift hounds of violent death devour. 
 Be man at one with equal-minded gods. 
 So shall he prosper ; not through laws torn up, 
 Violated rule and a new face of things. 
 A woman armed makes war upon herself, 
 Unwomanlike, and treads down use and wont 
 And the sweet common honour that she hath. 
 Love, and the cry of children, and the hand 
 Trothplight and mutual mouth of marriages. 
 This doth she, being unloved ; whom if one love. 
 Not fire nor iron and the wide-mouthed wars 
 Are deadlier than her lips or braided hair. 
 For of the one comes poison, and a curse 
 Falls from the other and burns the lives of men. 
 But thou, son, be not filled with evil dreams. 
 Nor with desire of these things ; for with time 
 Blind love burns out ; but if one feed it full 
 Till some discolouring stain dyes all his life. 
 He shall keep nothing praiseworthy, nor die 
 The sweet wise death of old men honourable, 
 Who have lived out all the length of all their years 
 Blameless, and seen well-pleased the face of gods, 
 And without shame and without fear have wrought 
 Things memorable, and while their days held out 
 In sight of all men and the sun's great light 
 
20 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 Have gat them gflory and given of their own praise 
 
 To the earth that bare them and the day that bred, 
 
 Home friends and far-off hospitalities, 
 
 And filled with gracious and memorial fame 
 
 Lands loved of summer or washed by violent seas, 
 
 Towns populous and many unfooted ways, 
 
 And alien lips and native with their own. 
 
 But when white age and venerable death 
 
 Mow down the strength and life within their limbs, 
 
 Drain out the blood and darken their clear eyes, 
 
 Immortal honour is on them, having past 
 
 Through splendid life and death desirable 
 
 To the clear s^at and remote throne of souls, 
 
 Lands indiscoverable in the unheard-of west. 
 
 Round which the strong stream of a sacred sea 
 
 Rolls without wind for ever, and the snow 
 
 There shows not her white wings and windy feet, 
 
 Nor thunder nor swift rain saith anything. 
 
 Nor the sun burns, but all things rest and thrive ; 
 
 And these, filled full of days, divine and dead, 
 
 Sages and singers fiery from the god. 
 
 And such as loved their land and all things good 
 
 And, best beloved of best men, liberty. 
 
 Free lives and lips, free hands of men free-born, 
 
 And whatsoever on earth was honourable 
 
 And whosoever of all the ephemeral seed, 
 
 Live there a life no liker to the gods 
 
 But nearer than their life of terrene days. 
 
 Love thou such life and look for such a death. 
 
 But from the light and fiery dreams of love 
 
 Spring heavy sorrows and a sleepless life, 
 
 Visions not dreams, whose lids no charm shall close 
 
 Nor song assuage them waking ; and swift death 
 
 Crushes with sterile feet the unripening ear. 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 21 
 
 Treads out the timeless vintag'e ; whom do thou 
 
 Eschewing- embrace the luck of this thy life, 
 
 Not without honour ; and it shall bear to thee 
 
 Such fruit as men reap from spent hours and wear. 
 
 Few men, but happy ; of whom be thou, O son, 
 
 Happiest, if thou submit thy soul to fate, 
 
 And set thine eyes and heart on hopes high-bon 
 
 And divine deeds and abstinence divine. 
 
 So shalt thou be toward all men all thy days 
 
 As light and might communicable, and burn 
 
 From heaven among the stars above the hours, 
 
 And break not as a man breaks nor burn down : 
 
 For to whom other of all heroic names 
 
 Have the gods given his life in hand as thine ? 
 
 And gloriously hast thou lived, and made thy life 
 
 To me that bare thee and to all men born 
 
 Thankworthy, a praise for ever ; and hast won fame 
 
 When wild wars broke all round thy father's house. 
 
 And the mad people of windy mountain rrays 
 
 Laid spears against us like a sea, and all 
 
 ^tolia thundered with Thessalian hoofs ; 
 
 Yet these, as wind baffles the foam, and beats 
 
 Straight back the relaxed ripple, didst thou break 
 
 And loosen all their lances, till undone 
 
 And man from man they fell ; for ye twain stood 
 
 God against god. Ares and Artemis, 
 
 And thou the mightier ; wherefore she unleashed 
 
 A sharp-toothed curse thou too shalt overcome ; 
 
 For in the greener blossom of thy life 
 
 Ere the full blade caught flower, and when time 
 
 gave 
 Respite, thou didst not slacken soul nor steep. 
 But with great hand and heart seek praise of men 
 Out of sharp straits and many a grievous thing, 
 
22 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 Seeing' the strangfe foam of undivided seas 
 On channels never sailed in, and by shores 
 Where the old winds cease not blowing", and all the 
 
 night 
 Thunders, and day is no delight to men. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Meleager, a noble wisdom and fair words 
 
 The gods have given this woman ; hear thou these. 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 mother, I am not fain to strive in speech 
 Nor set my mouth against thee, who art wise 
 Even as they say and full of sacred words. 
 
 But one thing I know surely, and cleave to this ; 
 That though I be not subtle of wit as thou 
 Nor womanlike to weave sweet words, and melt 
 Mutable minds of wise men as with fire, 
 
 1 too, doing justly and reverencing the gods. 
 Shall not want wit to see what things be right. 
 For whom they love and whom reject, being g"ods, 
 There is no man but seeth, and in good time 
 Submits himself, refraining all his heart. 
 
 And I too as thou sayest have seen great things ; 
 
 Seen otherwhere, but chiefly when the sail 
 
 First caught between stretched ropes the roaring 
 
 west. 
 And all our oars smote eastward, and the wind 
 First flung round faces of seafaring men 
 White splendid snow-flakes of the sundering^ foam. 
 And the first furrow in virginal green sea 
 Followed the plunging ploughshare of hewn pine. 
 And closed, as when deep sleep subdues man's breath 
 Lips close and heart subsides ; and closing, shone 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 23 
 
 Sunlike with many a Nereid's hair, and moved 
 Round many a trembling mouth of doubtful gods, 
 Risen out of sunless and sonorous gulfs 
 Through waning water and into shallow light. 
 That watched us ; and when flying the dove was 
 
 snared 
 As with men's hands, but we shot after and sped 
 Clear through the irremeable Symplegades ; 
 And chiefliest when hoar beach and herbless cliff 
 Stood out ahead from Colchis, and we heard 
 Clefts hoarse with wind, and saw through narrowing 
 
 reefs 
 The lightning of the intolerable wave 
 Flash, and the white wet flame of breakers burn 
 Far under a kindling south-wind, as a lamp 
 Burns and bends all its blowing flame one way ; 
 Wild heights untravelled of the wind, and vales 
 Cloven seaward by their violent streams, and whitt 
 With bitter flowers and bright salt scurf of brine ; 
 Heard sweep their sharp swift gales, and bowing 
 
 birdwise 
 Shriek with birds' voices, and with furious feet 
 Tread loose the long skirts of a storm ; and saw 
 The whole white Euxine clash together and fall 
 Full-mouthed, and thunderous from a thousand 
 
 throats : 
 Yet we drew thither and won the fleece and won 
 Medea, deadlier than the sea ; but there 
 Seeing many a wonder and fearful things to men 
 1 saw not one thing like this one seen here, 
 Most fair and fearful, feminine, a god, 
 Faultless ; whom I that love not, being unlikt. 
 Fear, and give honour, and choose from all the 
 
 grods. 
 
<24 
 
 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 CENEUS 
 
 Lady, the daughter of Thestius, and thou, son, 
 
 Not ignorant of your strife nor light of wit, 
 
 Scared with vain dreams and fluttering like spent 
 
 fire, 
 I come to judge between you, but a king 
 Full of past days and wise from years endured, 
 Nor thee I praise, who art fain to undo things done : 
 Nor thee, who art swift to esteem them overmuch. 
 For what the hours have given is given, and this 
 Changeless ; howbeit these change, and in good 
 
 time 
 Devise new things and good, not one thing still. 
 Us have they sent now at our need for help 
 Among men armed a woman, foreign born, 
 Virgin, not like the natural flower of things 
 That grows and bears and brings forth fruit and 
 
 dies ; 
 Unlovable, no light for a husband's house, 
 Espoused ; a glory among unwedded girls, 
 And chosen of gods who reverence maidenhood. 
 These too we honour in honouring her ; but thou. 
 Abstain thy feet from following, and thine eyes 
 From amorous touch ; nor set toward hers thine 
 
 heart. 
 Son, lest hate bear no deadlier fruit than love. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 O king, thou art wise, but wisdom halts ; and just, 
 But the gods love not justice more than fate. 
 And smite the righteous and the violent mouth, 
 And mix with insolent blood the reverent man's, 
 And bruise the holier as the lying lips. 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 25 
 
 Enough ; for wise words fail me, and my heart 
 Takes fire and trembles flamewise, O my son, 
 
 child, for thine head's sake ; mine eyes wax thick, 
 Turning toward thee, so goodly a weaponed man, 
 So glorious ; and for love of thine own eyes 
 
 They are darkened, and tears burn them, fierce as 
 
 fire, 
 And my lips pause and my soul sinks with love. 
 But by thine hand, by thy sweet life and eyes, 
 By thy great heart and these clasped knees, O son, 
 
 1 pray thee that thou slay me not with thee. 
 For there was never a mother woman-born 
 Loved her sons better ; and never a queen of men 
 More perfect in her heart toward whom she loved. 
 For what lies light on many and they forget, 
 Small things and transitory as a wind o' the sea, 
 
 I forget never ; I have seen thee all thine years 
 A man in arms, strong and a joy to men 
 Seeing thine head glitter and thine hand burn its way 
 Through a heavy and iron furrow of sundering 
 
 spears ; 
 But always also a flower of three suns old. 
 The small one thing that lying drew down my life 
 To lie with thee and feed thee ; a child and weak. 
 Mine, a delight to no man, sweet to me. 
 Who then sought to thee ? who gat help ? who knew 
 If thou wert goodly ? nay, no man at all. 
 Or what sea saw thee, or sounded with thine oar. 
 Child ? or what strange land shone with war through 
 
 thee ? 
 But fair for me thou wert, O little life, 
 Fruitless, the fruit of mine own flesh, and blind, 
 More than much gold, ungrown, a foolish flower. 
 For silver nor bright snow nor feather of foam 
 
 VOL. IV. E 
 
26 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 Was whiter, and no g"old yellower than thine hair, 
 
 child, my child ; and now thou art lordlier grown, 
 Not lovelier, nor a new thing- in mine eyes, 
 
 1 charge thee by thy soul and this my breast, 
 Fear thou the gods and me and thine own heart, 
 Lest all these turn against thee ; for who knows 
 What wind upon what wave of altering time 
 Shall speak a storm and blow calamity ? 
 
 And there is nothing stabile in the world 
 
 But the gods break it ; yet not less, fair son, 
 
 If but one thing be stronger, if one endure. 
 
 Surely the bitter and the rooted love 
 
 That burns between us, going from me to thee, 
 
 Shall more endure than all things. What dost thou, 
 
 Following strange loves? why wilt thou kill mine 
 
 heart ? 
 Lo, I talk wild and windy words, and fall 
 From my clear wits, and seem of mine own self 
 Dethroned, dispraised, disseated ; and my mind, 
 That was my crown, breaks, and mine heart is gone, 
 And I am naked of my soul, and stand 
 Ashamed, as a mean woman ; take thou thought : 
 Live if thou wilt, and if thou wilt not, look. 
 The gods have given thee life to lose or keep. 
 Thou shalt not die as men die, but thine end 
 Fallen upon thee shall break me unaware. 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 Queen, my whole heart is molten with thy tears. 
 And my limbs yearn with pity of thee, and love 
 Compels with grief mine eyes and labouring breath ; 
 For what thou art I know thee, and this thy breast 
 And thy fair eyes I worship, and am bound 
 Toward thee in spirit and love thee in all my soul. 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 27 
 
 For there is nothing terribler to men 
 Than the sweet face of mothers, and the might. 
 But what shall be let be ; for us the day 
 Once only lives a little, and is not found. 
 Time and the fruitful hour are more than we, 
 And these lay hold upon us ; but thou, God, 
 Zeus, the sole steersman of the helm of thmgs, 
 Father, be swift to see us, and as thou wilt 
 Help : or if adverse, as thou wilt, refrain. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 We have seen thee, O Love, thou art fair ; thou art 
 
 goodly, O Love ; 
 Thy wings make light in the air as the wings of a 
 
 dove. 
 Thy feet are as winds that divide the stream of the 
 
 sea ; 
 Earth is thy covering to hide thee, the garment of 
 
 thee. 
 Thou art swift and subtle and blind as a flame of 
 
 fire ; 
 Before thee the laughter, behind thee the tears of 
 
 desire ; 
 And twain go forth beside thee, a man with a maid ; 
 Her eyes are the eyes of a bride whom delight makes 
 
 afraid ; 
 As the breath in the buds that stir is her bridal 
 
 breath : 
 But Fate is the name of her ; and his name is Death. 
 
 For an evil blossom was born 
 
 Of sea-foam and the frothing of blood, 
 Blood-red and bitter of fruit, 
 
 And the seed of it laughter and tears. 
 
Z8 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 And the leaves of it madness and scorn ; 
 A bitter flower from the bud, 
 Sprung- of the sea without root, 
 
 Sprung without g"raft from the years. 
 
 The weft of the world was untorn 
 
 That is woven of the day on the night, 
 The hair of the hours was not white 
 
 Nor the raiment of time overworn, 
 When a wonder, a world's delight, 
 
 A perilous goddess was born ; 
 
 And the waves of the sea as she came 
 
 Clove, and the foam at her feet, 
 
 Fawning, rejoiced to bring forth 
 A fleshly blossom, a flame 
 
 Filling the heavens with heat 
 
 To the cold white ends of the north. 
 
 And in air the clamorous birds, 
 
 And men upon earth that hear 
 Sweet articulate words 
 
 Sweetly divided apart. 
 And in shallow and channel and mere 
 The rapid and footless herds, 
 
 Rejoiced, being foolish of heart. 
 
 For all they said upon earth. 
 
 She is fair, she is white like a dove, 
 And the life of the world in her breath 
 Breathes, and is born at her birth ; 
 
 For they knew thee for mother of love, 
 And knew thee not mother of death. 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 29 
 
 What hadst thou to do being born, 
 
 Mother, when winds were at ease, 
 As a flower of the springtime of corn, 
 
 A flower of the foam of the seas ? 
 For bitter thou wast from thy birth, 
 
 Aphrodite, a mother of strife ; 
 For before thee some rest was on earth, 
 A httle respite from tears, 
 A Httle pleasure of life ; 
 For life was not then as thou art, 
 But as one that waxeth in years 
 Sweet-spoken, a fruitful wife ; 
 Earth had no thorn, and desire 
 No sting, neither death any dart ; 
 
 What hadst thou to do amongst these, 
 Thou, clothed with a burning fire, 
 Thou, girt with sorrow of heart, 
 
 Thou, sprung of the seed of the seas 
 As an ear from a seed of corn. 
 
 As a brand plucked forth of a pyre, 
 As a ray shed forth of the morn, 
 
 For division of soul and disease, 
 For a dart and a sting and a thorn ? 
 What ailed thee then to be born ? 
 
 Was there not evil enough. 
 Mother, and anguish on earth 
 Born with a man at his birth, 
 
 Wastes underfoot, and above 
 Storm out of heaven, and dearth 
 
 Shaken down from the shining thereof, 
 Wrecks from afar overseas 
 And peril of shallow and firth. 
 
30 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 And tears that spring- and increase 
 In the barren places of mirth, 
 That thou, having- wings as a dove, 
 Being girt with desire for a girth, 
 That thou must come after these, 
 I That thou must lay on him love ? 
 
 Thou shouldst not so have been bom : 
 But death should have risen with thee. 
 Mother, and visible fear, 
 
 Grief, and the wringing of hands. 
 And noise of many that mourn ; 
 The smitten bosom, the knee 
 Bowed, and in each man's ear 
 A cry as of perishing lands, 
 A moan as of people in prison, 
 A tumult of infinite griefs ; 
 
 And thunder of storm on the sands. 
 And wailing- of wives on the shore : 
 And under thee newly arisen 
 
 Loud shoals and shipwrecking reefs, 
 Fierce air and violent light ; 
 Sail rent and sundering oar. 
 Darkness, and noises of night ; 
 Clashing of streams in the sea, 
 Wave against wave as a sword, 
 Clamour of currents, and foam ; 
 
 Rains making ruin on earth, 
 Winds that wax ravenous and roam 
 As wolves in a wolfish horde ; 
 Fruits growing faint in the tree. 
 
 And blind things dead in their birth ; 
 Famine, and blighting- of corn. 
 When thy time was come to be born. 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 3i 
 
 All these we know of ; but thee 
 Who shall discern or declare ? 
 In the uttermost ends of the sea 
 The light of thine eyelids and hair, 
 The light of thy bosom as fire 
 Between the wheel of the sun 
 And the flying flames of the air ? 
 
 Wilt thou turn thee not yet nor have pity. 
 But abide with despair and desire 
 And the crying of armies undone, 
 
 Lamentation of one with another 
 And breaking of city by city ; 
 The dividing of friend against friend. 
 
 The severing of brother and brother ; 
 Wilt thou utterly bring to an end ? 
 Have mercy, mother ! 
 
 For against all men from of old 
 
 Thou hast set thine hand as a curse, 
 And cast out gods from their places. 
 These things are spoken of thee. 
 Strong kings and goodly with gold 
 Thou hast found out arrows to pierce. 
 And made their kingdoms and races 
 As dust and surf of the sea. 
 All these, overburdened with woes 
 
 And with length of their days waxen weak, 
 Thou slewest ; and sentest moreover 
 Upon Tyro an evil thing, 
 Rent hair and a fetter and blows 
 
 Making bloody the flower of the cheek, 
 Though she lay by a god as a lover. 
 Though fair, and the seed of a king". 
 
32 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 For of old, being full of thy fire, 
 She endured not longer to wear 
 On her bosom a saffron vest, 
 
 On her shoulder an ashwood quiver ; 
 Being mixed and made one through desire 
 With Enipeus, and all her hair 
 
 Made moist with his mouth, and her brea^x. 
 Filled full of the foam of the river. 
 
 ATALANTA 
 
 Sun, and clear light among green hills, and day 
 Late risen and long sought after, and you just gods 
 Whose hands divide anguish and recompense. 
 But first the sun's white sister, a maid in heaven, 
 On earth of all maids worshipped — hail, and hear. 
 And witness with me if not without sign sent. 
 Not without rule and reverence, 1 a maid 
 Hallowed, and huntress holy as whom I serve. 
 Here in your sight and eyeshot of these men 
 Stand, girt as they toward hunting, and my shafts 
 Drawn ; wherefore all ye stand up on my side, 
 If I be pure and all ye righteous gods, 
 Lest one revile me, a woman, yet no wife, 
 That bear a spear for spindle, and this bow strung 
 For a web woven ; and with pure lips salute 
 Heaven, and the face of all the gods, and dawn 
 Filling with maiden flames and maiden flowers 
 The starless fold o' the stars, and making sweet 
 The warm wan heights of the air, moon-trodden ways 
 And breathless gates and extreme hills of heaven. 
 Whom, having offered water and bloodless gifts, 
 Flowers, and a golden circlet of pure hair. 
 Next Artemis I bid be favourable 
 And make this day all golden, hers and ours, 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 33 
 
 Gracious and good and white to the unblamed end. 
 
 But thou, O well-beloved, of all my days 
 
 Bid it be fruitful, and a crown for all, 
 
 To bring forth leaves and bind round all my hair 
 
 With perfect chaplets woven for thine of thee. 
 
 For not without the word of thy chaste mouth, 
 
 For not without law given and clean command, 
 
 Across the white straits of the running sea 
 
 From Elis even to the Acheloian horn, 
 
 I with clear winds came hither and gentle gods, 
 
 Far off my father's house, and left uncheered 
 
 lasius, and uncheered the Arcadian hills 
 
 And all their green-haired waters, and all woods 
 
 Disconsolate, to hear no horn of mine 
 
 Blown, and behold no flash of swift white feet. 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 For thy name's sake and awe toward thy chaste head, 
 
 O holiest Atalanta, no man dares 
 
 Praise thee, tho'igh fairer than whom all men praise, 
 
 And godlike for thy grace of hallowed hair 
 
 And holy habit of thine eyes, and feet 
 
 That make the blown foam neither swift nor white 
 
 Though the wind winnow and whirl it ; yet we praise 
 
 Gods, found because of thee adorable 
 
 And for thy sake praiseworthiest from all men : 
 
 Thee therefore we praise also, thee as these, 
 
 Pure, and a light lit at the hands of gods. 
 
 TOXEUS 
 
 How long will ye whet spears with eloquence, 
 Fight, and kill beasts dry-handed with sweet words ? 
 Cease, or talk still and slay thy boars at home. 
 
 VOL. IV. F 
 
34 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 PLEXIPPUS 
 
 Why, if she ride among us for a man, 
 
 Sit thou for her and spin ; a man grown girl 
 
 Is worth a woman weaponed ; sit thou here. 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 Peace, and be wise ; no gods love idle speech. 
 
 PLEXIPPUS 
 
 Nor any man a man's mouth woman-tongued. 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 For my lips bite not sharper than mine hands. 
 
 PLEXIPPUS 
 
 Nay, both bite soft, but no whit softly mine. 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 Keep thine hands clean ; they have time enough to 
 stain. 
 
 PLEXIPPUS 
 
 For thine shall rest and wax not red to-day. 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 Have all thy will of words ; talk out thine heart. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 Refrain your lips, O brethren, and my son, 
 
 Lest words turn snakes and bite you uttering them. 
 
 TOXEUS 
 
 Except she give her blood before the gods, 
 What profit shall a maid be among men ? 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 35 
 
 PLEXIPPUS 
 
 Let her come crowned and stretch her throat for a 
 
 knife, 
 Bleat out her spirit and die, and so shall men 
 Through her too prosper and through prosperous 
 
 gods. 
 But nowise through her living ; shall she live 
 A flower-bud of the flower-bed, or sweet fruit 
 For kisses and the honey-making mouth. 
 And play the shield for strong men and the spear ? 
 Then shall the heifer and her mate lock horns. 
 And the bride overbear the groom, and men 
 Gods ; for no less division sunders these ; 
 Since all things made are seasonable in time. 
 But if one alter unseasonable are all. 
 But thou, O Zeus, hear me that I may slay 
 This beast before thee and no man halve with me 
 Nor woman, lest these mock thee, though a god. 
 Who hast made men strong, and thou being wise be 
 
 held 
 Foolish ; for wise is that thing which endures. 
 
 ATALANTA 
 
 Men, and the chosen of all this people, and thou. 
 
 King, I beseech you a little bear with me. 
 
 For if my life be shameful that I live. 
 
 Let the gods witness and their wrath ; but these 
 
 Cast no such word against me. Thou, O mine, 
 
 O holy, O happy goddess, if I sin 
 
 Changing the words of women and the works 
 
 For spears and strange men's faces, hast not thou 
 
 One shaft of all thy sudden seven that pierced 
 
 Seven through the bosom or shining throat or side, 
 
36 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 All couched about one mother's loosening knees,- 
 
 All holy born, eng-raffed of Tantalus ? 
 
 But if toward any of you I am overbold 
 
 That take thus much upon me, let him think 
 
 How I, for all my forest holiness. 
 
 Fame, and this armed and iron maidenhood, 
 
 Pay thus much also ; I shall have no man's love 
 
 For ever, and no face of children born 
 
 Or feeding- lips upon me or fastening- eyes 
 
 For ever, nor being dead shall kings my sons 
 
 Mourn me and bury, and tears on daughters' cheeks 
 
 Burn ; but a cold and sacred life, but strange. 
 
 But far from dances and the back-blowing torch. 
 
 Far off from flowers or any bed of man, 
 
 Shall my life be for ever : me the snows 
 
 That face the first o' the morning, and cold hills 
 
 Full of the land-wind and sea-travelling storms 
 
 And many a wandering wing of noisy nights 
 
 That know the thunder and hear the thickening 
 
 wolves — 
 Me the utmost pine and footless frost of woods 
 That talk with many winds and gods, the hours 
 Re-risen, and white divisions of the dawn, 
 Springs thousand-tongued with the intei-mitting reed 
 And streams that murmur of the mother snow — 
 Me these allure, and know me ; but no man 
 Knows, and my goddess only. Lo now, see 
 If one of all you these things vex at all. 
 Would God that any of you had all the praise 
 And I no manner of memory when I die, 
 So might I show before her perfect eyes 
 Pure, whom I follow, a maiden to my death. 
 But for the rest let all have all they will ; 
 For is it a grief to you that I have part, 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 37 
 
 Being- woman merely, In your male might and deeds 
 
 Done by main strength ? yet in my body is throned 
 
 As great a heart, and in my spirit, O men, 
 
 I have not less of godlike. Evil it were 
 
 That one a coward should mix with you, one hand 
 
 Fearful, one eye abase itself ; and these 
 
 Well might ye hate and well revile, not me. 
 
 For not the difference of the several flesh 
 
 Being vile or noble or beautiful or base 
 
 Makes praiseworthy, but purer spirit and heart 
 
 Higher than these meaner mouths and limbs, that 
 
 feed, 
 Rise, rest, and are and are not ; and for me. 
 What should I say ? but by the gods of the world 
 And this my maiden body, by all oaths 
 That bind the tong-ue of men and the evil will, 
 I am not mighty-minded, nor desire 
 Crowns, nor the spoil of slain things nor the fame ; 
 Feed ye on these, eat and wax fat ; cry out. 
 Laugh, having- eaten, and leap without a lyre, 
 Sing, mix the wind with clamour, smite and shake 
 Sonorous timbrels and tumultuous hair. 
 And fill the dance up with tempestuous feet. 
 For I will none ; but having- prayed my prayers 
 And made thank-offering for prosperities, 
 I shall go hence and no man see me more. 
 What thing is this for you to shout me down, 
 What, for a man to grudge me this my life 
 As it were envious of all yours, and I 
 A thief of reputations ? nay, for now. 
 If there be any highest in heaven, a god 
 Above all thrones and thunders of the gods 
 Throned, and the wheel of the world roll under him, 
 Judge he between me and all of you, and see 
 
'38 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 If I transgress at all : but ye, refrain 
 Transgressing hands and reinless mouths, and keep 
 Silence, lest by much foam of violent words 
 And proper poison of your lips ye die. 
 
 CENEUS 
 
 O flower of Tegea, maiden, fleetest foot 
 
 And holiest head of women, have good cheer 
 
 Of thy good words : but ye, depart with her 
 
 In peace and reverence, each with blameless eye 
 
 Following his fate ; exalt your hands and hearts. 
 
 Strike, cease not, arrow on arrow and wound on 
 
 wound. 
 And go with gods and with the gods return. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Who hath given man speech ? or who hath set 
 
 therein 
 A thorn for peril and a snare for sin ? 
 For in the word his life is and his breath, 
 
 And in the word his death. 
 That madness and the infatuate heart may breed 
 
 From the word's womb the deed 
 And life bring one thing forth ere all pass by, 
 Even one thing which is ours yet cannot die — 
 Death. Hast thou seen him ever anywhere. 
 Time's twin-born brother, imperishable as he 
 ^s perishable and plaintive, clothed with care 
 
 And mutable as sand. 
 But death is strong and full of blood and fair 
 And perdurable and like a lord of land ? 
 Nay, time thou seest not, death thou wilt not see 
 Till life's right hand be loosened from thine hand 
 
 And thy life-days from thee. 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON :g 
 
 For the gfods very subtly fashion 
 
 Madness with sadness upon earth : 
 Not knowing- in any wise compassion, 
 
 Nor holding- pity of any worth ; 
 And many things they have given and taken. 
 
 And wrought and ruined many things ; 
 The firm land have they loosed and shaken, 
 
 And sealed the sea with all her spring-s ; 
 They have wearied time with heavy burdens 
 
 And vexed the lips of life with breath : 
 Set men to labour and given them guerdons. 
 
 Death, and great darkness after death : 
 Put moans into the bridal measure 
 
 And on the bridal wools a stain ; 
 And circled pain about with pleasure, 
 
 And girdled pleasure about with pain ; 
 And strewed one marriag^e-bed with tears and fire 
 For extreme loathing and supreme desire. 
 
 What shall be done with all these tears of ours ? 
 
 Shall they make watersprings in the fair heaven 
 To bathe the brows of morning- ? or like flowers 
 Be shed and shine before the starriest hours. 
 
 Or made the raiment of the weeping- Seven ? 
 Or rather, O our masters, shall they be 
 Food for the famine of the grievous sea, 
 
 A great well-head of lamentation 
 Satiating the sad gods ? or fall and flow 
 Among- the years and seasons to and fro, 
 
 And wash their feet with tribulation 
 And fill them full with grieving ere they g-o ? 
 
 Alas, our lords, and yet alas ag-ain, 
 Seeing- all your iron heaven is g-ilt as g-old 
 
 But all we smite thereat in vain ; 
 
40 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 Smite the g-ates barred with g-roanings maaifold, 
 
 But all the floors are paven with our pain. 
 Yea, and with weariness of lips and eyes, 
 With breaking- of the bosom, and with sighs, 
 
 We labour, and are clad and fed with grief 
 And filled with days we would not fain behold 
 And nights we would not hear of ; we wax old, 
 
 All we wax old and wither like a leaf. 
 We are outcast, strayed between bright sun and 
 moon ; 
 
 Our light and darkness are as leaves of flowers. 
 Black flowers and white, that perish ; and the noon 
 
 As midnight, and the night as daylight hours. 
 
 A little fruit a little while is ours. 
 And the worm finds it soon. 
 
 But up in heaven the high gods one by one 
 Lay hands upon the draught that quickeneth. 
 
 Fulfilled with all tears shed and all things done;, 
 And stir with soft imperishable breath 
 The bubbling bitterness of life and death. 
 
 And hold it to our lips and laugh ; but they 
 
 Preserve their lips from tasting night or day. 
 
 Lest they too change and sleep, the fates that spun, 
 
 The lips that made us and the hands that slay ; 
 Lest all these change, and heaven bow down to 
 none. 
 
 Change and be subject to the secular sway 
 And terrene revolution of the sun. 
 
 Therefore they thrust it from them, putting time away. 
 
 I would the wine of time, made sharp and sweet 
 With multitudinous days and nights and tears 
 And many mixing savours of strange years, 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 41 
 
 Were no more trodden of them under feet, 
 
 Cast out and spilt about their holy places : 
 That life were given them as a fruit to eat 
 And death to drink as water ; that the light 
 Might ebb, drawn backward from their eyes, and night 
 
 Hide for one hour the imperishable faces. 
 That they might rise up sad in heaven, and know 
 Sorrow and sleep, one paler than young snow, 
 
 One cold as blight of dew and ruinous rain j 
 Rise up and rest and suffer a little, and be 
 Awhile as all things born with us and we. 
 
 And grieve as men, and like slain men be slain. 
 
 For now we know not of them ; but one saith 
 
 The gods are gracious, praising God ; and one. 
 When hast thou seen ? or hast thou felt his breath 
 
 Touch, nor consume thine eyelids as the sun, 
 Nor fill thee to the lips with fiery death ? 
 
 None hath beheld him, none 
 Seen above other gods and shapes of things, 
 Swift without feet and flying without wings, 
 Intolerable, not clad with death or life. 
 
 Insatiable, not known of night or day, 
 The lord of love and loathing and of strife 
 
 Who gives a star and takes a sun away ; 
 Who shapes the soul, and makes her a barren wife 
 
 To the earthly body and grievous growth of clay ; 
 Who turns the large limbs to a little flame 
 
 And binds the great sea with a little sand ; 
 Who makes desire, and slays desire with shame ; 
 
 Who shakes the heaven as ashes in his hand ; 
 Who, seeing the light and shadow for the same, 
 
 Bids day waste night as fire devours a brand. 
 Smites without sword, and scourges without rod ; 
 
 The supreme evil, God. 
 VOL. IV. G 
 
4a ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 Yea, with thine hate, O God, thou hast covered us, 
 One saith, and hidden our eyes away from sight. 
 And made us transitory and hazardous, 
 
 Light things and slight ; 
 Yet have men praised thee, saying, He hath made 
 man thus, 
 And he doeth right. 
 Thou hast kissed us, and hast smitten ; thou hast 
 
 laid 
 Upon us with thy left hand life, and said, 
 Live : and again thou hast said, Yield up your 
 
 breath, 
 And with thy right hand laid upon us death. 
 Thou hast sent us sleep, and stricken sleep with 
 dreams, 
 Saying, Joy is not, but love of joy shall be ; 
 Thou hast made sweet springs for all the pleasant 
 streams. 
 In the end thou hast made them bitter with the 
 sea. 
 Thou hast fed one rose with dust of many men ; 
 
 Thou hast marred one face with fire of many tears ; 
 Thou hast taken love, and given us sorrow again ; 
 With pain thou hast filled us full to the eyes and 
 ears. 
 Therefore because thou art strong, our father, and 
 we 
 Feeble ; and thou art against us, and thine hand 
 Constrains us in the shallows of the sea 
 
 And breaks us at the limits of the land ; 
 Because thou hast bent thy lightnings as a bow. 
 And loosed the hours like arrows ; and let fall 
 Sins and wild words and many a winged woe 
 And wars among us, and one end of all } 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 43 
 
 Because thou hast made the thunder, and thy feet 
 
 Are as a rushing water when the skies 
 Break, but thy face as an exceeding heat 
 
 And flames of fire the eyelids of thine eyes ; 
 Because thou art over all who are over us ; 
 
 Because thy name is life and our name death ; 
 Because thou art cruel and men are piteous, 
 
 And our hands labour and thine hand scattereth ; 
 Lo, with hearts rent and knees made tremulous, 
 
 Lo, with ephemeral lips and casual breath, 
 
 At least we witness of thee ere we die 
 
 That these things are not otherwise, but thus ; 
 
 That each man in his heart sigheth, and saith, 
 That all men even as I, 
 All we are against thee, against thee, O God most 
 high. 
 
 But ye, keep ye on earth 
 
 Your lips from over-speech. 
 Loud words and longing are so little worth ; 
 
 And the end is hard to reach. 
 For silence after grievous things is good. 
 
 And reverence, and the fear that makes men whole, 
 And shame, and righteous governance of blood, 
 
 And lordship of the soul. 
 But from sharp words and wits men pluck no fruit, 
 And gathering thorns they shake the tree at root ; 
 For words divide and rend ; 
 But silence is most noble till the end. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 I heard within the house a cry of news 
 
 And came forth eastward hither, where the dawn 
 
 Cheers first these warder gods that face the sun 
 
44 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 And next our eyes unrisen ; for unaware 
 Came clashes of swift hoofs and trampling- feet 
 And through the windy pillared corridor 
 Light sharper than the frequent flames of day 
 That daily fill it from the fiery dawn ; 
 Gleams, and a thunder of people that cried out, 
 And dust and hurrying horsemen ; lo their chief, 
 That rode with CEneus rein by rein, returned. 
 What cheer, O herald of my lord the king ? 
 
 HERALD 
 
 Lady, good cheer and great ; the boar is slain. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Praised be aJ2 g^cds that look toward Calydon. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 Good news and brief ; but by whose happier hand ? 
 
 HERALD 
 
 A maiden's and a prophet's and thy son's. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 Well fare the spear that severed him and life. 
 
 HERALD 
 
 Thine own, and not an alien, hast thou blest. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 Twice be thou too for my sake blest and his. 
 
 HERALD 
 
 At the king's word I rode afoam for thine. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 Thou sayest he tarrieth till they bring the spoil ? 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 45 
 
 HERALD 
 
 Hard by the quarry, where they breathe, O queen. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 Speak thou their chance ; but some bring flowers and 
 
 crown 
 These g-ods and all the lintel, and shed wine, 
 Fetch sacrifice and slay ; for heaven is good. 
 
 HERALD 
 
 Some furlong's northward where the brakes begin 
 
 West of that narrowing range of warrior hills 
 
 Whose brooks have bled with battle when thy son 
 
 Smote Acarnania, there all they made halt, 
 
 And with keen eye took note of spear and hound, 
 
 Royally ranked ; Laertes island-born. 
 
 The young Gerenian Nestor, Panopeus, 
 
 And Cepheus and Ancaeus, mightiest thewed. 
 
 Arcadians ; next, and evil-eyed of these. 
 
 Arcadian Atalanta, with twain hounds 
 
 Lengthening the leash, and under nose and brow 
 
 Glittering with lipless tooth and fire-swift eye ; 
 
 But from her white braced shoulder the plumed shafts 
 
 Rang, and the bow shone from her side ; next her 
 
 Meleager, like a sun in spring that strikes 
 
 Branch into leaf and bloom into the world, 
 
 A glory among men meaner ; Iphicles, 
 
 And following him that slew the biform bull 
 
 Pirithous, and divine Eurytion, 
 
 And, bride-bound to the gods, ^acides. 
 
 Then Telamon his brother, and Argive-born 
 
 The seer and sayer of visions and of truth, 
 
 Amphiaraus ; and a four-fold strength. 
 
46 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 Thine, even thy mother's and thy sister's sons. 
 And recent from the roar of foreign foam 
 Jason, and Dryas twin-begot with war, 
 A blossom of bright battle, sword and man 
 Shining ; and Idas, and the keenest eye 
 Of Lynceus, and Admetus twice-espoused, 
 And Hippasus and Hyleus, great in heart. 
 These having halted bade blow horns, and rode 
 Through woods and waste lands cleft by stormy 
 
 streams, 
 Past yew-trees and the heavy hair of pines. 
 And where the dew is thickest under oaks. 
 This way and that ; but questing up and down 
 They saw no trail nor scented ; and one said, 
 Plexippus, Help, or help not, Artemis, 
 And we will flay thy boarskin with male hands ; 
 But saying, he ceased and said not that he would, 
 Seeing where the green ooze of a sun-struck marsh 
 Shook with a thousand reeds untunable, 
 And in their moist and multitudinous flower 
 Slept no soft sleep, with violent visions fed. 
 The blind bulk of the immeasurable beast 
 And seeing, he shuddered with sharp lust of praise 
 Through all his limbs, and launched a double dart. 
 And missed ; for much desire divided him, 
 Too hot of spirit and feebler than his will, 
 That his hand failed, though fervent ; and the shaft. 
 Sundering the rushes, in a tamarisk stem 
 Shook, and stuck fast ; then all abode save one, 
 The Arcadian Atalanta ; from her side 
 Sprang her hounds, labouring at the leash, and 
 
 slipped. 
 And plashed ear-deep with plunging feet ; but she 
 Saying, Speed it as I send it for thy sake, 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 47 
 
 Goddess, drew bow and loosed ; the sudden string- 
 Rang", and sprang inward, and the waterish air 
 Hissed, and the moist plumes of the songless reeds 
 Moved as a wave which the wind moves no more. 
 But the boar heaved half out of ooze and slime 
 His tense flank trembling round the barbed wound, 
 Hateful ; and fiery with invasive eyes 
 And bristling with intolerable hair 
 Plunged, and the hounds clung, and green flowers 
 
 and white 
 Reddened and broke all round them where they 
 
 came. 
 And charging with sheer tusk he drove, and smote 
 Hyleus ; and sharp death caught his sudden soul, 
 And violent sleep shed night upon his eyes. 
 Then Peleus, with strong strain of hand and heart, 
 Shot ; but the sidelong arrow slid, and slew 
 His comrade born and loving countryman, 
 Under the left arm smitten, as he no less 
 Poised a like arrow ; and bright blood brake afoam, 
 And falling, and weighed back by clamorous arms, 
 Sharp rang the dead limbs of Eurytion. 
 Then one shot happier, the Cadmean seer, 
 Amphiaraus ; for his sacred shaft 
 Pierced the red circlet of one ravening eye 
 Beneath the brute brows of the sanguine boar. 
 Now bloodier from one slain ; but he so galled 
 Sprang straight, and rearing cried no lesser cry 
 Than thunder and the roar of wintering streams 
 That mix their own foam with the yellower sea ; 
 And as a tower that falls by fire in fight 
 With ruin of walls and all its archery. 
 And breaks the iron flower of war beneath. 
 Crushing charred limbs and molten arms of men ; 
 
48 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 So through crushed branches and the reddenings 
 
 brake 
 Clamoured and crashed the fervour of his feet, 
 And trampled, springing- sideways from the tusk, 
 Too tardy a moving- mould of heavy strength, 
 Ancaeus ; and as flakes of weak-winged snow 
 Break, all the hard thews of his heaving limbs 
 Broke, and rent flesh fell every way, and blood 
 Flew, and fierce fragments of no more a man. 
 Then all the heroes drew sharp breath, and gazed, 
 And smote not ; but Meleager, but thy son. 
 Right in the wild way of the coming curse 
 Rock-rooted, fair with fierce and fastened lips, 
 Clear eyes, and springing muscle and shortening 
 
 limb — 
 With chin aslant indrawn to a tightening throat. 
 Grave, and with gathered sinews, like a god, — 
 Aimed on the left side his well-handled spear 
 Grasped where the ash was knottiest hewn, and 
 
 smote. 
 And with no missile wound, the monstrous boar 
 Right in the hairiest hollow of his hide 
 Under the last rib, sheer through bulk and bone. 
 Deep in ; and deeply smitten, and to death, 
 The heavy horror with his hanging shafts 
 Leapt, and fell furiously, and from raging lips 
 Foamed out the latest wrath of all his life. 
 And all they praised the gods with mightier heart, 
 Zeus and all gods, but chiefliest Artemis, 
 Seeing ; but Meleager bade whet knives and flay, 
 Strip and stretch out the splendour of the spoil ; 
 And hot and horrid from the work all these 
 Sat, and drew breath and drank and made great 
 
 cheer 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 49 
 
 And washed the hard sweat off their calmer brows. 
 For much sweet grass grew higher than grew the 
 
 reed, 
 And good for slumber, and every holier herb, 
 Narcissus, and the low-lying melilote. 
 And all of goodliest blade and bloom that springs 
 Where, hid by heavier hyacinth, violet buds 
 Blossom and burn ; and fire of yellower flowers 
 And light of crescent lilies, and such leaves 
 As fear the Faun's and know the Dryad's foot ; 
 Olive and ivy and poplar dedicate, 
 And many a well-spring overwatched of these. 
 There now they rest ; but me the king bade bear 
 Good tidings to rejoice this town and thee. 
 Wherefore be glad, and all ye give much thanks. 
 For fallen is all the trouble of Calydon. 
 
 ALTHiEA 
 
 Laud ye the gods ; for this they have given is 
 
 good. 
 And what shall be they hide until their time. 
 Much good and somewhat grievous hast thou said. 
 And either well ; but let all sad things be. 
 Till all have made before the prosperous gods 
 Burnt-offering, and poured out the floral wine. 
 Look fair, O gods, and favourable ; for we 
 Praise you with no false heart or flattering mouth, 
 Being merciful, but with pure souls and prayer. 
 
 HERALD 
 
 Thou hast prayed well ; for whoso fears not these, 
 But once being prosperous waxes huge of heart, 
 Him shall some new thing unaware destroy. 
 
 VOL. IV. H 
 
50 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 ^ CHORUS 
 
 O that I now, I too were 
 By deep wells and water-floods, 
 Streams of ancient hills, and where 
 All the wan green places bear 
 Blossoms cleaving to the sod. 
 Fruitless fruit, and grasses fair, 
 Or such darkest ivy-buds 
 As divide thy yellow hair, 
 Bacchus, and their leaves that nod 
 Round thy fawnskin brush the bare 
 Snow-soft shoulders of a god ; 
 There the year is sweet, and there 
 Earth is full of secret springs. 
 And the fervent rose-cheeked hours, 
 Those that marry dawn and noon, 
 There are sunless, there look pale 
 . In dim leaves and hidden air, 
 Pale as gfrass or latter flowers 
 Or the wild vine's wan wet ring's 
 Full of dew beneath the moon, 
 And all day the nighting'ale 
 Sleeps, and all night singfs ; 
 There in cold remote recesses 
 That nor alien eyes assail. 
 Feet, nor imminence of wing"s, 
 Nor a wind nor any tune. 
 Thou, O queen and holiest, 
 Flower the whitest of all thing-s. 
 With reluctant lengthening tresses 
 And with sudden splendid breast 
 Save of maidens unbeholden. 
 There art wont to enter, there 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 5^ 
 
 Thy divine swift limbs and golden 
 
 Maiden growth of unbound hair, 
 
 Bathed in waters white, 
 
 Shine, and many a maid's by thee 
 
 In moist woodland or the hilly 
 
 Flowerless brakes where wells abound 
 
 Out of all men's sight ; 
 
 Or in lower pools that see 
 
 All their marges clothed all round 
 
 With the innumerable lily, 
 
 Whence the golden-girdled bee 
 
 Flits through flowering rush to fret 
 
 White or duskier violet. 
 
 Fair as those that ift far years 
 
 With their buds left luminous 
 
 And their little leaves made wet, 
 
 From the warmer dew of tears, 
 
 Mother's tears in extreme need, 
 
 Hid the limbs of lamus. 
 
 Of thy brother's seed ; 
 
 For his heart was piteous 
 
 Toward him, even as thine heart now 
 
 Pitiful toward us ; 
 
 Thine, O goddess, turning hither 
 
 A benignant blameless brow ; 
 
 Seeing enough of evil done 
 
 And lives withered as leaves wither 
 
 In the blasting of the sun ; 
 
 Seeing enough of hunters dead, 
 
 Ruin enough of all our year, 
 
 Herds and harvests slain and shed, 
 
 Herdsmen stricken many an one. 
 
 Fruits and flocks consumed together, 
 
 And great length of deadly days. 
 
52 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 Yet with reverent lips and fear 
 
 Turn we toward thee, turn and praise 
 
 For this Hg-htening- of clear weather 
 
 And prosperities begun. 
 
 For not seldom, when all air 
 
 As brig-ht water without breath 
 
 Shines, and when men fear not, fate 
 
 Without thunder unaware 
 
 Breaks, and brings down death. 
 
 Joy with grief ye great g-ods g"ive, 
 
 Good with bad, and overbear 
 
 All the pride of us that live, 
 
 All the hig-h estate, 
 
 As ye long since overbore, 
 
 As in old time long before, 
 
 Many a strong- man and a gfreat, 
 
 All that were. 
 
 But do thou, sweet, otherwise, 
 
 Having- heed of all our prayer. 
 
 Taking- note of all our sighs ; 
 
 We beseech thee by thy light. 
 
 By thy bow, and thy sweet eyes, 
 
 And the kingdom of the night, 
 
 Be thou favourable and fair ; 
 
 By thine arrows and thy mig-ht 
 
 And Orion overthrown ; 
 
 By the maiden thy delight, 
 
 By the indissoluble zone 
 
 And the sacred hair. 
 
 MESSENGER 
 
 Maidens, if ye will sing now, shift your song, 
 Bow down, cry, wail for pity ; is this a time 
 For singing ? nay, for strewing of dust and ash, 
 Rent raiment, and for bruising of the breast. 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 53 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 What new thing wolf-like lurks behind thy words ? 
 What snake's tongue in thy Hps? what fire in the 
 eyes? 
 
 MESSENGER 
 
 Bring me before the queen and I will speak. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Lo, she comes forth as from thank-offering made. 
 
 MESSENGER 
 
 A barren offering for a bitter gift. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 What are these borne on branches, and the face 
 Covered ? no mean men living, but now slain 
 Such honour have they, if any dwell with death. 
 
 MESSENGER 
 
 Queen, thy twain brethren and thy mother's sons. 
 
 ALTH.EA 
 
 Lay down your dead till I behold their blood 
 If it be mine indeed, and I will weep. 
 
 MESSENGER 
 
 Weep if thou wilt, for these men shall no more. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 O brethren, O my father's sons, of me 
 Well loved and well reputed, I should weep 
 Tears dearer than the dear blood drawn from you 
 But that I know you not uncomforted, 
 Sleeping no shameful sleep, however slain, 
 For my son surely hath avenged you dead. 
 
54 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 MESSENGER 
 
 Nay, should thine own seed slay himself, O queen ? 
 
 ALTH.EA 
 
 rhy double word brings forth a double death. 
 
 MESSENGER 
 
 Know this then singly, by one hand they fell. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 What mutterest thou with thine ambiguous mouth ? 
 
 MESSENGER 
 
 Slain by thy son's hand ; is that saying so hard ? 
 
 ALTH-iEA 
 
 Our time is come upon us : it is here. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 O miserable, and spoiled at thine own hand. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 Wert thou not called Meleager from this womb ? 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 A grievous huntsman hath it bred to thee. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 Wert thou born fire, and shalt thou not devour ? 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 The fire thou madest, will it consume even thee ? 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 My dreams are fallen upon me ; burn thou too. 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 55 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Not without God are visions born and die. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 The gods are many about me ; I am one. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 She groans as men wrestling with heavier gods, 
 
 ALTHiEA 
 
 They rend me, they divide me, they destroy. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Or one labouring in travail of strange births. 
 
 ALTHAEA 
 
 They are strong, they are strong ; I am broken, and 
 these prevail. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 The god is great against her ; she will die. 
 
 ALTHiEA 
 
 Yea, but not now ; for my heart too is great. 
 I would I were not here in sight of the sun. 
 But thou, speak all thou sawest, and I will die. 
 
 MESSENGER 
 
 O queen, for queenlike hast thou borne thyself, 
 A little word may hold so great mischance. 
 For in division of the sanguine spoil 
 These men thy brethren wrangling bade yield up 
 The boar's head and the horror of the hide 
 That this might stand a wonder in Calydon, 
 
56 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 Hallowed ; and some drew toward them ; but thy son 
 
 With great hands g^rasping all that weight of hair 
 
 Cast down the dead heap clang-ing- and collapsed 
 
 At female feet, saying- This thy spoil not mine, 
 
 Maiden, thine own hand for thyself hath reaped, 
 
 And all this praise God g-ives thee : she thereat 
 
 Laug-hed, as when dawn touches the sacred night 
 
 The sky sees laugh and redden and divide 
 
 Dim lips and eyelids virgin of the sun, 
 
 Hers, and the warm slow breasts of morning heave, 
 
 Fruitful, and flushed with flame from lamp-lit hours, 
 
 And maiden undulation of clear hair 
 
 Colour the clouds ; so laughed she from pure heart, 
 
 Lit with a low blush to the braided hair. 
 
 And rose-coloured and cold like very dawn, ^ 
 
 Golden and godlike, chastely with chaste lips, 
 
 A faint grave laugh ; and all they held their peace. 
 
 And she passed by them. Then one cried Lo now, 
 
 Shall not the Arcadian shoot out lips at us, 
 
 Saying all we were despoiled by this one girl ? 
 
 And all they rode against her violently 
 
 And cast the fresh crown from her hair, and now 
 
 They had rent her spoil away, dishonouring her, 
 
 Save that Meleager, as a tame lion chafed. 
 
 Bore on them, broke them, and as fire cleaves wood 
 
 So clove and drove them, smitten in twain ; but she 
 
 Smote not nor heaved up hand ; and this man first, 
 
 Plexippus, crying out This for love's sake, sweet. 
 
 Drove at Meleager, who with spear straightening 
 
 Pierced his cheek through ; then Toxeus made for 
 
 him. 
 Dumb, but his spear Spake ; vain and violent words. 
 Fruitless ; for him too stricken through both sides 
 The earth felt falling, and his horse's foam 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 57 
 
 Blanched thy son's face, his slayer ; and these being 
 
 slain, 
 None moved nor spake ; but CEneus bade bear hence 
 These made of heaven infatuate in their deaths, 
 Foolish ; for these would baffle fate, and fell. 
 And they passed on, and all men honoured her, 
 Being honourable, as one revered of heaven. 
 
 ALTHAEA 
 
 What say you, women ? is all this not well doae ? 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 No man doth well but God hath part in hiin. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 But no part here ; for these my brethren bom 
 
 Ye have no part in, these ye know not of 
 
 As I that was their sister, a sacrifice 
 
 Slain in their slaying-. I would I had died for these ; 
 
 For this man dead walked with me, child by child, 
 
 And made a weak staff for my feebler feet 
 
 With his own tender wrist and hand, and held 
 
 And led me softly and shewed me gold and steel 
 
 And shining shapes of mirror and bright crown 
 
 And all things fair ; and threw light spears, and 
 
 brought 
 Young hounds to huddle at my feet and thrust 
 Tame heads against my little maiden breasts 
 And please me with great eyes ; and those days went 
 And these are bitter and I a barren queen 
 And sister miserable, a grievous thing 
 And mother of many curses ; and she too. 
 My sister Leda, sitting overseas 
 With fair fruits round her, and her faultless lord, 
 
 VOL. IV. I 
 
58 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 Shall curse me, saying A sorrow and not a son, 
 Sister, thou barest, even a burning- fire, 
 A brand consuming- thine own soul and me. 
 But ye now, sons of Thestius, make good cheer, 
 For ye shall have such wood to funeral fire 
 As no king hath ; and flame that once burnt down 
 Oil shall not quicken or breath relume or wine 
 Refresh again ; much costlier than fine gold, 
 And more than many lives of wandering men. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 queen, thou hast yet with thee love-worthy things, 
 Thine husband, and the great strength of thy son. 
 
 AUTHJEA 
 
 Who shall get brothers for me while I live ? 
 
 Who bear them ? who bring forth in lieu of these ? 
 
 Are not our fathers and our brethren one, 
 
 And no man like them ? are not mine here slain ? 
 
 Have we not hung together, he and I, 
 
 Flowerwise feeding as the feeding bees, 
 
 With mother-milk for honey ? and this man too. 
 
 Dead, with my son's spear thrust between his sides, 
 
 Hath he not seen us, later born than he. 
 
 Laugh with lips filled, and laughed again for love ? 
 
 There were no sons then in the world, nor spears, 
 
 Nor deadly births of women ; but the gods 
 
 Allc'wed us, and our days were clear of these. 
 
 1 would I had died unwedded, and brought forth 
 i*Jo swords to vex the world ; for these that spake 
 Sweet words long since and loved me will not speak^ 
 Nor love nor look upon me ; and all my life 
 
 I shall not hear nor see them living men. 
 But I too living, how shall I now live ? 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 59 
 
 What life shall this be with my son, to know 
 
 What hath been and desire what will not be. 
 
 Look for dead eyes and listen for dead lips, 
 
 And kill mine own heart with remembering- them, 
 
 And with those eyes that see their slayer alive 
 
 Weep, and wring- hands that clasp him by the hand ? 
 
 How shall I bear my dreams of them, to hear 
 
 False voices, feel the kisses of false mouths 
 
 And footless sound of perished feet, and then 
 
 Wake and hear only it may be their own hounds 
 
 Whine masterless in miserable sleep, 
 
 And see their boar-spears and their beds and seats 
 
 And all the gear and housings of their lives 
 
 And not the men ? shall hounds and horses mourn, 
 
 Pine with strange eyes, and prick up hungry ears. 
 
 Famish and fail at heart for their dear lords. 
 
 And I not heed at all ? and those blind thing-s 
 
 Fall oflF from life for love's sake, and I live ? 
 
 Surely some death is better than some life, 
 
 Better one death for him and these and m' 
 
 For if the gods had slain them it may be 
 
 I had endured it ; if they had fallen by war 
 
 Or by the nets and knives of privy death 
 
 And by hired hands while sleeping, this thing too 
 
 I had set my soul to suffer ; or this hunt. 
 
 Had this despatched them, under tusk or tooth 
 
 Torn, sanguine, trodden, broken ; for all deaths 
 
 Or honourable or with facile feet avenged 
 
 And hands of swift gods following, all save this, 
 
 Are bearable ; but not for their sweet land 
 
 Fighting, but not a sacrifice, lo these 
 
 Dead ; for I had not then shed all mine heart 
 
 Out at mine eyes : then either with good speed. 
 
 Being just, 7 had slain their slayer atoningly. 
 
6o ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 Or strewn with flowers their fire and on their tombs 
 Hungf crowns, and over them a song, and seen 
 Their praise outflame their ashes : for all men, 
 All maidens, had come thither, and from pure lips 
 Shed songs upon them, from heroic eyes 
 Tears ; and their death had been a deathless life ; 
 But now, by no man hired nor alien sword, 
 By their own kindred are they fallen, in peace, 
 After much peril, friendless among- friends, 
 By hateful hands they loved ; and how shall mine 
 Touch these returning red and not from war. 
 These fatal from the vintage of men's veins. 
 Dead men my brethren ? how shall these wash oiF 
 No festal stains of undelightful wine, 
 How mix the blood, my blood on them, with me, 
 Holding mine hand ? or how shall I say, son. 
 That am no sister ? but by night and day 
 Shall we not sit and hate each other, and think 
 Things hate-worthy ? not live with shamefast eyes, 
 Brow-beaten, treading soft with fearful feet. 
 Each unupbraided, each without rebuke 
 Convicted, and without a word reviled 
 Each of another ? and I shall let thee live 
 And see thee strong and hear men for thy sake 
 Praise me, but these thou wouldest not let live 
 No man shall praise for ever ? these shall lie 
 Dead, unbeloved, unholpen, all through thee ? 
 Sweet were they toward me living, and mine heart 
 Desired them, but was then well satisfied. 
 That now is as men hungered ; and these dead 
 I shall want always to the day I die. 
 For all things else and all men may renew ; 
 Yea, son for son the gods may give and take, 
 But never a brother or sister any more. 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 6i 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Nay, for the son lies close about thine heart, 
 
 Full of thy milk, warm from thy womb, and drains 
 
 Life and the blood of life and all thy fruit, 
 
 Eats thee and drinks thee as who breaks bread and 
 
 eats, 
 Treads wine and drinks, thyself, a sect of thee ; 
 And if he feed not, shall not thy flesh faint ? 
 Or drink not, are not thy lips dead for thirst ? 
 This thing- moves more than all things, even thy son, 
 That thou cleave to him ; and he shall honour thee, 
 Thy womb that bare him and the breasts he knew. 
 Reverencing most for thy sake all his gods. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 But these the gods too gave me, and these my son. 
 
 Not reverencing his gods nor mine own heart 
 
 Nor the old sweet years nor all venerable things, 
 
 But cruel, and in his ravin like a beast. 
 
 Hath taken away to slay them : yea, and she 
 
 She the strange woman, she the flower, the sword, 
 
 Red from spilt blood, a mortal flower to men, 
 
 Adorable, detestable — even she 
 
 Saw with strange eyes and with strange lips rejoiced. 
 
 Seeing these mine own slain of mine own, and me 
 
 Made miserable above all miseries made, 
 
 A grief among all women in the world, 
 
 A name to be washed out with all men's tears. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Strengthen thy spirit ; is this not also a god, 
 Chance, and the wheel of all necessities ? 
 Hard things have fallen upon us from '.arsh gods, 
 Whom lest worse hap rebuke we not f jr these. 
 
62 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 My spirit IS strong- against itself, and I 
 
 For these things' sake cry out on mine own soul 
 
 That it endures outrage, and dolorous days, 
 
 And life, and this inexpiable impotence. 
 
 Weak am I, weak and shameful ; my breath drawn 
 
 Shames me, and monstrous things and violent gods. 
 
 What shall atone ? what heal me ? what bring back 
 
 Strength to the foot, light to the face ? what herb 
 
 Assuage me ? what restore me ? what release ? 
 
 What strange thing eaten or drunken, O great gods, 
 
 Make me as you or as the beasts that feed. 
 
 Slay and divide and cherish their own hearts ? 
 
 For these ye show us ; and we less than these 
 
 Have not wherewith to live as all these things 
 
 Which all their lives fare after their own kind 
 
 As who doth well rejoicing ; but we ill. 
 
 Weeping or laughing, we whom eyesight fails, 
 
 Knowledge and light of face and perfect heart. 
 
 And hands we lack, and wit ; and all our days 
 
 Sin, and have hunger, and die infatuated. 
 
 For madness have ye given us and not health, 
 
 And sins whereof we know not ; and for these 
 
 Death, and sudden destruction unaware. 
 
 What shall we say now ? what thing- comes of us ? 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Alas, for all this all men undergo. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 Wherefore I will not that these twain, O gods, 
 Die as a dog dies, eaten of creeping things, 
 Abominable, a loathing ; but though dead 
 Shall they have honour and such funereal flame 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 63 
 
 As strews men's ashes in their enemies' face 
 
 And blinds their eyes who hate them : lest men say, 
 
 *' Lo how they lie, and livingf had great kin, 
 
 And none of these hath pity of them, and none 
 
 Regards them lying-, and none is wrung- at heart, 
 
 None moved in spirit for them, naked and slain, 
 
 Abhorred, abased, and no tears comfort them : " 
 
 And in the dark this grieve Eurythemis, 
 
 Hearing how these her sons come down to her 
 
 Unburied, unavenged, as kinless men. 
 
 And had a queen their sister. That were shame 
 
 Worse than this grief. Yet how to atone at all 
 
 I know not ; seeing the love of my born son, 
 
 A new-made mother's new-born love, that grows 
 
 From the soft child to the strong man, now soft 
 
 Now strong as either, and still one sole same love, 
 
 Strives with me, no light thing to strive withal ; 
 
 This love is deep, and natural to man's blood. 
 
 And ineffaceable with many tears. 
 
 Yet shall not these rebuke me though I die, 
 
 Nor she in that waste world with all her dead, 
 
 My mother, among the pale flocks fallen as leaves. 
 
 Folds of dead people, and alien from the sun ; 
 
 Nor lack some bitter comfort, some poor praise, 
 
 Being queen, to have borne her daughter like a queen. 
 
 Righteous ; and though mine own fire burn me too, 
 
 She shall have honour and these her sons, though dead. 
 
 But all the gods will, all they do, and we 
 
 Not all we would, yet somewhat ; and one choice 
 
 We have, to live and do just deeds and die. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Terrible words she communes with, and turns 
 
 Swift fiery e)'^es in doubt against herself, 
 
 And murmurs as who talks in dreams with death. 
 
64 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 For the unjust also dieth, and him all men 
 
 Hate, and himself abhors the unrighteousness. 
 
 And seeth his own dishonour intolerable. 
 
 But I being just, doing right upon myself, 
 
 Slay mine own soul, and no man born shames me. 
 
 For none constrains nor shal) rebuke, being done, 
 
 What none compelled me doing ; thus these things 
 
 fare. 
 Ah, ah, that such things should so fare ; ah me, 
 That I am found to do them and endure. 
 Chosen and constrained to choose, and bear myself 
 Mine own wound through mine own flesh to the heart 
 Violently stricken, a spoiler and a spoil, 
 A ruin ruinous, fallen on mine own son. 
 Ah, ah, for me too as for these ; alas. 
 For that is done that shall be, and mine hand 
 Full of the deed, and full of blood mine eyes, 
 That shall see never nor touch anything 
 Save blood unstanched and fire unquenchable. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 What wilt thou do ? what ails thee ? for the house 
 Shakes ruinously ; wilt thou bring fire for it ? 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 Fire in the roofs, and on the lintels fire. 
 
 Lo ye, who stand and weave, between the doors. 
 
 There ; and blood drips from hand and thread, and 
 
 stains 
 Threshold and raiment and me passing in 
 Flecked with the sudden sanguine drops of death. 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 65 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Alas that time is stronger than strong men, 
 Fate than all gods : and these are fallen on us. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 A little since and I was glad ; and now 
 I never shall be glad or sad again. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Between two joys a grief grows unaware. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 A little while and I shall laugh ; and then 
 I shall weep never and laugh not any more. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 What shall be said ? for words are thorns to grief. 
 Withhold thyself a little and fear the gods. 
 
 ALTHiEA 
 
 Fear died when these were slain ; and I am as dead, 
 And fear is of the living ; these fear none. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Have pity upon all people for their sake. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 It is done now ; shall I put back my day ? 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 An end is come, an end ; this is of God. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 I am fire, and burn myself ; keep clear of fire. 
 
 VOL. IV. K 
 
66 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 The house is broken, is broken ; it shall not stand. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 Woe, woe for him that breaketh ; and a rod 
 Smote it of old, and now the axe is here. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Not as with sundering" of the earth 
 
 Nor as with cleaving- of the sea 
 Nor fierce foreshadowing-s of a birth 
 
 Nor flying- dreams of death to be 
 Nor loosening- of the larg-e world's g-irth 
 And quickening- of the body of night, 
 
 And sound of thunder in men's ears 
 And fire of lightning in men's sig-ht, 
 
 Fate, mother of desires and fears. 
 
 Bore unto men the law of tears ; 
 But sudden, an unfathered flame, 
 
 And broken out of night, she shone, 
 She, without body, without name. 
 
 In days forgfotten and foregone ; 
 And heaven rang- round her as she came 
 Like smitten cymbals, and lay bare ; 
 
 Clouds and great stars, thunders and snows, 
 The blue sad fields and folds of air, 
 
 The life that breathes, the life that grows. 
 
 All wind, all fire, that burns or blows, 
 Even all these knew her : for she is great ; 
 
 The daughter of doom, the mother of death, 
 The sister of sorrow ; a lifelong weight 
 
 That no man's finger lighteneth. 
 Nor any god can lighten fate ; 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 67 
 
 A landmark seen across the way 
 
 Where one race treads as the other trod ; 
 
 An evil sceptre, an evil stay, 
 
 Wrought for a staff, wrought for a rod, 
 The bitter jealousy of God. 
 
 For death is deep as the sea, 
 
 And fate as the waves thereof. 
 Shall the waves take pity on thee 
 
 Or the southwind offer thee love ? 
 Wilt thou take the night for thy day 
 Or the darkness for light on thy way, 
 
 Till thou say in thine heart Enough ? 
 Behold, thou art over fair, thou art over wise ; 
 The sweetness of spring in thine hair, and the light 
 
 in thine eyes. 
 The light of the spring in thine eyes, and the sound 
 
 in thine ears ; 
 Yet thine heart shall wax heavy with sighs and thine 
 
 eyelids with tears. 
 Wilt thou cover thine hair with gold, and with silver 
 
 thy feet ? 
 Hast thou taken the purple to fold thee, and made 
 
 thy mouth sweet ? 
 Behold, when thy face is made bare, he that loved 
 
 thee shall hate ; 
 Thy face shall be no more fair at the fall of thy fate. 
 For thy life shall fall as a leaf and be shed as the rain ^ 
 And the veil of thine head shall be grief ; and the 
 
 crown shall be pain. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 Ho, ye that wail, and ye that sing, make way 
 Till I be come among you. Hide your tears, 
 
68 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 Ye little weepers, and your laughing- lips, 
 
 Ye laughers for a little ; lo mine eyes 
 
 That outweep heaven at rainiest, and my mouth 
 
 That laughs as gods laugh at us. Fate's are we, 
 
 Yet fate is ours a breathing-space ; yea, mine. 
 
 Fate is made mine for ever ; he is my son, 
 
 My bedfellow, my brother. You strong gods, 
 
 Give place unto me ; I am as any of you. 
 
 To give life and to take life. Thou, old earth, 
 
 That hast made man and unmade ; thou whose mouth 
 
 Looks red from the eaten fruits of thine own womb ; 
 
 Behold me with what lips upon what food 
 
 I feed and fill my body ; even with flesh 
 
 Made of my body. Lo, the fire I lit 
 
 I burn with fire to quench it ; yea, with flame 
 
 I burn up even the dust and ash thereof. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Woman, what fire is this thou burnest with ? 
 
 ALTHAEA 
 
 Yea to the bone, yea to the blood and all. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 For this thy face and hair are as one fire. 
 
 ALTHiEA 
 
 A tongue that licks and beats upon the dust. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 And in thine eyes are hollow light and heat. 
 
 ALTHiEA 
 
 Of flame not fed with hand or frankincense. 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 69 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 I fear thee for the trembling of thine eyes. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 Neither with loye they tremble nor for fear. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 And thy mouth shuddering- Hke a shot bird. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 Not as the bride's jnouth when man kisses it. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Nay, but what thing is this thing thou hast done ? 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 Look, I am silent, speak your eyes for me. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 I see a faint fire Cghtening from the hall. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 Gaze, stretch your eyes, strain till the lids drop off. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Flushed pillars down the flickering vestibule. 
 
 ALTRSA 
 
 Stretch with your necks like birds : cry, chirp as 
 they. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 And a long brand that blackens : and white dust. 
 
70 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 O children, what is this ye see ? your eyes 
 Are blinder than night's face at fall of moon. 
 That is my son, my flesh, my fruit of life, 
 My travail, and the year's weight of my womb, 
 Meleager, a hre enkindled of mine hands 
 And of mine hands extinguished ; this is he. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 gods, what word has flown out at thy mouth ? 
 
 ALfH-aJA 
 
 1 did this and I say this and I die. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Death stands upon the doorway of thy lips, 
 And in thy mouth has death set up his house. 
 
 ALTH.EA 
 
 death, a little, a little while, sweet death, 
 Until I see the brand burnt down and die. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 She reels as any reed under the wind, 
 
 And cleaves unto the ground with staggering feet. 
 
 ALTH^A 
 
 Girls, one thing will I say and hold my peace. 
 
 1 that did this will weep not nor cry out. 
 Cry ye and weep : I will not call on gods, 
 Call ye on them ; I will not pity man, 
 Shew ye your pity. I know not if I live ; 
 Save that I feel the fire upon my face 
 And on my cheek the burning of a brand. 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 71 
 
 Yea the smoke bites me, yea I drink the steam 
 
 With nostril and with eyelid and with lip 
 
 Insatiate and intolerant ; and mine hands 
 
 Burn, and fire feeds upon mine eyes ; I reel 
 
 As one made drunk with living-, whence he draws 
 
 Drunken delight ; yet I, though mad for joy, 
 
 Loathe my long- living and am waxen red 
 
 As with the shadow of shed blood ; behold, 
 
 I am kindled with the flames that fade in him, 
 
 I am swollen with subsiding- of his veins, 
 
 I am flooded with his ebbing- ; my lit eyes 
 
 Flame with the falling fire that leaves his lids 
 
 Bloodless ; my cheek is luminous with blood 
 
 Because his face is ashen. Yet, O child. 
 
 Son, first-born, fairest — O sweet mouth, sweet eyes, 
 
 That drew my life out through my suckling breast. 
 
 That shone and clove mine heart through — O soft 
 
 knees 
 Clinging, O tender treadings of soft feet, 
 Cheeks warm with little kissings — O child, child. 
 What have we made each other ? Lo, I felt 
 Thy weight cleave to me, a burden of beauty, O son, 
 Thy cradled brows and loveliest loving lips. 
 The floral hair, the little lightening eyes. 
 And all thy goodly glory ; with mine hands 
 Delicately I fed thee, with my tongue 
 Tenderly spake, saying, Verily in God's time, 
 For all the little likeness of thy limbs. 
 Son, I shall make thee a kingly man to fight, 
 A lordly leader ; and hear before I die, 
 " She bore the goodliest sword of all the world." 
 Oh ! oh ! For all my life turns round on me ; 
 I am severed from myself, my name is gone, 
 My name that was a healing, it is changed. 
 
72 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 My name is a consuming-. From this time, 
 Though mine eyes reach to the end of all these things, 
 My lips shall not unfasten till I die. 
 
 SEMICHORUS 
 
 She has filled with sighing the city, 
 And the ways thereof with tears ; 
 
 She arose, she girdled her sides, 
 
 She set her face as a bride's ; 
 
 She wept, and she had no pity ; 
 Trembled, and felt no fears. 
 
 SEMICHORUS 
 
 Her eyes were clear as the sun, 
 Her brows were fresh as the day ; 
 
 She girdled herself with gold. 
 
 Her robes were manifold ; 
 
 But the days of her worship are done. 
 Her praise is taken away. 
 
 SEMICHORUS 
 
 For she set her hand to the fire, 
 
 With her mouth she kindled the same ; 
 
 As the mouth of a flute-player. 
 
 So was the mouth of her ; 
 
 With the might of her strong desire 
 She blew the breath of the flame. 
 
 SEMICHORUS 
 
 She set her hand to the wood. 
 
 She took the fire in her hand ; 
 As one who is nigh to death. 
 She panted with strange breath ; 
 She opened her lips unto blood. 
 
 She breathed and kindled the brand. 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 73 
 
 SEMICHORUS 
 
 As a wood-dove newly shot, 
 
 She sobbed and lifted her breast ; 
 
 She sighed and covered her eyes, 
 
 Filling her lips with sighs ; 
 
 She sighed, she withdrew herself not, 
 She refrained not, taking not rest ; 
 
 SEMICHORUS 
 
 But as the wind which is drouth, 
 
 And as the air which is death, 
 As storm that severeth ships, 
 Her breath severing her lips. 
 The breath came forth of her mouth 
 
 And the fire came forth of her breatL 
 
 SECOND MESSENGER 
 
 Queen, and you maidens, there is come on us 
 A thing more deadly than the face of death ; 
 Melea^er the good lord is as one slain. 
 
 SEMICHORUS 
 
 Without sword, without sword is he stricken i 
 Slain, and slain without hand. 
 
 SECOND MESSENGER 
 
 For as keen ice divided of the sun 
 
 His limbs divide, and as thawed snow the flesh 
 
 Thaws from off all his body to the hair. 
 
 SEMICHORUS 
 
 He wastes as the embers quicken ; 
 With the brand he fades as a brand. 
 
 VOL. IV. L 
 
74 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 SECOND MESSENGER 
 
 Even while they sang and all drew hither and he 
 Lifted both hands to crown the Arcadian s hair 
 And fix the looser leaves, both hands fell down. 
 
 SEMICHORUS 
 
 With rending- of cheek and of hair 
 Lament ye, mourn for him, weep. 
 
 SECOND MESSENGER 
 
 Straightway the crown slid off and smote on earth, 
 First fallen ; and he, grasping his own hair, groaned 
 And cast his raiment round his face and fell. 
 
 SEMICHORUS 
 
 Alas for visions that were, 
 
 And soothsayings spoken in sleep. 
 
 SECOND MESSENGER 
 
 But the king twitched his reins in and leapt down 
 And caught him, crying out twice " O child " and 
 
 thrice. 
 So that men's eyelids thickened with their tears. 
 
 SEMICHORUS 
 
 Lament with a long lamentation, 
 Cry, for an end is at hand. 
 
 SECOND MESSENGER 
 
 O son, he said, son, lift thine eyes, draw breath, 
 
 Pity me ; but Meleager with sharp lips 
 
 Grasped, and his face waxed like as sunburnt grass. 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 75 
 
 SEMICHORUS 
 
 Cry aloud, O thou kingdom, O nation, 
 O stricken, a ruinous land. 
 
 SECOND MESSENGER 
 
 Whereat king- CEneus, straightening feeble knees. 
 With feeble hands heaved up a lessening weight, 
 And laid him sadly in strange hands, and wept. 
 
 SEMICHORUS 
 
 Thou art smitten, her lord, her desire. 
 Thy dear blood wasted as rain. 
 
 SECOND MESSENGER 
 
 And they with tears and rendings of the beard 
 Bear hither a breathing body, wept upon 
 And lightening at each footfall, sick to death. 
 
 SEMICHORUS 
 
 Thou madest thy sword as a fire. 
 With fire for a sword thou art slain. 
 
 SECOND MESSENGER 
 
 And lo, the feast turned funeral, and the crowns 
 Fallen ; and the huntress and the hunter trapped ; 
 And weeping and changed faces and veiled hair. 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 Let your hands meet 
 
 Round the weight of my head ; 
 Lift ye my feet 
 As the feet of the dead ; 
 For the flesh of my body is molten, the limbs of it 
 molten as lead. 
 
76 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 O thy luminous face, 
 Thine imperious eyes ! 
 
 the grief, O the grace, 
 As of day when it dies ! 
 
 Who is this bending- over thee, lord, with tears and 
 suppression of sighs ? 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 Is a bride so fair ? 
 
 Is a maid so meek ? 
 With unchapleted hair, 
 With unfilleted cheek, 
 Atalanta, the pure among women, whose name is as 
 blessing to speak. 
 
 ATALANTA 
 
 1 would that with feet 
 
 Unsandalled, unshod, 
 Overbold, overfleet, 
 
 I had swum not nor trod 
 From Arcadia to Calydon northward, a blast of the 
 envy of God. 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 Unto each man his fate ; 
 Unto each as he saith 
 In whose fingers the weight 
 Of the world is as breath ; 
 Yet I would that in clamour oi' battle mine hands had 
 laid hold upon death. 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 17 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Not with cleaving" of shields 
 
 And their clash in thine ear, 
 When the lord of fought fields 
 Breaketh spearshaft from spear, 
 Thou art broken, our lord, thou art broken, with 
 travail and labour and fear. 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 Would God he had found me 
 
 Beneath fresh boug^hs ! 
 Would God he had bound me 
 Unawares in mine house. 
 With light in mine eyes, and songs in my lips, and a 
 crown on my brows ! 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Whence art thou sent from us ? 
 
 Whither thy goal ? 
 How art thou rent from us, 
 Thou that wert whole. 
 As with severing of eyelids and eyes, as with sunder- 
 ing of body and soul ! 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 My heart is within me 
 
 As an ash in the fire ; 
 Whosoever hath seen me, 
 Without lute, without lyre. 
 Shall sing of me grievous things, even things that 
 were ill to desire. 
 
78 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Who shall raise thee 
 
 From the house of the dead ? 
 Or what man praise thee 
 
 That thy praise may be said ? 
 Alas thy beauty ! alas thy body ! alas thine head ! 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 But thou, O mother, 
 
 The dreamer of dreams, 
 Wilt thou bring- forth another 
 To feel the sun's beams 
 Whe.a ! move among- shadows a shadow, and wail 
 by impassable streams ? 
 
 (ENEUS 
 
 What things wilt thou leave me 
 
 Now this thing- is done? 
 A man wilt thou g-ive me, 
 A son for my son, 
 For the light of mine eyes, the desire of my life, the 
 desirable one ? 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Thou wert g-lad above others. 
 
 Yea, fair beyond word ; 
 Thou wert glad among mothers ; 
 For each man that heard 
 Of thee, praise there was added unto thee, as wing's 
 to the feet of a bird. 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 79 
 
 CENEUS 
 
 Who shall g-ive back 
 
 Thy face of old years, 
 With travail made black, 
 Grown grey among- fears, 
 Mother of sorrow, mother of cursing-, mother of 
 tears ? 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 Though thou art as fire 
 Fed with fuel in vain, 
 My delight, my desire, 
 
 Is more chaste than the rain, 
 More pure than the dewfall, more holy than stars are 
 that live without stain. 
 
 ATALANTA 
 
 I would that as water 
 
 My life's blood had thawn< 
 Or as winter's wan daughter 
 Leaves lowland and lawn 
 Spring-stricken, or ever mine eyes had beheld thee 
 made dark in thy dawn. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 When thou dravest the men 
 
 Of the chosen of Thrace, 
 None turned him again 
 Nor endured he thy face 
 Clothed round with the blush of the battle, with light 
 from a terrible place. 
 
8o ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 CENEUS 
 
 Thou shouldst die as he dies 
 
 For whom none sheddeth tears ; 
 Filling thine eyes 
 
 And fulfilling' thine ears 
 With the brilliance of battle, the bloom and the 
 beauty, the splendour of spears. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 In the ears of the world 
 
 It is sung, it is told, 
 And the light thereof hurled 
 And the noise thereof rolled 
 From the Acroceraunian snow to the ford of the 
 fleece of gold. 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 Would God ye could carry me 
 
 Forth of all these ; 
 Heap sand and bury me 
 By the Chersonese 
 Where the thundering Bccphorus answers the 
 thunder of Pontic seas. 
 
 CENEUS 
 
 Dost thou mock at our praise 
 
 And the singing begun 
 And the men of strange days 
 Praising my son 
 ?n the folds of the hills of home, high places of 
 Calydon ? 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 8l 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 For the dead man no home is ; 
 
 Ah, better to be 
 What the flower of the foam is 
 In fields of the sea, 
 That the sea-waves mig^ht be as my raiment, the 
 gulf-stream a garment for me. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Who shall seek thee and bring- 
 
 And restore thee thy day. 
 When the dove dipt her wing 
 And the oars won their way 
 Where the narrowing Symplegades whitened the 
 straits of Propontis with spray ? 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 Will ye crown me my tomb 
 
 Or exalt me my name, 
 Now my spirits consume, 
 Now my flesh is a flame ? 
 Let the sea slake it once, and men speak of me sleep- 
 ing to praise me or shame. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Turn back now, turn thee. 
 
 As who turns him to wake ; 
 Though the life in thee burn thee, 
 Couldst thou bathe it and slake 
 Where the sea-ridge of Helle hangs heavier, and east 
 upon west waters break ? 
 VOL. IV. M 
 
82 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 Would the winds blow me back 
 Or the waves hurl me home ? 
 Ah, to touch in the track 
 
 Where the pine learnt to roam 
 Cold girdles and crowns of the sea-gods, cool 
 blossoms of water and foam ! 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 The gfods may release 
 
 That they made fast ; 
 Thy soul shall have ease 
 In thy limbs at the last ; 
 But what shall they give thee for life, sweet life that 
 is overpast ? 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 Not the life of men's veins, 
 
 Not of flesh that conceives ; 
 But the grace that remains, 
 The fair beauty that cleaves 
 To the life of the rains in the grasses, the life of the 
 dews on the leaves. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Thou wert helmsman and chief; 
 
 Wilt thou turn in an hour, 
 Thy limbs to the leaf. 
 Thy face to the flower. 
 Thy blood to the water, thy soul to the gods who 
 divide and devour ? 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 83 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 The years are hungry, 
 
 They wail all their days ; 
 The g-ods wax angry 
 And weary of praise ; 
 And who shall bridle their lips ? and who shall straiten 
 their ways ? 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 The g"ods guard over us 
 
 With sword and with rod ; 
 Weaving shadow to cover us, 
 Heaping the sod, 
 That law may fulfil herself wholly, to darken maii*s 
 face before God. 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 O holy head of QSneus, lo thy son 
 Guiltless, yet red from alien guilt, yet foul 
 With kinship of contaminated lives, 
 Lo, for their blood I die ; and mine own blood 
 For bloodshedding of mine is mixed therewith. 
 That death may not discern me from my kin. 
 Yet with clean heart I die and faultless hand, 
 Not shamefully ; thou therefore of thy love 
 Salute me, and bid fare among the dead 
 Well, as the dead fare ; for the best man dead 
 Fares sadly ; nathless I now faring well 
 Pass without fear where nothing is to fear 
 Having thy love about me and thy goodwill, 
 O father, among dark places and men dead. 
 
84 . ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 (ENEUS 
 
 Child, I salute thee with sad heart and tears, 
 And bid thee comfort, being a perfect man 
 In fight, and honourable in the house of peace. 
 The gods give thee fair wage and dues of death, 
 And me brief days and ways to come at thee. 
 
 MELEAGER 
 
 Pray thou thy days be long before thy death. 
 And full of ease and kingdom ; seeing in death 
 There is no comfort and none aftergrowth, 
 Nor shall one thence look up and see day's dawn 
 Nor light upon the land whither I go. 
 Live thou and take thy fill of days and die 
 When thy day comes ; and make not much of death 
 Lest ere thy day thou reap an evil thing. 
 Thou too, the bitter mother and mother-plague 
 Of this my weary body — thou too, queen. 
 The source and end, the sower and the scythe. 
 The rain that ripens and the drought that slays. 
 The sand that swallows and the spring that feeds, 
 *ro make me and unmake me— thou, I say. 
 Althaea, since my father's ploughshare, drawn 
 Through fatal seedland of a female field. 
 Furrowed thy body, whence a wheaten ear 
 Strong from the sun and fragrant from the rains 
 I sprang and cleft the closure of thy womb, 
 Mother, I dying with unforgetful tongue 
 Hail thee as holy and worship thee as just 
 Who art unjust and unholy ; and with my knees 
 Would worship, but thy fire and subtlety, 
 Dissundering them, devour me ; for these limbs 
 Are as light dust and crumblingfs from mine urn 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 85 
 
 Before the fire has touched them ; and my face 
 
 As a dead leaf or dead foot's mark on snow, 
 
 And all this body a broken barren tree 
 
 That was so strong-, and all this flower of life 
 
 Disbranched and desecrated miserably, 
 
 And minished all that god-like muscle and mig-ht 
 
 And lesser than a man's : for all my veins 
 
 Fail me, and all mine ashen life burns down. 
 
 I would thou hadst let me live ; but gods averse, 
 
 But fortune, and the fiery feet of change. 
 
 And time, these would not, these tread out my life, 
 
 These and not thou ; me too thou hast loved, and I 
 
 Thee ; but this death was mixed with all my life, 
 
 Mine end with my beginning : and this law. 
 
 This only, slays me, and not my mother at all. 
 
 And let no brother or sister grieve too sore, 
 
 Nor melt their hearts out on me with their tears, 
 
 Since extreme love and sorrowing overmuch 
 
 Vex the great gods, and overloving men 
 
 Slay and are slain for love's sake ; and this house 
 
 Shall bear much better children ; why should these 
 
 Weep ? but in patience let them live their lives 
 
 And mine pass by forgotten : thou alone. 
 
 Mother, thou sole and only, thou not these, 
 
 Keep me in mind a little when 1 die 
 
 Because I was thy first-born ; let thy soul 
 
 Pity me, pity even me gone hence and dead. 
 
 Though thou wert wroth, and though thou bear again 
 
 Much happier sons, and all men later born 
 
 Exceedingly excel me ; yet do thou 
 
 Forget not, nor think shame ; I was thy son. 
 
 Time was I did not shame thee ; and time was 
 
 I thought to live and make thee honourable 
 
 With deeds as great as these men's ; but they live, 
 
86 ATALANTA IN CALYDON 
 
 These, and I die ; and what thing should have been 
 
 Surely I know not ; yet I charge thee, seeing 
 
 I am dead already, love me not the less, 
 
 Me, O my mother ; I charge thee by these gods, 
 
 My father's, and that holier breast of thine. 
 
 By these that see me dying, and that which nursed. 
 
 Love me not less, thy first-born : though grief come, 
 
 Grief only, of me, and of all these great joy, 
 
 And shall come always to thee ; for thou knowest, 
 
 O mother, O breasts that bare me, for ye know, 
 
 sweet head of my mother, sacred eyes, 
 Ye know my soul albeit I sinned, ye know 
 Albeit I kneel not neither touch thy knees. 
 But with my lips I kneel, and with my heart 
 
 1 fall about thy feet and worship thee. 
 
 And ye farewell now, all my friends ; and ye, 
 
 Kinsmen, much younger and glorious more than I, 
 
 Sons of my mother's sister ; and all farewell 
 
 That were in Colchis with me, and bare down 
 
 The waves and wars that met us : and though times 
 
 Chani^e, and though now I be not anything. 
 
 Forget not me among you, what I did 
 
 In my good time ; for even by all those days, 
 
 Those days and this, and your own living souls, 
 
 And by the light and luck of you that live. 
 
 And by this miserable spoil, and me 
 
 Dying, I beseech you, let my name not die. 
 
 But thou, dear, touch me with thy rose-like hands. 
 
 And fasten up mine eyelids with thy mouth, 
 
 A bitter kiss ; and grasp me with thine arms. 
 
 Printing with heavy lips my light waste flesh. 
 
 Made light and thin by heavy-handed fate. 
 
 And with thine holy maiden eyes drop dew, 
 
 Drop tears for dew upon me who am dead, 
 
ATALANTA IN CALYDON 87 
 
 Me who have loved thee ; seeing- without sin done 
 I am gone down to the empty weary house 
 Where no flesh is nor beauty nor swift eyes 
 Nor sound of mouth nor might of hands and feet. 
 But thou, dear, hide my body with thy veil, 
 And with thy raiment cover foot and head, 
 And stretch thyself upon me and touch hands 
 With hands and lips with lips : be pitiful 
 As thou art maiden perfect ; let no man 
 Defile me to despise me, saying-, This man 
 Died woman-wise, a woman's offering, slain 
 Through female fingers in his woof of life, 
 Dishonourable ; for thou hast honoured me. 
 And now for God's sake kiss me once and twice 
 And let me g^o ; for the night gathers me, 
 And in the night shall no man gatlier fruit 
 
 ATALANTA 
 
 Hail thou : but I with heavy face and feet 
 Turn homeward and am g-one out of thine eyes. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Who shall contend with his lords 
 Or cross them or do them wrong- ? 
 
 Who shal! bind them as with cords ? 
 Who shall tame them as with song ? 
 
 Who shall smite them as with swords ? 
 For the hands of their kingdom are strong. 
 
ERECHTHEUS 
 
 A TRAGEDY 
 
 3 to! .lj:.ttf)ai leal locTfpaioi uaI Jicili^ot, 
 'EAAoSos (pfiff/ia, KAetvoi 'Adai/ai, 5aifi6vtov VTo\U9pov» 
 
 PiND. ^r. 47. 
 
 AT. Tts f e TOifiivup sirfffTj Koiri^eyird^ei ffrnarov,' 
 XO. »irw9S Sov\oi K(K\rivraL (pwTbs ouS' virr)K6oi. 
 
 .£scH. Ptrr. 241-2. 
 
 VOL IV. 
 
TO 
 
 MY MOTHER 
 
PERSONS 
 
 ERECHTHEUS. 
 
 CHORUS OF ATHENIAN ELDERS. 
 
 PRAXITHEA. 
 
 CHTHONIA. 
 
 HERALD OF EUMOLPUS. 
 
 MESSENGER. 
 
 ATHENIAN HERALD. 
 
 ATHENA. 
 
ERECHTHEUS 
 
 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 Mother of life and death and all men's days, 
 Earth, whom I chief of all men born would bless, 
 And call thee with more loving lips than theirs 
 Mother, for of this very body of thine 
 And living blood I have my breath and live. 
 Behold me, even thy son, me crowned of men, 
 Me made thy child by that strong cunning God 
 Who fashions fire and iron, who begat 
 Me for a sword and beacon-fire on thee, 
 Me fosterling of Pallas, in her shade 
 Reared, that I first might pay the nursing debt. 
 Hallowing her fame with flower of third-year feasts, 
 And first bow down the bridled strength of steeds 
 To lose the wild wont of their birth, and bear 
 Clasp of man's knees and steerage of his hand, 
 Or fourfold service of his fire-swift wheels 
 That whirl the four-yoked chariot ; me the king 
 Who stand before thee naked now, and cry, 
 O holy and general mother of all men born. 
 But mother most and motherliest of mine. 
 Earth, for I ask thee rather of all the Gods, 
 What have we done ? what word mistimed or work 
 Hath winged the wild feet of this timeless curse 
 To fall as fire upon us ? Lo, I stand 
 
94 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 Here on this brow's crown of the city's head 
 
 That crowns its lovely body, till death's hour 
 
 Waste it ; but now the dew of dawn and birth 
 
 Is fresh upon it from thy womb, and we 
 
 Behold it born how beauteous ; one day more 
 
 I see the world's wheel of the circling- sun 
 
 Roll up rejoicing- to regard on earth 
 
 This one thing goodliest, fair as heaven or he, 
 
 Worth a God's gaze or strife of Gods ; but now 
 
 Would this day's ebb of their spent wave of strife 
 
 Sweep it to sea, wash it on wreck, and leave 
 
 A costless thing contemned ; and in our stead, 
 
 Where these walls were and sounding streets of men. 
 
 Make wide a waste for tongueless water-herds 
 
 And spoil of ravening fishes ; that no more 
 
 Should men say. Here was Athens. This shalt thou 
 
 Sustain not, nor thy son endure to see. 
 
 Nor thou to live and look on ; for the womb 
 
 Bare me not base that bare me miserable, 
 
 To hear this loud brood of the Thracian foam 
 
 Break its broad strength of billowy-beating war 
 
 Here, and upon it as a blast of death 
 
 Blowing, the keen wrath of a fire-souled king, 
 
 A strange growth grafted on our natural soil, 
 
 A root of Thrace in Eleusinian earth 
 
 Set for no comfort to the kindly land. 
 
 Son of the sea's lord and our first-born foe, 
 
 Eumolpus ; nothing sweet in ears of thine 
 
 The music of his making, nor a song 
 
 Toward hopes of ours auspicious ; for the note 
 
 Rings as for death oracular to thy sons 
 
 That goes before him on the sea-wind blown 
 
 Full of this charge laid on me, to put out 
 
 The brief light kindled of mine own child's life, 
 
ERECHTHEUS 95 
 
 Or with this helmsman hand that steers the state 
 Run right on the under shoal and ridge of death 
 The populous ship with all its fraughtage gone 
 And sails that were to take the wind of time 
 Rent, and the tackling that should hold out fast 
 In confluent surge of loud calamities 
 Broken, with spars of rudders and lost oars 
 That were to row toward harbour and find rest 
 In some most glorious haven of all the world 
 And else may never near it : such a song 
 The Gods have set his lips on fire withal 
 Who threatens now in all their names to bring 
 Ruin ; but none of these, thou knowest, have I 
 Chid with my tongue or cursed at heart for grief, 
 Knowing how the soul runs reinless on sheer death 
 Whose grief or joy takes part against the Gods. 
 And what they will is more than our desire. 
 And their desire is more than what we will. 
 For no man's will and no desire of man's 
 Shall stand as doth a God's will. Yet, O fair 
 Mother, that seest me how I cast no word 
 Against them, plead no reason, crave no cause, 
 Boast me not blameless, nor beweep me wronged, 
 By this fair wreath of towers we have decked thee 
 
 with, 
 This chaplet that we give thee woven of walls, 
 This girdle of gace and temple and citadel 
 Drawn round beneath thy bosom, and fast linked 
 As to thine heart's root — this dear crown of thine. 
 This present light, this city — be not thou 
 Slow to take heed nor slack to strengthen her, 
 Fare we so short-lived howsoe'er, and pay 
 What price we may to ransom thee thy town, 
 Not me my life ; but thou that diest not, thou. 
 
96 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 Though all our house die for this people's sake, 
 Keep thou for ours thy crown our city, guard 
 And give it life the lovelier that we died. 
 
 CHORUS. 
 
 Sun, that hast lightened and loosed by thy might 
 Ocean and Earth from the lordship of night, 
 Quickening with vision his eye that was veiled, 
 Freshening the force in her heart that had failed, 
 That sister fettered and blinded brother 
 Should have sight by thy grace and delight of each 
 other. 
 Behold now and see 
 
 What profit is given them of thee ; 
 What wrath has enkindled with madness of mind 
 Her limbs that were bounden, his face that was blind, 
 To be locked as in wrestle together, and lighten 
 With fire that shall darken thy fire in the sky, 
 Body to body and eye against eye 
 
 In a war against kind, 
 Till the bloom of her fields and her high hills whiten 
 
 With the foam of his waves more high. 
 For the sea-marks set to divide of old 
 The kingdoms to Ocean and Earth assigned, 
 The hoar sea-fields from the cornfields' gold. 
 His wine-bright waves from her vineyards' fold, 
 
 Frail forces we find 
 To bridle the spirit of Gods or bind 
 
 Till the heat of their hearts wax cold. 
 But the peace that was stablished between them to 
 
 stand 
 Is rent now in twain by the strength of his hand 
 Who stirs up the storm of his sons overbold 
 To pluck from fight what he lost of right, 
 
ERECHTHEUS 97 
 
 By council and judg-ment of Gods that spake 
 And gave great Pallas the strife's fair stake, 
 The lordship and love of the lovely land, 
 The g"race of the town that hath on it for crown 
 But a headband to wear 
 
 Of violets one-hued with her hair : 
 For the vales and the green high places of earth 
 
 Hold nothing so fair, 
 And the depths of the sea bear no such birth 
 
 Of the manifold births they bear. 
 Too well, too well was the great stake worth 
 A strife divine for the Gods to judge, 
 A crowned God's triumph, a foiled God's grudge, 
 Though the loser be strong and the victress wise 
 Who played long since for so large a prize, 
 The fruitful immortal anointed adored 
 Dear city of men without master or lord, 
 Fair fortress and fostress of sons born free, 
 Who stand in her sight and in thine, O sun. 
 Slaves of no man, subjects of none ; 
 A wonder enthroned on the hills and sea, 
 A maiden crowned with a fourfold glory 
 That none from the pride of her head may rend, 
 Violet and olive-leaf purple and hoary. 
 Song-wreath and story the fairest of fame, 
 Flowers that the winter can blast not or bend ; 
 A light upon earth as the sun's own flame, 
 A name as his name, 
 
 Athens, a praise without end. 
 
 A noise is arisen against us of waters, [■S"^''- i- 
 
 A sound as of battle come up from the sea. 
 Strange hunters are hard on us, hearts without pity; 
 They have staked their nets round the fair young city, 
 
 VOL. IV. o 
 
98 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 That the sons of her streng^th and her virgin 
 daughters 
 Should find not whither alive to flee. 
 And we know not yet of the word unwritten, M"^- i- 
 
 The doom of the Pythian we have not heard ; 
 From the navel of earth and the veiled mid altar 
 We wait for a token with hopes that falter, 
 With fears that hang on our hearts thought-smitten 
 
 Lest her tongue be kindled with no good word. 
 O thou not born of the womb, nor bred \.Str. 2. 
 
 In the bride-night's warmth of a changed God's bed. 
 But thy life as a lightning was flashed from the light 
 of thy father's head, 
 O chief God's child by a motherless birth, 
 If aught in thy sight we indeed be worth, 
 Keep death from us thou, that art none of the Gods 
 of the dead under earth. 
 Thou that hast power on us, save, if thou wilt ; [Ant. 2. 
 Let the blind wave breach not thy wall scarce 
 built ; 
 But bless us not so as by bloodshed, impute not for 
 grace to us guilt, 
 Nor by price of pollution of blood set us free ; 
 Let the hands be taintless that clasp thy knee, 
 Nor a maiden be slain to redeem for a maiden her 
 shrine from the sea. 
 
 O earth, O sun, turn back [.Str. 3. 
 
 Full on his deadly track 
 Death, that would smite you black and mar your 
 creatures. 
 
 And with one hand disroot 
 All tender flower and fruit. 
 With one strike blind and mute the heaven's fair 
 features, 
 
ERECHTHEUS 99 
 
 Pluck out the eyes of morn, and make 
 Silence in the east and blackness whence the bright 
 songs break. 
 
 Help, earth, help, heaven, that hear [^«A 3- 
 
 The song-notes of our fear. 
 Shrewd notes and shrill, not clear or joyful-sounding ; 
 Hear, highest of Gods, and stay 
 Death on his hunter's way. 
 Full on his forceless prey his beagles hounding ; 
 
 Break thou his bow, make short his hand. 
 Maim his fleet foot whose passage kills the living 
 land. 
 Let a third wave smite not us, father, [Sfr. 4. 
 
 Long since sore smitten of twain, 
 
 Lest the house of thy son's son perish 
 And his name be barren on earth. 
 Whose race wilt thou comfort rather 
 If none to thy son remain ? 
 
 Whose seed wilt thou choose to cherish 
 If his be cut off in the birth ? 
 For the first fair graft of his grafting [Ani. 4. 
 
 Was rent from its maiden root 
 
 By the strong swift hand of a lover 
 Who fills the night with his breath ; 
 On the lip of the stream low-laughing 
 Her green soft virginal shoot 
 Was plucked from the stream-side cover 
 By the grasp of a love like death. 
 For a God's was the mouth that kissed her [S/r. 5. 
 Who speaks, and the leaves lie dead, 
 When winter awakes as at warning 
 To the sound of his foot from Thrace. 
 Nor happier the bed of her sister 
 Though Love's self laid her abed 
 
100 ERECHIHEUS 
 
 By a bridegroom beloved of the morning- 
 And fair as the dawn's own face. 
 For Procris, ensnared and ensnaring lAnf. 5. 
 
 By the fraud of a twofold wile, 
 With the point of her own spear stricken 
 By the gift of her own hand fell. 
 Oversubtle in doubts, overdaring 
 In deeds and devices of guile, 
 
 And strong to quench as to quicken, 
 O Love, have we named thee well ? 
 By thee was the spear's edge whetted [Sir. 6. 
 
 That laid her dead in the dew, 
 
 In the moist green glens of the midland 
 By her dear lord slain and thee. 
 And him at the clifFs end fretted 
 By the grey keen waves, him too, 
 Thine hand from the white-browed headland 
 Flung down for a spoil to the sea. 
 But enough now of griefs grey-growing [Anf. 6. 
 Have darkened the house divine, 
 
 Have flowered on its boughs and faded. 
 And green is the brave stock yet. 
 O father all seeing and all knowing, 
 Let the last fruit fall not of thine 
 From the tree with whose boughs we are 
 shaded, 
 From the stock that thy son's hand set. 
 
 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 O daughter of Cephisus, from all time 
 Wise have I found thee, wife and queen, of heart 
 Perfect ; nor in the days that knew not wind 
 Nor days when storm blew death upon our peace 
 
ERECHTHEUS. lOi 
 
 Was thine heart swoln with seed of pride, or bowed 
 With blasts of bitter fear that break men's souls 
 Who lift too high their mi>:ds toward heaven, in 
 
 thought 
 Too godlike grown for worship ; but of mood 
 Equal, in good time reverent of time bad, 
 And glad in ill days of the good that were. 
 Nor now too would I fear thee, now misdoubt 
 Lest fate should find thee lesser than thy doom, 
 Chosen if thou be to bear and to be great 
 Haply beyond all women ; and the word 
 Speaks thee divine, dear queen, that speaks thee dead, 
 Dead being alive, or quick and dead in one 
 Shall not men call thee living ? yet I fear 
 To slay thee timeless with my proper tongue. 
 With lips, thou knowest, that love thee ; and such 
 
 work 
 Was never laid of Gods on men, such word 
 No mouth of man learnt ever, as from mine 
 Most loth to speak thine ear most loth shall take 
 And hold it hateful as the grave to hear. 
 
 PRAXITHEA 
 
 That word there is not in all speech of man, 
 King, that being spoken of the Gods and thee 
 I have not heart to honour, or dare hold 
 More than I hold thee or the Gods in hate 
 Hearing ; but if my heart abhor it heard 
 Being insubmissive, hold me not thy wife 
 But use me like a stranger, whom thine hand 
 Hath fed by chance and finding thence no thanks 
 Flung off for shame's sake to forgetfulness. 
 
102 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 O, of what breath shaH such a word be made, 
 
 Or from what heart find utterance? Would my 
 
 tongue 
 Were rent forth rather from the quivering- root 
 Than made as fire or poison thus for thee. 
 
 PRAXITHEA 
 
 But if thou speak of blood, and I that hear 
 Be chosen of all for this land's love to die 
 And save to thee thy city, know this well, 
 Happiest I hold me of her seed alive. 
 
 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 O sun that seest, what saying was this of thine, 
 God, that thy power has breathed into my lips ? 
 For from no sunlit shrine darkling it came. 
 
 PRAXITHEA 
 
 What portent from the mid oracular place 
 Hath smitten thee so like a curse that flies 
 Wingless, to waste men with its plagues ? yet speak. 
 
 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 Thy blood the Gods require not ; take this first. 
 
 PRAXITHEA 
 
 To me than thee more grievous this should sound. 
 
 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 That word rang truer and bitterer than it knew. 
 
 PRAXITHEA 
 
 This is not then thy grief, to see me die ? 
 
ERECHTHEUS 103 
 
 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 Die shalt thou not, yet give thy blood to death. 
 
 PRAXITHEA 
 
 If this ring worse I know not ; strange it rang", 
 
 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 Alas, thou knowest not ; woe is me that know. 
 
 PRAXITHEA 
 
 And woe shall mine be, knowing ; yet halt not here. 
 
 ERECHTHEUS 
 Guiltless of blood this state may stand no more. 
 
 PRAXITHEA 
 
 Firm let it stand whatever bleed or fall. 
 
 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 O Gods, that I should say it shall and weep. 
 
 PRAXITHEA 
 
 Weep, and say this ? no tears should bathe such words. 
 
 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 Woe's me that I must weep upon them, woe. 
 
 PRAXITHEA 
 
 What stain is on them for thy tears to cleanse ? 
 
 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 A stain of blood unpurgeable with tears. 
 
 PRAXITHEA 
 
 Whence ? for thou sayest it is and is not mine. 
 
104 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 Hear then and know why only of al! men I 
 That bring- such news as mine is, I alone 
 Must wash good words with weeping ; I and thou, 
 Woman, must wail to hear men sing, must groan 
 To see their joy who love us ; all our friends 
 Save only we, and all save we that love 
 This holiness of Athens, in our sig^ht 
 Shall lift their hearts up, in our hearingf praise 
 Gods whom we may not ; for to these they g^ive 
 Life of their children, flower of all their seed, 
 For all their travail fruit, for all their hopes 
 Harvest ; but we for all our good thingii, we 
 Have at their hands which fill all these folk full 
 Death, barrenness, child-slaughter, curses, cares, 
 Sea-leag-uer and land-shipwreck ; which of these. 
 Which wilt thou first give thanks for ? all are thine. 
 
 PRAXITHEA 
 
 What first they g-ive who give this city good. 
 For that first given to save it I give thanks 
 First, and thanks heartier from a happier tongue, 
 More than for any my peculiar grace 
 Shown me and not my country ; next for this, 
 That none of all these but for all these I 
 Must bear my burden, and no eye but mine 
 Weep of all women's in this broad land born 
 Who see their land's deliverance ; but much more. 
 But most for this I thank them most of all, 
 That this their edge of doom is chosen to pierce 
 My heart and not my country's ; for the sword 
 Drawn to smite there and sharpened for such stroke 
 Should wound more deep than any turned on me. 
 
ERECHTHEUS ^ 105 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Well fares the land that bears such fruit, and well 
 The spirit that breeds such thought and speech in man. 
 
 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 woman, thou hast shamed my heart with thine, 
 To show so strong- a patience ; take then all ; 
 For all shall break not nor bring- down thy soul. 
 The word that journeying to the bright God's shrine 
 Who speaks askance and darkling, but his name 
 Hath in it slaying and ruin broad writ out, 
 
 1 heard, hear thou : thus saith he ; There shall die 
 One soul for all this people ; from thy womb 
 Came forth the seed that here on dry bare ground 
 Death's hand must sow untimely, to bring forth 
 Nor blade nor shoot in season, being by name 
 
 To the under Gods made holy, who require 
 For this land's life her death and maiden blood 
 To save a maiden city. Thus I heard. 
 And thus with all said leave thee ; for save this 
 No word is left us, and no hope alive. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 He hath uttered too surely his wrath not obscurely, 
 
 nor wrapt as in mists of his breath, [Str. 
 
 The master that lightens not hearts he enlightens, but 
 
 gives them foreknowledge of death. 
 
 As a bolt from the cloud hath he sent it aloud and 
 
 proclaimed it afar. 
 From the darkness and height of the horror of night 
 hath he shown us a star. 
 Star may I name it and err not, or flame shall I say. 
 Born of the womb that was born for the tomb 
 of the day ? 
 
 VOL. IV. ** 
 
io6 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 Night, whom other but thee for mother, and Death 
 
 for the father, Night, [An^. 
 
 Shall we dream to discover, save thee and thy lover, 
 to bring such a sorrow to sight ? 
 From the slumberless bed for thy bedfellow spread 
 
 and his bride under earth 
 Hast thou brought forth a wild and insatiable child, 
 an unbearable birth. 
 Fierce are the fangs of his wrath, and the pangs 
 
 that they give ; 
 None is there, none that may bear them, not one 
 that would live. 
 
 CHTHONIA 
 
 Forth of the fine-spun folds of veils that hide 
 My virgin chamber toward the full-faced sun 
 
 1 set my foot not moved of mine own will, 
 Unmaidenlike, nor with unprompted speed 
 Turn eyes too broad or doglike unabashed 
 
 On reverend heads of men and thence on thine, 
 Mother, now covered from the light and bowed 
 As hers who mourns her brethren ; but what grief 
 Bends thy blind head thus earthward, holds thus mute, 
 I know not till thy will be to lift up 
 Toward mine thy sorrow-muffled eyes and speak ; 
 And till thy will be would I know this not. 
 
 PRAXITHEA 
 
 Old men and childless, or if sons ye have seen 
 And daughters, elder-born were these than mine, 
 Look on this child, how young of years, how sweet, 
 How scant of time and green of age her life 
 Puts forth its flower of giiihood ; and her gait 
 How virginal, how soft her speech, her eyes 
 
ERECHTHEUS 107 
 
 How seemly smiHng- ; wise should all ye be, 
 
 All honourable and kindly men of age ; 
 
 Now give me counsel and one word to say 
 
 That I may bear to speak, and hold my peace 
 
 Henceforth for all time even as all ye now. 
 
 Dumb are ye all, bowed eyes and tongueless mouths, 
 
 Unprofitable ; if this were wind that speaks, 
 
 As much its breath might move you. Thou then, 
 
 child. 
 Set thy sweet eyes on mine ; look through them well ; 
 Take note of all the writing of my face 
 As of a tablet or a tomb inscribed 
 That bears me record ; lifeless now, my life 
 Thereon that was think written ; brief to read, 
 Yet shall the scripture sear thine eyes as fire 
 And leave them dark as dead men's. Nay, dear child, 
 Thou hast no skill, my maiden, and no sense 
 To take such knowledge ; sweet is all thy lore, 
 And all this bitter ; yet I charge thee learn 
 And love and lay this up within thine heart, >^ 
 
 Even this my word ; less ill it were to die 
 Than live and look upon thy mother dead, 
 Thy mother-land that bare thee ; no man slain 
 But him who hath seen it shall men count unblest. 
 None blest as him who hath died and seen it not. 
 
 CHTHONIA 
 
 That sight some God keep from me though I die. 
 
 PRAXITHEA 
 
 A God from thee shall keep it ; fear not this. 
 
 CHTHONIA 
 
 Thanks all my life long shall he gain of mine. 
 
lo8 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 PRAXITHEA 
 
 Short gain of all yet shall he get of thee. 
 
 CHTHONIA 
 
 Brief be my life, yet so Icng live my thanks. 
 
 PRAXITHEA 
 
 So long- ? so little ; how long shall they live ? 
 
 CHTHONIA 
 
 Even while I see the sunlight and thine eyes. 
 
 PRAXITHEA 
 
 Would mine might shut ere thine upon the sun. 
 
 CHTHONIA 
 
 For me thou prayest unkindly ; change that prayer^ 
 
 PRAXITHEA 
 
 Not well for me thou sayest, and ill for thee 
 
 CHTHONIA 
 
 Nay, for me well, if thou shalt live, not I. 
 
 PRAXITHEA 
 
 How live, and lose these loving looks of thine ? 
 
 CHTHONIA 
 
 It seems I too, thus praying, then, love thee not. 
 
 PRAXITHEA 
 
 Lov'st thou not life ? what wouldst thou do to die ? 
 
 CHTHONIA 
 
 Well, but not more than all things, love I life. 
 
ERECHTHEUS 109 
 
 PRAXITHEA 
 
 And fain wouldst keep it as thine age allows ? 
 
 CHTHONIA 
 
 Fain would I live, and fain not fear to die. 
 
 PRAXITHEA 
 
 That I might bid thee die not ! Peace ; no more. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 A godlike race of grief the Gods have set 
 
 For these to run matched equal, heart with heart. 
 
 PRAXITHEA 
 
 Child of the chief of Gods, and maiden crowned, 
 Queen of these towers and fostress of their king, 
 Pallas, and thou my father's holiest head, 
 A living well of life nor stanched nor stained, 
 O God Cephisus, thee too charge I next. 
 Be to me judge and witness ; nor thine ear 
 Shall now my tongue invoke not, thou to me 
 Most hateful of things holy, mournfullest 
 Of all old sacred streams that wash the world, 
 Ilissus, on whose marge at flowery play 
 A whirlwind-footed bridegroom found my child 
 And rapt her northward where mine elder-born 
 Keeps now the Thracian bride-bed of a God 
 Intolerable to seamen, but this land 
 Finds him in hope for her sake favourable, 
 A gracious son by wedlock ; hear me then 
 Thou likewise, if with no faint heart or false 
 The word I say be said, the gift be given. 
 Which might I choose I had rather die than give 
 Or speak and die not. Ere thy limbs were made 
 
110 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 Or thine eyes lightened, strife, thou knowest, my 
 
 child, 
 'Twixt God and God had risen, which heavenlier 
 
 name 
 Should here stand hallowed, whose more liberal grace 
 Should win this city's worship, and our land 
 To which of these do reverence ; first the lord 
 Whose wheels make lightnings of the foam-flowered 
 
 sea 
 Here on this rock, whose height brow-bound with 
 
 dawn 
 Is head and heart of Athens, one sheer blow 
 Struck, and beneath the triple wound that shook 
 The stony sinews and stark roots of the earth 
 Sprang toward the sun a sharp salt fount, and sank 
 Where lying it lights the heart up of the hill, 
 A well of bright strange brine ; but she that reared 
 Thy father with her same chaste fostering hand 
 Set for a sign against it in our guard 
 The holy bloom of the olive, whose hoar leaf 
 High in the shadowy shrine of Pandrosus 
 Hath honour of us all ; and of this strife 
 The twelve most high Gods judging with one mouth 
 Acclaimed her victress ; wroth whereat, as wronged 
 That she should hold from him such prize and place, 
 The strong king of the tempest-rifted sea 
 Loosed reinless on the low Thriasian plain 
 The thunders of his chariots, swallowing stunned 
 Earth, beasts, and men, the whole blind foundering 
 
 world 
 That was the sun's at morning, and ere noon 
 Death's ; nor this only prey fulfilled his mind ; 
 For with strange crook-toothed prows of Carian folk 
 Who snatch a sanguine life out of the sea, 
 
ERECHTHEUS iii 
 
 Thieves keen to pluck their bloody fruit of spoil 
 
 From the g^rey fruitless waters, has their God 
 
 Furrowed our shores to waste them, as the fields 
 
 Were landward harried from the north with swords 
 
 Aonian, sickles of man-slaughtering- edge 
 
 Ground for no hopeful harvest of live grain 
 
 Against us in Boeotia ; these being spent, 
 
 Now this third time his wind of wrath has blown 
 
 Right on this people a mightier wave of v/ar, 
 
 Three times more huge a ruin ; such its ridge 
 
 Foam-rimmed and hollow like the womb of heaven, 
 
 But black for shining, and with death for life 
 
 Big now to birth and ripe with child, fuil-blown 
 
 With fear and fruit of havoc, takes the sun 
 
 Out of our eyes, darkening the day, and blinds 
 
 The fair sky's face unseasonably with change, 
 
 A cloud in one and billow of battle, a surge 
 
 High reared as heaven with monstrous surf of spears 
 
 That shake on us their shadow, till men's heads 
 
 Bend, and their hearts even with its forward wind 
 
 Wither, so blasts all seed in them of hope 
 
 Its breath and blight of presage ; yea, even now 
 
 The winter of this wind out of the deeps 
 
 Makes cold our trust in comfort of the Gods 
 
 And blind our eye toward outlook ; yet not here, 
 
 Here never shall the Thracian plant on iiigh 
 
 For ours his father's symbol, nor with wreaths 
 
 \ strange folk wreathe it upright set and crowned 
 
 Here where our natural people born behold 
 
 The golden Gorgon of the shield's defence 
 
 That screens their flowering olive, nor strange Gods 
 
 Be graced, and Pallas here have praise no more. 
 
 And if this be not I must give my child, 
 
 Thee, mine own very blood and spirit of mine, 
 
112 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 Thee to be slain. Turn from me, turn thine eyes 
 
 A little from me ; I can bear not yet 
 
 To see if still they smile on mine or no, 
 
 If fear make faint the light in them, or faith 
 
 Fix them as stars of safety. Need have we. 
 
 Sore need of stars that set not in mid storm. 
 
 Lights that outlast the lightnings ; yet my heart 
 
 Endures not to make proof of thine or these, 
 
 Not yet to know thee whom I made, and bare 
 
 What manner of woman ; had I borne thee man, 
 
 I had made no question of thine eyes or heart, 
 
 Nor spared to read the scriptures in them writ, 
 
 Wert thou my son ; yet couldst thou then but die 
 
 Fallen in sheer fight by chance and charge of spears 
 
 And have no more of memory, fill no tomb 
 
 More famous than thy fellows in fair field. 
 
 Where many share the grave, many the praise ; 
 
 But one crown shall one only girl my child 
 
 Wear, dead for this dear city, and give back life 
 
 To him that gave her and to me that bare. 
 
 And save two sisters living ; and all this. 
 
 Is this not all good ? I shall give thee, child, 
 
 Thee but by fleshly nature mine, to bleed 
 
 For dear land's love ; but if the city fall 
 
 What part is left me in my children then ? 
 
 But if it Swand and thou for it lie dead. 
 
 Then hast thou in it a better part than we, 
 
 A holier portion than we all ; for each 
 
 Hath but the length of his own life to live, 
 
 And this most glorious mother-land on earth 
 
 To worship till that life have end ; but thine 
 
 Hath end no more than hers ; thou, dead, shalt live 
 
 Till Athens live not ; for the days and nights 
 
 Given of thy bare brief dark dividual life, 
 
ERECHTHEUS 113 
 
 Shall she give thee half all her agelong- own 
 And all its glory ; for thou givest her these ; 
 But with one hand she takes and gives again 
 More than I gave or she requires of thee. 
 Come therefore, I will make thee fit for death, 
 I that could give thee, dear, no gift at birth 
 Save of light life that breathes and bleeds, even I 
 Will help thee to this better gift than mine 
 And lead thee by this little living hand 
 That death shall make so strong, to that great end 
 Whence it shall lighten like a God's, and strike 
 Dead the strong heart of battle that would break 
 Athens ; but ye, pray for this land, old men, 
 That it may bring forth never child on earth 
 To love it less, for none may more, than we. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Out of the north wind grief came forth, [Sir. i. 
 
 And the shining of a sword out of the sea. 
 Yea, of old the first-blown blast blew the prelude 
 of this last, 
 
 The blast of his trumpet upon Rhodope. 
 Out of the north skies full of his cloud. 
 With the clamour of his storms as of a crowd 
 At the wheels of a great king crying aloud, 
 At the axle of a strong king's car 
 That has girded on the girdle of war — 
 With hands that lightened the skies in sunder 
 And feet whose fall was followed of thunder, 
 
 A God, a great God strange of name. 
 
 With horse-yoke fleeter-hoofed than flame, 
 To the mountain bed of a maiden came, 
 Oreithyia, the bride mismated, 
 
 VOL. IV. 
 
114 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 Wofully wed in a snow-strewn bed 
 
 With a brideg^room that kisses the bride's mouth 
 
 dead ; 
 Without g-arland, without glory, without song", 
 As a fawn by night on the hills belated, 
 Given over for a spoil unto the strong. 
 From lips how pale so keen a wail [Ant. i. 
 
 At the grasp of a God's hand on her she gave, 
 When his breath that darkens air made a havoc 
 
 of her hair, 
 It rang from the mountain even to the wave ; 
 Rang with a cry, IVoe's me, woe is me I 
 From the darkness upon Haemus to the sea : 
 And with hands that clung to her new lord's knee. 
 As a virgin overborne with shame, 
 She besought him by her spouseless fame. 
 By the blameless breasts of a maid unmarried, 
 And locks unmaidenly rent and harried, 
 And all her flower of body, born 
 To match the maidenhood of morn. 
 With the might of the wind's wrath wrenched anu 
 
 torn. 
 Vain, all vain as a dead man's vision 
 Falling by night in his old friends' sight, 
 To be scattered with slumber and slain ere light ; 
 Such a breath of such a bridegroom in that hour 
 Of her prayers made mock, of her fears derision. 
 And a ravage of her youth as of a flower. 
 With a leap of his limbs as a lion's, a cry from his 
 
 lips as of thunder, {.^tr. 2. 
 
 In a storm of amorous godhead filled with fire. 
 From the height of the heaven that was rent with 
 
 the roar of his coming in sunder. 
 Sprang the strong God on the spoil of his desire. 
 
ERECHTHEUS 115 
 
 And the pines of the hills were as green reeds 
 
 shattered, 
 And their branches as buds of the soft spring- 
 scattered, 
 And the west wind and east, and the sound of the 
 
 south, 
 Fell dumb at the blast of the north wind's mouth, 
 
 At the cry of his coming- out of heaven. 
 And the wild beasts quailed in the rifts and hollows 
 Where hound nor clarion of huntsman follows, 
 And the depths of the sea were ag^hast, and 
 
 whitened, 
 And the crowns of their waves were as flame that 
 
 lightened. 
 And the heart of the floods thereof was riven. 
 But she knew not him coming for terror, she felt not 
 
 her wrong that he wrought her, [^«/. 2. 
 
 When her locks as leaves were shed before his 
 
 breath, 
 And she heard not for terror his prayer, though the 
 
 cry was a God's that besought her. 
 Blown from lips that strew the world-wide seas 
 
 with death. 
 For the heart was molten within her to hear. 
 And her knees beneath her were loosened for 
 
 fear. 
 And her blood fast bound as a frost-bound water. 
 And the soft new bloom of the g-reen earth's 
 
 daughter 
 Wind-wasted as blossom of a tree ; 
 As the wild God rapt her from earth's breast 
 
 lifted. 
 On the strength of the stream of his dark breath 
 
 drifted, 
 
ii6 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 From the bosom of earth as a bride from the 
 
 mother, 
 With storm for bridesman and wreck for brother. 
 As a cloud that he sheds upon the sea. 
 
 Of this hoary-headed woe \Epode^ 
 
 Song" made memory long" ag-o ; 
 
 Now a young"er g"rief to mourn 
 
 Needs a new song" young-er born. 
 
 Who shall teach our tong"ues to reach 
 
 What strang-e height of saddest speech, 
 For the new bride's sake that is g"iven to be 
 A stay to fetter the foot of the sea, 
 Lest it quite spurn down and trample the town, 
 Ere the violets be dead that were plucked for 
 its crown. 
 Or its olive-leaf whiten and wither ? 
 
 Who shall say of the wind's way 
 
 That he journeyed yesterday. 
 Or the track of the storm that shall sound to- 
 morrow, 
 If the new be more than the grey-g"rown sorrow ? 
 For the wind of the g"reen first season was keen. 
 And the blast shall be sharper than blew between 
 That the breath of the sea blows hither. 
 
 HERALD OF EUMOLPUS 
 
 Old men, grey borderers on the march of death. 
 Tongue fighters, tough of talk and sinewy speech, 
 Else nerveless, from no crew of such faint folk 
 Whose tongues are stouter than their hands come I 
 To bid not you to battle ; let them strike 
 Whose swords are sharper than your keen-tongued 
 wail, 
 
ERECHTHEUS Ii7 
 
 And ye, sit fast and sorrow ; but what man 
 Of all this land-folk and earth-labouring- herd 
 For heart or hand seems foremost, him I call 
 If heart be his to hearken, him bid forth 
 To try if one be in the sun's sight born 
 Of all that grope and grovel on dry ground 
 That may join hands in battle- grip for death 
 With them whose seed and strength is of the sea. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Know thou this much for all thy loud blast blown, 
 
 We lack not hands to speak with, swords to plead. 
 
 For proof of peril, not of boisterous breath. 
 
 Sea-wind and storm of barren mouths that foam 
 
 And rough rock's edge of menace ; and short space 
 
 May lesson thy large ignorance and inform 
 
 This insolence with knowledge if there live 
 
 Men earth-begotten of no tenderer thews 
 
 Than knit the great joints of the grim sea's brood 
 
 With hasps of steel together ; heaven to help. 
 
 One man shall break, even on their own flood's verge, 
 
 That iron bulk of battle ; but thine eye 
 
 That sees it now swell higher than sand or shore 
 
 Haply shall see not when thine host shall shrink. 
 
 HERALD OF EUMOLPUS 
 
 Not haply, nay, but surely, shall not thine. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 That lot shall no God give who fights for thee. 
 
 HERALD OF EUMOLPUS 
 
 Shall Gods bear bit and bridle, fool, of men ? 
 
ii8 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Nor them forbid we nor shalt thou constrain, 
 
 HERALD OF EUMOLPUS 
 
 Yet say'st thou none shall make the good lot mine ? 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Of thy side none, nor moved for fear of thee. 
 
 HERALD OF EUMOT.PUS 
 
 Gods hast thou then to baffle Gods of ours ? 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Nor thine nor mine, but equal-souled are they. 
 
 HERALD OF EUMOLPUS 
 
 Toward good and ill, then, equal-eyed of soul ? 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Nay, but swift-eyed to note where ill thoughts breed. 
 
 HERALD OF EUMOLPUS 
 
 Thy shaft word-feathered flies yet far of me. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Pride knows not, wounded, till the heart be cleft. 
 
 HERALD OF EUMOLPUS 
 
 No shaft wounds deep whose wing is plumed with 
 words. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Lay that to heart, and bid thy tongue learn grace. 
 
ERECHTHEUS 119 
 
 HERALD OF EUMOLPUS 
 
 Grace shall thine own crave soon too late of mine. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Boast thou till then, but I wag-e words no more. 
 
 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 Man, what shrill wind of speech and wrang-ling air 
 Blows in our ears a summons from thy lips 
 Winged with what message, or what gift or grace 
 Requiring ? none but what his hand may take 
 Here may the foe think hence to reap, nor this 
 Except some doom from Godward yield it him. 
 
 HERALD OF EUMOLPUS 
 
 King of this land-folk, by my mouth to thee 
 Thus saith the son of him that shakes thine earth, 
 Eumolpus ; now the stakes of war are set. 
 For land or sea to win by throw and wear ; 
 Choose therefore or to quit thy side and give 
 The palm unfought for to his bloodless hand, 
 Or by that father's sceptre, and the foot 
 Whose tramp far off makes tremble for pure fear 
 Thy soul-struck mother, piercing like a sword 
 The immortal womb that bare thee ; by the waves 
 That no man bridles and that bound thy world, 
 And by the winds and storms of all the sea, 
 He swears to raze from eyeshot of the sun 
 This city named not of his father's name. 
 And wash to deathward down one flood of doom 
 This whole fresh brood of earth yeaned naturally, 
 Green yet and faint in its first blade, unblown 
 With yellow hope of harvest ; so do thou. 
 
120 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 Seeing" whom thy time is come to meet, for fear 
 Yield, or gird up thy force to fight and die. 
 
 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 To fight then be it ; for if to die or live, 
 
 No man but only a God knows this much yet 
 
 Seeing us fare forth, who bear but in our hands 
 
 The weapons not the fortunes of our fight ; 
 
 For these now rest as lots that yet undrawn 
 
 Lie in the lap of the unknown hour ; but this 
 
 I know, not thou, whose hollow mouth of storm 
 
 Is but a warlike wind, a sharp salt breath 
 
 That bites and wounds not ; death nor life of mine 
 
 Shall give to death or lordship of strange kings 
 
 The soul of this live city, nor their heel 
 
 Bruise her dear brow discrowned, nor snaffle or goad 
 
 Wound her free mouth or stain her sanguine side 
 
 Yet masterless of man ; so bid thy lord 
 
 Learn ere he weep to learn it, and too late 
 
 Gnash teeth that could not fasten on her flesh. 
 
 And foam his life out in dark froth of blood 
 
 Vain as a wind's waif of the loud-mouthed sea 
 
 Torn from the wave's edge whitening-. Tell him this ; 
 
 Though thrice his might were mustered for our 
 
 scathe 
 And thicker set with fence of thorn-edged spears 
 Than sands are whirled about the wintering beach 
 When storms have swoln the rivers, and their blasts 
 Have breached the broad sea-banks with stress of 
 
 sea. 
 That waves of inland and the main make war 
 As men that mix and grapple ; though his ranks 
 Were more to number than all wildwood leaves 
 The wind waves on the hills of all the world. 
 
ERECHTHEUS 121 
 
 Yet should the heart not faint, the head not fall, 
 The breath not fail of Athens. Say, the Gods 
 From lips that have no more on earth to say- 
 Have told thee this the last good news or ill 
 That I shall speak in sight of earth and sun 
 Or he shall hear and see them : for the next 
 That ear of his from tongue of mine may take 
 Must be the first word spoken underground 
 From dead to dead in darkness. Hence ; make 
 
 haste, 
 Lest war's fleet foot be swifter than thy tongue 
 And I that part not to return again 
 On him that comes not to depart away 
 Be fallen before thee ; for the time is full, 
 And with such mortal hope as knows not fear 
 I go this high last way to the end of all. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Who shall put a bridle in the mourner's lips to chasten 
 them, [Sfr. I. 
 
 Or seal up the fountains of his tears for shame ? 
 Song nor prayer nor prophecy shall slacken tears nor 
 hasten them, 
 Till grief be within him as a burnt-out flame ; 
 Till the passion be broken in his breast 
 And the might thereof molten into rest. 
 And the rain of eyes that weep be dry, 
 And the breath be stilled of lips that sigh. 
 Death at last for all men is a harbour ; yet they flee 
 from it, [Anf. i. 
 
 Set sails to the storm-wind and again to sea ; 
 Yet for all their labour no whit further shall they be 
 from it, 
 Nor longer but wearier shall their life's work be. 
 
 VOL. IV. R 
 
122 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 And with anguish of travail until night 
 Shall they steer into shipwreck out of sight, 
 And with oars that break and shrouds that strain 
 Shall they drive whence no ship steers again. 
 Bitter and strange is the word of the God most 
 high, [Str. 2. 
 
 And steep the strait of his way. 
 Through a pass rock-rimmed and narrow the light 
 
 that gleams 
 On the faces of men falls faint as the dawn of dreams, 
 The dayspring of death as a star in an under sky 
 
 Where night is the dead men's day. 
 As darkness and storm is his will that on earth is 
 done, lAnt. 2. 
 
 As a cloud is the face of his strength. 
 King of kings, holiest of holies, and mightiest of 
 
 might. 
 Lord of the lords of thine heaven that are humble in 
 
 thy sight, 
 Hast thou set not an end for the path of the fires of 
 the sun. 
 
 To appoint him a rest at length ? 
 Hast thou told not by measure the waves of the 
 waste wide sea, [Sir. 3. 
 
 And the ways of the wind their master and thrall to 
 thee? 
 
 Hast thou filled not the furrows with fruit for 
 the world's increase ? 
 Has thine ear not heard from of old or thine eye not 
 
 read 
 The thought and the deed cf lis living, the doom of 
 us dead ? 
 
 Hast thou made not war upon earth, and again 
 made peace ? 
 
ERECHTHEUS 123 
 
 Therefore, O father, that seest us whose lives are a 
 
 breath, [.Ani. 3. 
 
 Take off us thy burden, and give us not wholly to 
 
 death. 
 
 For lovely is life, and the law wherein all 
 things live, 
 And gracious the season of each, and the hour of its 
 
 kind, 
 And precious the seed of his life in a wise man's 
 
 mind ; 
 
 But all save life for his life will a base man 
 give. 
 But a life that is given for the life of the whole live 
 
 land, [Sir. 4. 
 
 From a heart unspotted a gift of a spotless hand. 
 Of pure will perfect and free, for the land's life's sake, 
 What man shall fear not to put forth his hand and 
 
 take? 
 For the fruit of a sweet life plucked in its pure green 
 
 prime [ylni. 4. 
 
 On his hand who plucks is as blood, on his soul as 
 
 crime. 
 With cursing ye buy not blessing, nor peace with 
 
 strife, 
 And the hand is hateful that chaflFers with death for 
 
 life. 
 
 Hast thou heard, O my heart, and endurest [Sir. 5. 
 The word that is said, 
 
 What a garland by sentence found surest 
 Is wrought for what head ? 
 With what blossomless flowerage of sea-foam and 
 
 blood-coloured foliage inwound 
 It shall crown as a heifer's for slaughter the forehead 
 
 for marriage uncrowned ? 
 
124 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 How the veils and the wreaths that should 
 cover t-^«'. S- 
 
 The brows of the bride 
 Shall be shed by the breath of what lover 
 And scattered aside ? 
 With a blast of the mouth of what bridegroom the 
 
 crowns shall be cast from her hair, 
 And her head by what altar made humble be left of 
 
 them naked and bare ? 
 At a shrine unbeloved of a God unbeholden a gift 
 shall be given for the land, [Str. 6. 
 
 That its ramparts though shaken with clamour and 
 
 horror of manifold waters may stand : 
 That the crests of its citadels crowned and its turrets 
 
 that thrust up their heads to the sun 
 May behold him unblinded with darkness of waves 
 
 overmastering their bulwarks begun. 
 As a bride shall they bring her, a prey for the bride- 
 groom, a flower for the couch of her lord ; [^nt. 6. 
 They shall muffle her mouth that she cry not or 
 
 curse them, and cover her eyes from the sword. 
 They shall fasten her lips as with bit and with bridle, 
 
 and darken the light of her face. 
 That the soul of the slayer may not falter, his heart 
 be not molten, his hand give not grace. 
 If she weep then, yet may none that hear take 
 pity ; [S/r. 7. 
 
 If she cry not, none should hearken though she 
 cried. 
 Shall a virg-in shield thine head for love, O city, 
 
 With a virgin's blood anointed as for pride ? 
 Yet we held thee dear and hallowed of her favour, 
 
 [Aut. 7. 
 Dear of all men held thy people to her heart ; 
 
ERECHTHEUS 125 
 
 Nought she loves the breath of blood, the sanguine 
 
 savour, 
 Who hath built with us her throne and chosen 
 her part. 
 
 Bloodless are her works, and sweet \Epode. 
 
 All the ways that feel her feet ; 
 
 From ths empire of her eyes 
 
 Light takes life and darkness flies ; 
 
 From the harvest of her hands 
 
 Wealth strikes root in prosperous lands ; 
 
 Wisdom of her word is made ; 
 
 At her strength is strength afraid ; 
 
 From the beam of her bright spear 
 
 War's fleet foot goes back for fear ; 
 
 In her shrine she reared the birth 
 
 Fire-begotten on live earth ; 
 
 Glory from her helm was shed 
 
 On his olive- shadowed head ; 
 
 By no hand but his shall she 
 
 Scourge the storms back of the sea. 
 
 To no fame but his shall give 
 
 Grace, being dead, with hers to live, 
 
 And in double name divine 
 
 Half the godhead of their shrine. 
 But now with what word, with what woe may we 
 
 meet 
 The timeless passage of piteous feet, 
 Hither that bend to the last way's end 
 
 They shall walk upon earth ? 
 What song be rolled for a bride black-stoled 
 And the mother whose hand of her hand hath hold ? 
 For anguish of heart is my soul's strength broken 
 And the tongue sealed fast that would fain have 
 spoken, 
 
126 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 To behold thee, O child of so bitter a birth 
 
 That we counted so sweet, 
 What way thy steps to what bride-feast tend, 
 What gift he must give that shall wed thee for 
 
 token 
 If the bridegroom be goodly to greet. 
 
 CHTHONIA 
 
 People, old men of my city, lordly wise and hoar of 
 
 head, 
 I a spouseless bride and crownless but with garlands 
 
 of the dead 
 From the fruitful light turn silent to my dark un- 
 
 childed bed. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Wise of word was he too surely, but with deadlier 
 
 wisdom wise, 
 First who gave thee name from under earth, no breath 
 
 from upper skies. 
 When, foredoomed to this day's darkness, their first 
 
 daylight filled thine eyes. 
 
 PRAXITHEA 
 
 Child, my child that wast and art but death's and now 
 
 no more of mine. 
 Half my heart is cloven with anguish by the sword 
 
 made sharp for thine. 
 Half exalts its wing for triumph, that I bare thee 
 
 thus divine. 
 
ERECHTHEUS 127 
 
 CHTHONIA 
 
 Though for me the sword's edg-e thirst that sets no 
 
 point against thy breast, 
 Mother, O my mother, where I drank of Hfe and fell 
 
 on rest. 
 Thine, not mine, is all the grief that marks this hour 
 
 accurst and blest. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Sweet thy sleep and sweet the bosom was that gave 
 thee sleep and birth ; 
 
 Harder now the breast, and girded with no marriage- 
 band for girth, 
 
 Where thine head shall sleep, the namechild of the 
 lords of under earth 
 
 PRAXITHEA 
 
 Dark the name and dark the gifts they gave thee, 
 
 child, in childbirth were, 
 Sprung from him that rent the womb of earth, a 
 
 bitter seed to bear, 
 Born with groanings of the ground that gave him 
 
 way toward heaven's dear air. 
 
 CHTHONIA 
 
 Day to day makes answer, first to last, and life to 
 
 death ; but I, 
 Born for death's sake, die for life's sake, if indeed this 
 
 be to die. 
 This my doom that seals me deathless till the springs 
 
 of time run dry. 
 
128 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Children shalt thou bear to memory, that to man 
 
 shalt bring forth none ; 
 Yea, the lordliest that lift eyes and hearts and songs 
 
 to meet the sun, 
 Names to fire men's ears like music till the round 
 
 world's race be run. 
 
 PRAXITHEA 
 
 I thy mother, named of Gods that wreak revenge and 
 
 brand with blame. 
 Now for thy love shall be loved as thou, and famous 
 
 with thy fame, 
 While this city's name on earth shall be for earth her 
 
 mightiest name. 
 
 CHTHONIA 
 
 That I may give this poor girl's blood of mine 
 
 Scarce yet sun-warmed with summer, this thin life 
 
 Still green with flowerless growth of seedling days. 
 
 To build again my city ; that no drop 
 
 Fallen of these innocent veins on the cold ground 
 
 But shall help knit the joints of her firm walls 
 
 To knead the stones together, and make sure 
 
 The band about her maiden girdlestead 
 
 Once fastened, and of all men's violent hands 
 
 Inviolable for ever ; these to me 
 
 Were no such gifts as crave no thanksgiving, 
 
 If with one blow dividing the sheer life 
 
 I might make end, and one pang wind up all 
 
 And seal mine eyes from sorrow ; for such end 
 
 The Gods give none they love not ; but my heart, 
 
 That leaps up lightened of all sloth or fear 
 
ERECHTHEUS 129 
 
 To take the sword's point, yet with one thought's 
 
 load 
 Flags, and falls back, broken of wing, that halts 
 Maimed in mid flight for thy sake and borne down, 
 Mother, that in the places where I played 
 An arm's length from thy bosom and no more 
 Shalt find me never, nor thine eye wax glad 
 To mix with mine its eyesight and for love 
 Laugh without word, filled with sweet light, and speak 
 Divine dumb things of the inward spirit and heart. 
 Moved silently ; nor hand or lip again 
 Touch hand or lip of either, but for mine 
 Shall thine meet only shadows of swift night. 
 Dreams and dead thoughts of dead things ; and the 
 
 bed 
 Thou strewedst, a sterile place for all time, strewn 
 For my sleep only, with its void sad sheets 
 Shall vex thee, and the unfruitful coverlid 
 For empty days reproach me dead, that leave 
 No profit of my body, but am gone 
 As one not worth being born to bear no seed, 
 A sapless stock and branchless ; yet thy womb 
 Shall want not honour of me, that brought forth 
 For all this people freedom, and for earth 
 From the unborn city born out of my blood 
 To light the face of all men evermore 
 Glory ; but lay thou this to thy great heart 
 Whereunder in the dark of birth conceived 
 Mine unlit life lay girdled with the zone 
 That bound thy bridal bosom ; set this thought 
 Against all edge of evil as a sword 
 To beat back sorrow, that for all the world 
 Thou brought'st me forth a saviour, who shall save 
 Athens ; for none but I from none but thee 
 
 VOL. IV. ^ 
 
130 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 Shall take this death for g"arland ; and the men 
 Mine unknown children of unsounded years, 
 My sons unrisen shall rise up at thine hand, 
 Sown of thy seed to bring forth seed to thee, 
 And call thee most of all most fruitful found 
 Blessed ; but me too for my barren womb 
 More than my sisters for their children born 
 Shall these g"ive honour, yea in scorn's own place 
 Shall men set love and bring for mockery praise 
 And thanks for curses ; for the dry wild vine 
 Scoffed at and cursed of all men that was I 
 Shall shed them wine to make the world's- heart 
 
 warm, 
 That all eyes seeing may lighten, and all ears 
 Hear and be kindled ; such a draught to drink 
 Shall be the blood that bids this dust bring forth. 
 The chaliced life here spilt on this mine earth. 
 Mine, my great father's mother ; whom 1 pra} 
 Take me now gently, tenderly take home. 
 And softly lay in his my cold chaste hand 
 Who is called of men by my name, being of Gods 
 Charged only and chosen to bring men under earth. 
 And now must lead and stay me with his staff 
 A silent soul led of a silent God, 
 Toward sightless things led sightless-; and on earth 
 I see now but the shadow of mine end, 
 And this last light of all for me in heaven. 
 
 PRAXITHEA 
 
 Farewell I bid thee ; so bid thou not me, 
 Lest the Gods hear and mock us ; yet on these 
 I lay the weight not of this grief, nor cast 
 111 words for ill deeds back ; for if one say 
 
ERECHTHEUS 131 
 
 They have done men wrongf, what hurt have they to 
 
 hear, 
 Or he what help to have said it ? surely, child, 
 If one among- men born might say it and live 
 Blameless, none more than I may, who beingf vexed 
 Hold yet my peace ; for now through tears enough 
 Mine eyes have seen the sun that from this day 
 Thine shall see never more ; and in the night 
 Enough has blown of evil, and mine ears 
 With wail enough the winds have filled, and broug-ht 
 Too much of cloud from over the sharp sea 
 To mar for me the morning- ; such a blast 
 Rent from these wide void arms and helpless breast 
 Long- since one gfraft of me disbranched, and bore 
 Beyond the wild ways of the unwandered world 
 And loud wastes of the thunder-throated sea, 
 Spring's of the night and openings of the heaven, 
 The old g-arden of the Sun ; whence never more 
 From west or east shall winds bring- back that blow 
 From folds of opening- heaven or founts of night 
 The flower of mine once ravished, born my child 
 To bear strange children ; nor on wings of theirs 
 Shall comfort come back to me, nor their sire 
 Breathe help upon my peril, nor his strength 
 Raise up my weakness ; but of Gods and men 
 I drift unsteered on ruin, and the wave 
 Darkens my head with imminent height, and hang's 
 Dumb, filled too full with thunder that shall leave 
 These ears death-deafened when the tide finds tong-ue 
 And all its wrath bears on them ; thee, O child. 
 I help not, nor am holpen ; fain, ah fain. 
 More than was ever mother born of man, 
 Were I to help thee ; fain beyond all prayer, 
 Beyond all thought fain to redeem thee, torn 
 
132 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 More timeless from me sorrowings than the dream 
 That was thy sister ; so shalt thou be too, 
 Thou but a vision, shadow-shaped of sleep, 
 By grief made out of nothing ; now but once 
 I touch, but once more hold thee, one more kiss 
 This last time and none other ever more 
 Leave on thy lips and leave them. Go ; thou wast 
 My heart, my heart's blood, life-blood of my life, 
 My child, my nursling : now this breast once thine 
 Shall rear again no children ; never now 
 Shall any mortal blossom born like thee 
 Lie there, nor ever with small silent mouth 
 Draw the sweet springs dry for an hour that feed 
 The blind blithe life that knows not ; never head 
 Rest here to make these cold veins warm, nor eye 
 Laugh itself open with the lips that reach 
 Lovingly toward a fount more loving ; these 
 Death makes as all good lesser things now dead. 
 And all the latter hopes that flowered from thes** 
 And fall as these fell fruitless ; no joy more 
 Shall man take of thy maidenhood, no tongue 
 Praise it ; no good shall eyes get more of thee 
 That lightened for thy love's sake. Now, take note. 
 Give ear, O all ye people, that my word 
 May pierce your hearts through, and the stroke that 
 
 cleaves 
 Be fruitful to them ; so shall all that hear 
 Grow great at heart with child of thought most high 
 And bring forth seed in season ; this my child, 
 This flower of this my body, this sweet life, 
 This fair live youth I give you, to be slain, 
 Spent, shed, poured out, and perish ; take my gift 
 And give it death and the under Gods who crave 
 So much for that they give ; for this is more, 
 
ERECHTHEUS 133 
 
 Much more is this than all we ; for they give 
 
 Freedom, and for a blast, an air of breath, 
 
 A little soul that is not, they give back 
 
 Light for all eyes, cheer for all hearts, and life 
 
 That fills the world's width full of fame and praise 
 
 And mightier love than children's. This they give. 
 
 The grace to make thy country great, and wrest 
 
 From time and death power to take hold on her 
 
 And strength to scathe for ever ; and this gift, 
 
 Is this no more than man's love is or mine. 
 
 Mine and all mothers'? nay, where that seems more, 
 
 Where one loves life of child, wife, father, friend, 
 
 Son, husband, mother, more than this, even there 
 
 Are all these lives worth nothing, all loves else 
 
 With this love slain and buried, and their tomb 
 
 A thing for shame to spit on ; for what love 
 
 Hath a slave left to love with ? or the heart 
 
 Base-born and bound in bondage fast to fea. 
 
 What should it do to love thee ? what hath he, 
 
 The man that hath no country ? Gods nor men 
 
 Have such to friend, yoked beast-like to base life, 
 
 Vile, fruitless, grovelling at the foot of death, 
 
 Landless and kinless thralls of no man's blood, 
 
 Unchilded and unmothered, abject limbs 
 
 That breed things abject ; but who loves on earth 
 
 Not friend, wife, husband, father, mother, child, 
 
 Nor loves his own life for his own land's sake, 
 
 But only this thing most, more this than all. 
 
 He loves all well and well of all is loved. 
 
 And this love lives for ever. See now, friends. 
 
 My countrymen, my brothers, with what heart 
 
 I give you this that of your hands again 
 
 The Gods require for Athens ; as I give 
 
 So give ye to them what their hearts would have 
 
134 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 Who shall gfive back things better ; yea, and these 
 
 I take for me to witness, all these Gods, 
 
 Were their gfreat will more grievous than it is, 
 
 Not one but three, for this one thin-spun thread 
 
 A threefold band of children would I g"ive 
 
 For this land's love's sake ; for whose love to-day 
 
 I bid thee, child, fare deathward and farewell. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 O wofullest of women, yet of all 
 
 Happiest, thy word be hallowed ; in all time 
 
 Thy name shall blossom, and from strang-e new 
 
 tong-ues 
 High things be spoken of thee ; for such grace 
 The Gods have dealt to no man, that on none 
 Have laid so heavy sorrow. From this day 
 Live thou assured of godhead in thy blood, 
 And in thy fate no lowlier than a God 
 In all good things and evil ; such a name 
 Shall be thy child this city's, and thine own 
 Next hers that called it Atnens. Go now forth 
 Blest, and grace with thee to the doors of death. 
 
 CHTHONIA 
 
 O city, O glory of Athens, O crown of my father's 
 land, farewell. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 For welfare is given her of thee. 
 
 CHTHONIA 
 
 O Goddess, be good to thy people, that in them 
 dominion and freedom may dwell. 
 
ERECHTHEUS 135 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Turn from us the strengths of the sea. 
 
 CHTHONIA 
 
 Let glory's and theirs be one name in the mouths of 
 all nations made glad with the sun. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 For the cloud is blown back with thy breath. 
 
 CHTHONfA 
 
 With the long last love of mine eyes I salute thee, 
 O land where my days now are done. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 But her life shall be born of thy detah. 
 
 CHTHONIA 
 
 I put on me the darkness thy shadow, my mother, and 
 symbol, O Earth, of my name. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 For thine was her witness from birth. 
 
 CHTHONIA 
 
 In thy likeness I come to thee darkling, a daugilter 
 whose dawn and her even are the same. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Be thine heart to her gracious, O Earth. 
 
 CHTHONIA 
 
 To thine own kind be kindly, for thy son's name's 
 sake. 
 
136 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 That sons unborn may praise thee and thy first- 
 born son. 
 
 CHTHONIA 
 
 Give me thy sleep, who give thee all my life awake. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Too swift a sleep, ere half the web of day be spun. 
 
 CHTHONIA 
 
 Death brings the shears or ever life wind up the weft. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Their edge is ground and sharpened ; who shall 
 stay his hand ? 
 
 CHTHONIA 
 
 The woof is thin, a small short life, with no thread 
 left. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Yet hath it strength, stretched out, to shelter all 
 the land. 
 
 CHTHONIA 
 
 Too frail a tent for covering, and a screen too strait. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Yet broad enough for buckler shall thy sweet life be. 
 
 CHTHONIA 
 
 A little bolt to bar off battle from the gate. 
 CHORUS 
 A wide sea-wall, that shatters the besieging sea. 
 
ERECHTHEUS I37 
 
 CHTHONIA 
 
 I lift up mine eyes from the skirts of the shadow, [Sir. 
 
 From the border of death to the limits of lig-ht ; 
 O streams and rivers of mountain and meadow 
 That hallow the last of my sig-ht, 
 O father that wast of my mother 
 Cephisus, O thou too his brother 
 From the bloom of whose banks as a prey 
 Winds harried my sister away, 
 O crown on the world's head lying- 
 
 Too high for its waters to drown, 
 Take yet this one word of me dying, 
 O city, O crown. 
 Though land-wind and sea wind with mouths that 
 blow slaughter [Ant. 
 
 Should gird them to battle against thee again, 
 New-born of the blood of a maiden thy daughter. 
 The rage of their breath shall be vain. 
 For their strength shall be quenched and made 
 
 idle, 
 And the foam of their mouths find a bridle, 
 And the height of their heads bow down 
 At the foot of the towers of the town. 
 Be blest and beloved as I love thee 
 
 Of all that shall draw from thee breath ; 
 Be thy life as the sun's is above thee ; 
 I go to my death. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Many loves of many a mood and many a kind i^ff- i 
 Fill the life of man, and mould the secret mind ; 
 Many days bring many dooms, to loose and bind ; 
 
 VOL. IV, T 
 
138 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 Sweet is each in season, g-ood the gift it brings, 
 Sweet as change of night and day with altering 
 wings, 
 Night that lulls world-weary day, day that comforts 
 
 night, 
 Night that fills our eyes with sleep, day that fills with 
 light. 
 None of all is lovelier, loftier love is none, {.Am. i. 
 Less is bride's for bridegroom, mother's less for 
 
 son. 
 Child, than this that crowns and binds up all in 
 
 one ; 
 Love of thy sweet light, thy fostering breast and 
 
 hand. 
 Mother Earth, and city chosen, and natural land ; 
 Hills that bring the strong streams forth, heights of 
 
 heavenlier air. 
 Fields aflower with winds and suns, woods with 
 
 shadowing hair. 
 But none of the nations of men shall they liken to 
 thee, [S(r. 2. 
 
 Whose children true-born and the fruit of thy body 
 
 are we. 
 The rest are thy sons but in figure, in word are thy 
 
 seed ; 
 We only the flower of thy travail, thy children in- 
 deed. 
 Of thy soil hast thou fashioned our limbs, of thy 
 
 waters their blood. 
 And the life of thy springs everlasting is fount of our 
 
 flood. 
 No wind oversea blew us hither adrift on thy shore, 
 None sowed us by land in thy womb that conceived 
 us and bore. 
 
ERECHTHEUS 139 
 
 But the stroke of the shaft of the sunlig-ht that brought 
 
 us to birth 
 Pierced only and quickened thy furrows to bear us, 
 
 O Earth. 
 With the beams of his love wast thou cloven as with 
 
 iron or fire, 
 And the life in thee yearned for his life, and grew 
 
 great with desire. 
 And the hunger and thirst to be wounded and healec 
 
 with his dart 
 Made fruitful the love in thy veins and the depth of 
 
 thine heart. 
 And the showers out of heaven overflowing and liquid 
 
 with love 
 Fulfilled thee with child of his godhead as rain from 
 
 above. 
 Such desire had ye twain of each other, till molten 
 
 in one i^^'- 2. 
 
 Ye might bear and beget of your bodies the fruits of 
 
 the sun. 
 And the trees in their season brought forth and were 
 
 kindled anew 
 By the warmth of the moisture of marriage, the child- 
 bearing dew. 
 And the firstlings were fair of the wedlock of heaven 
 
 and of earth ; 
 All countries were bounteous with blossom and 
 
 burgeon of birth. 
 Green pastures of grass for all cattle, and life-giving 
 
 corn ; 
 But here of thy bosom, here only, the man-child was 
 
 born. 
 All races but one are as aliens engrafted or 
 
 sown, 
 
140 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 Strang-e children and chang-elings ; but we, O our 
 
 mother, thine own. 
 Thy nurslings are others, and seedlings they know not 
 
 of whom ; 
 For these hast thou fostered, but us thou hast borne 
 
 in thy womb. 
 Who is he of us all, O beloved, that owe thee for birth, 
 Who would give not his blood for his birth's sake, O 
 
 mother, O Earth ? 
 What landsman is he that was fostered and reared of 
 
 thine hand 
 Who may vaunt him as we may in death though he 
 
 died for the land ? 
 
 Well doth she therefore who g"ives thee in guerdon 
 
 The bloom of the life of thy giving ; [Epode. 
 
 And thy body was bowed by no fruitless burden, 
 That bore such fruit of thee living. 
 
 For her face was not darkened for fear, 
 For her eyelids conceived not a tear. 
 
 Nor a cry from her lips craved pity ; 
 But her mouth was a fountain of song", 
 And her heart as a citadel strong- 
 That gfuards the heart of the city. 
 
 MESSENGER 
 
 Hig-h thing's of strong-souled men that loved their land 
 On brass and stone are written, and their deeds 
 On high days chanted ; but none graven or sung 
 That ever set men's eyes or spirits on fire, 
 Athenians, has the sun's height seen, or earth 
 Heard in her depth reverberate as from heaven. 
 More worth men's praise and good report of Gods 
 Than here I bring for record in your ears. 
 
ERECHTHEUS 141 
 
 For now being come to the altar, where as priest 
 
 Death ministering' should meet her, and his hand 
 
 Seal her sweet eyes asleep, the maiden stood, 
 
 With light in all her face as of a bride 
 
 Smiling, or shine of festal flame by night 
 
 Far flung from towers of triumph ; and her lips 
 
 Trembled with pride in pleasure, that no fear 
 
 Blanched them nor death before his time drank dry 
 
 The blood whose bloom fulfilled them ; for her cheeks 
 
 Lightened, and brighter than a bridal veil 
 
 Her hair enrobed her bosom and enrolled 
 
 From face to feet the body's whole soft length 
 
 As with a cloud sun-saturate ; then she spake 
 
 With maiden tongue words manlike, but her eyes 
 
 Lit mildly like a maiden's : Countrymen, 
 
 With more goodwill and height of happier heart 
 
 I give me to you than my mother hare. 
 
 And go more gladly this great way to death 
 
 Than young men bound to battle. Then with face 
 
 Turned to the shadowiest part of all the shrine 
 
 And eyes fast set upon the further shade, 
 
 Take me, dear Gods ; and as some form had shone 
 
 From the deep hollow shadow, some God's tongue 
 
 Answered, I bless you that your guardian grace 
 
 Gives m.e to guard this country, takes my blood. 
 
 Your child! s by nam.e, to heal it. Then the priest 
 
 Set to the flower-sweet snow of her soft throat 
 
 The sheer knife's edge that severed it, and loosed 
 
 From the fair bondage of so spotless flesh 
 
 So strong a spirit ; and all that girt them round 
 
 Gazing, with souls that hung on that sad stroke, 
 
 Groaned, and kept silence after while a man 
 
 Might count how far the fresh blood crept, and bathed 
 
 How deep the dark robe and the bright shrine's base 
 
142 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 Red-rounded with a running- ring- that grew 
 More large and duskier as the wells that fed 
 Were drained of that pure effluence : but the queen 
 Groaned not nor spake nor wept, but as a dream 
 Floats out of eyes awakening so past forth 
 Ghost-like, a shadow of sorrow, from all sight 
 To the inner court and chamber where she sits 
 Dumb, till word reach her of this whole day's end. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 More hapless born by far [Sir. 
 
 Beneath some wintrier star, 
 One sits in stone among- hig-h Lydian snows, 
 The tomb of her own woes :- 
 Yet happiest was once of the daughters of Gods, and 
 
 divine by her sire and her lord, 
 Ere her tongue was a shaft for the hearts of her sons, 
 for the heart of her husband a sword. 
 
 For she, too g-reat of mind, [Ant. 
 
 Grown through her good things blind. 
 With godless lips and fire of her own breath 
 Spake all her house to death ; 
 But thou, no mother unmothered, nor kindled in 
 
 spirit with pride of thy seed, 
 Thou hast hallowed thy child for a blameless blood- 
 offering, and ransomed thy race by thy deed. 
 
 MESSENGER 
 
 As flower is graffed on flower, so grief on grief 
 Engraffed brings forth new blossoms of strange tears, 
 Fresh buds and green fruits of an alien pain ; 
 For now flies rumour on a dark wide wing. 
 
ERECHTHEUS 143 
 
 Murmuring of woes more than ye knew, most like 
 Hers whom ye hailed most wretched ; for the twain 
 Last left of all this house that wore last night 
 A threefold crown of maidens, and to-day 
 Should let but one fall dead out of the wreath, 
 If mad with grief we know not and sore love 
 For this their sister, or with shame soul-stung 
 To outlive her dead or doubt lest their lives too 
 The Gods require to seal their country safe 
 And bring the oracular doom to perfect end, 
 Have slain themselves, and fallen at the altar-foot 
 Lie by their own hands done to death ; and fear 
 Shakes all the city as winds a wintering tree. 
 And as dead leaves are men's hearts blown about 
 And shrunken with ill thoughts, andflowerless hopes 
 Parched up with presage, lest the piteous blood 
 Shed of these maidens guiltless fall and fix 
 On this land's forehead like a curse that cleaves 
 To the unclean soul's inexpiate hunted head 
 Whom his own crime tracks hotlier than a hound 
 To life's veiled end unsleeping ; and this hour 
 Now blackens toward the battle that must close 
 All gates of hope and fear on all their hearts 
 Who tremble toward its issue, knowing not yet 
 If blood may buy them surety, cleanse or soil 
 The helpless hands men raise and reach no stay. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 111 thoughts breed fear, and fear ill words ; but these 
 The Gods turn from us that have kept their law. 
 Let us lift up the strength of our hearts in song, [Sir. i. 
 
 And our souls to the height of the darkling day. 
 
 If the wind in our eyes blow blood for spray, 
 
144 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 Be the spirit that breathes, in us life more strong-, 
 Though the prow reel round and the helm point 
 wrong-, 
 And sharp reefs whiten the shoreward way. 
 For the steersman time sits hidden astern, [AnL i. 
 With dark hand plying- the rudder of doom, 
 And the surf-smoke under it flies like fume 
 As the blast shears off and the oar-blades 
 
 churn 
 The foam of our lives that to death return, 
 
 Blown back as they break to the g^ulfing- g-loom. 
 What cloud upon heaven is arisen, what shadow, 
 what sound, [Sir. 2. 
 
 From the world beyond earth, from the night 
 underground. 
 That scatters from wings unbeholden the weight of 
 its darkness around ? 
 For the sense of my spirit is broken, and blinded 
 its eye, C^«^. 2- 
 
 As the soul of a sick man ready to die. 
 With fear of the hour that is on me, with dread if an 
 end be not nigh. 
 O Earth, O Gods of the land, have ye heart now to 
 see and to hear [-S"^^- 3- 
 
 What slays with terror mine eyesight and seals 
 mine ear ? 
 O fountains. of streams everlasting, are all ye not 
 shrunk up and withered for fear ? 
 Lo, night is arisen on the noon, and her hounds 
 are in quest by day, [Ani. 3. 
 
 And the world is fulfilled of the noise of them 
 crying for their prey. 
 And the sun's self stricken in heaven, and cast out of 
 his course as a blind man astray. 
 
ERECHTHEUS 145 
 
 From east to west of the south sea-line l^^f- 4* 
 
 Glitters the lightning of spears that shine ; 
 As a storm-cloud swoln that comes up from the skirts 
 of the sea 
 By the wind for helmsman to shoreward ferried, 
 So black behind them the live storm serried 
 Shakes earth with the tramp of its foot, and the 
 terror to be. 
 Shall the sea give death whom the land gave 
 birth ? [^«^. 4. 
 
 O Earth, fair mother, O sweet live Earth, 
 Hide us again in thy womb from the waves of it, 
 help us or hide. 
 As a sword is the heart of the God thy 
 
 brother, 
 But thine as the heart of a new-made mother. 
 To deliver thy sons from his ravin, and rage of his 
 tide. 
 O strong north wind, the pilot of cloud and rain, 
 
 [Sir. 5. 
 
 For the gift we gave thee what gift hast thou given 
 
 us again ? 
 O God dark-winged, deep-throated, a terror to forth- 
 faring ships by night, 
 What bride-song is this that is blown on the blast 
 
 of thy breath ? 
 A gift but of grief to thy kinsmen, a song but of 
 
 death, 
 For the bride's folk weeping, and woe for her father, 
 
 who finds thee against him in fight. 
 Turn back from us, turn thy battle, take heed of 
 
 our cry ; [Am. 5. 
 
 Let thy dread breath sound, and the waters of war 
 
 be dry ; 
 
 VOL. IV. U 
 
146 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 Let thy strong- wrath shatter the strength of our foe- 
 men, the sword of their strength and the shield ; 
 As vapours in heaven, or as waves or the wrecks 
 
 of ships. 
 So break thou the ranks of their spears with the 
 
 breath of thy Hps, 
 Till their corpses have covered and clothed as with 
 
 raiment the face of the sword-ploughed field. 
 O son of the rose-red morning, O God twin-born 
 
 with the day, [Sir.6. 
 
 O wind with the young sun waking, and winged 
 
 for the same wide way. 
 Give up not the house of thy kin to the host thou 
 
 hast marshalled from northward for prey. 
 From the cold of thy cradle in Thrace, from the 
 
 mists of the fountains of night, [-^«^- 6. 
 
 From the bride-bed of dawn whence day leaps 
 
 laughing, on fire for his flight. 
 Come down with their doom in thine hand on the 
 
 ships thou hast brought up against us to fight. 
 For now not in word but in deed is the harvest of 
 
 spears begun, l-^^^- 7- 
 
 And its clamour outbellows the thunder, its lightning- 
 
 outlightens the sun. 
 From the springs of the morning it thunders and 
 
 lightens across and afar 
 To the wave where the moonset ends and the fall of 
 
 the last low star. 
 With a trampling of drenched red hoofs and an earth 
 
 quake of men that meet, 
 Strong war sets hand to the scythe, and the furrows 
 
 take fire from his feet. 
 Earth groans from her g-reat rent heart, and the 
 
 hollows of rocks are afraid, 
 
ERECHTHEUS 147 
 
 And the mountains are moved, and the valleys as 
 
 waves in a storm-wind swayed. 
 From the roots of the hills to the plain's dim verge 
 
 and the dark loud shore, 
 Air shudders with shrill spears crossing-, and hurtling 
 
 of wheels that roar. 
 As the grinding of teeth in the jaws of a lion that 
 
 foam as they gnash 
 Is the shriek of the axles that loosen, the shock of the 
 
 poles that crash. 
 The dense manes darken and glitter, the mouths of 
 
 the mad steeds champ. 
 Their heads flash blind through the battle, and death's 
 
 foot rings in their tramp. 
 For a fourfold host upon earth and in heaven is 
 
 arrayed for the fight. 
 Clouds ruining in thunder and armies encountering 
 
 as clouds in the night. 
 Mine ears are amazed with the terror of trumpets, 
 
 with darkness mine eyes, 
 At the sound of the sea's host charging that deafens 
 
 the roar of the sky's. 
 White frontlet is dashed upon frontlet, and horse 
 
 against horse reels hurled. 
 And the gorge of the gulfs of the battle is wide for 
 
 the spoil of the world. 
 And the meadows are cumbered with shipwreck of 
 
 chariots that founder en land, [Ani. 7. 
 
 And the horsemen are broken with breach as of 
 
 breakers, and scattered as sand. 
 Through the roar and recoil of the charges that 
 
 mingle their cries and confound, 
 Like fire are the notes of the trumpets that flash 
 
 through the darkness of sound. 
 
148 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 As the swing of the sea churned yellow that sways 
 
 with the wind as it swells 
 Is the lift and relapse of the wave of the chargers 
 
 that clash with their bells ; 
 And the clang- of the sharp shrill brass through the 
 
 burst of the wave as it shocks 
 Rings clean as the clear wind's cry through the roar 
 
 of the surge on the rocks : 
 And the heads of the steeds in their headgear of war, 
 
 and their corsleted breasts, 
 Gleam broad as the brows of the billows that brighten 
 
 the storm with their crests, 
 Gleam dread as their bosoms that heave to the ship- 
 wrecking wind as they rise, 
 Filled full of the terror and thunder of water, that 
 
 slays as it dies. 
 So dire is the glare of their foreheads, so fearful the 
 
 fire of their breath, 
 And the light of their eyeballs enkindled so bright 
 
 with the lightnings of death ; 
 And the foam of their mouths as the sea's when the 
 
 jaws of its gulf are as graves. 
 And the ridge of their necks as the wind-shaken mane 
 
 on the ridges of waves : 
 And their fetlocks afire as they rear drip thick with a 
 
 dewfall of blood 
 As the lips of the rearing breaker with froth of the 
 
 manslaying flood. 
 And the whole plain reels and resounds as the fields 
 
 of the sea by night 
 When the stroke of the wind falls darkling, and death 
 
 is the seafarer's light. 
 
 But thou, fair beauty of heaven, dear face of the day 
 nigh dead, {Epode. 
 
ERECHTHEUS 149 
 
 What horror hath hidden thy glory, what hand hath 
 muffled thine head ? 
 O sun, with what song- shall we call thee, or ward off 
 thy wrath by what name, 
 With what prayer shall we seek to thee, soothe with 
 
 what incense, assuage with what gift. 
 If thy light be such only as lightens to deathward 
 the seaman adrift 
 With the fire of his house for a beacon, that foemen 
 have wasted with flame ? 
 Arise now, lift up thy light ; give ear to us, put forth 
 
 thine hand, 
 Reach toward us £hy torch of deliverance, a lamp for 
 the night of the land. 
 Thine eye is the light of the living, no lamp for the 
 
 dead ; 
 O, lift up the light of thine eye on the dark of our 
 
 dread. 
 Who hath blinded thee ? who hath prevailed on 
 
 thee ? who hath ensnared ? 
 Who hath broken thy bow, and the shafts for thy 
 battle prepared ? 
 Have they found out a fetter to bind thee, a chain for 
 
 thine arm that was bared ? 
 Be the name of thy conqueror set forth, and the might 
 of thy master declared. 
 O God, fair God of the morning, O glory of 
 
 day. 
 What ails thee to cast from thy forehead its 
 
 garland away ? 
 To pluck from thy temples their chaplet enwreathed 
 
 of the light. 
 And bind on the brows of thy godhead a frontlet 
 of night ? 
 
150 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 Thou hast loosened the necks of thine horses, and 
 
 g-oaded their flanks with affrig-ht, 
 To the race of a course that we know not on ways 
 that are hid from our sight. 
 As a wind through the darkness the wheels of their 
 
 chariot are whirled, 
 And the light of its passage is night on the face of 
 
 the world. 
 And there falls from the wings of thy glory no help 
 
 from on high, 
 But a shadow that smites us with fear and desire of 
 thine eye. 
 For our hearts are as reeds that a wind on the water 
 
 bovvs down and goes by, 
 To behold not thy comfort in heaven that hath left us 
 untimely to die. 
 But what light is it now leaps forth on the land 
 Enkindling the waters and ways of the air 
 From thy forehead made bare, 
 From the gleam of thy bow-bearing hand ? 
 Hast thou set not thy right hand again to the string. 
 With the back-bowed horns bent sharp for a spring 
 
 And the barbed shaft drawn. 
 Till the shrill steel sing and the tense nerve ring 
 That pierces the heart of the dark with dawn, 
 
 O huntsman, O king, 
 When the flame of thy face hath twilight in chase 
 
 As a hound hath a blood-mottled fawn ? 
 He has glanced into golden the grey sea-strands. 
 And the clouds are shot through with the fires of 
 
 his hands, 
 And the height of the hollow of heaven that he fills 
 As the heart of a strong man is quickened and 
 thrills ; 
 
ERECHTHEUS 151 
 
 High over the folds of the low-lying lands, 
 On the shadowless hills 
 As a guard on his watchtower he stands. 
 All earth and all ocean, all depth and all height, 
 At the flash of an eyebeam are filled with his might : 
 The sea roars backward, the storm drops dumb, 
 And silence as dew on the fire of the fight 
 Falls kind in our ears as his face in our sight 
 
 With presage of peace to come. 
 Fresh hope in my heart from the ashes of dread 
 Leaps clear as a flame from the pyres of the dead. 
 
 That joy out of woe 
 May arise as the spring out of tempest and snow, 
 With the flower-feasted month in her hands rose- 
 red 
 Borne soft as a babe from the bearing-bed. 
 Yet it knows not indeed if a God be friend. 
 If rescue may be from the rage of the sea, 
 
 Or the wrath of its lord have end. 
 For the season is full now of death or of birth, 
 To bring forth life, or an end of all ; 
 And we know not if anything stand or fall 
 That is girdled about with the round sea's girth 
 
 As a town with its wall ; 
 But thou that art highest of the Gods most high, 
 That art lord if we live, that art lord though we die, 
 Have heed of the tongues of our terror that cry 
 For a grace to the children of Earth. 
 
 ATHENIAN HERALD 
 
 Sons of Athens, heavy-laden with the holy weight of 
 
 years. 
 Be your hearts as young men's lightened of their 
 
 loathlier load of fears ; 
 
152 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 For the wave is sunk whose thunder shoreward shook 
 the shuddering lands, 
 
 And unbreached of warring- waters Athens like a sea- 
 rock stands. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Well thy word has cheered us, well thy face and 
 
 glittering eyes, that spake 
 Ere thy tongue spake words of comfort : yet no 
 
 pause behoves it make 
 Till the whole good hap find utterance that the Gods 
 
 have given at length. 
 
 ATHENIAN HERALD 
 
 All is this, that yet the city stands unforced by 
 stranger strength. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Sweeter sound might no mouth utter in man's ear 
 than this thy word. 
 
 ATHENIAN HERALD 
 
 Feed thy soul then full of sweetness till some bitterer 
 note be heard. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 None, if this ring sure, can mar the music fallen from 
 heaven as rain. 
 
 ATHENIAN HERALD 
 
 If no fire of sun or star untimely sear the tender 
 grain. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Fresh the dewfall of thy tidings on our hopes re- 
 flowering lies. 
 
ERECHTHEUS 
 
 ATHENIAN HERALD 
 
 153 
 
 Till a joyless shower and fruitless blight them, rain- 
 ing" from thine eyes. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Bitter springs have barren issues ; these bedew griefs 
 arid sands. 
 
 ATHENIAN HERALD 
 
 Such thank-offerings ask such altars as expect thy 
 suppliant hands. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Tears for triumph, wail for welfare, what strange 
 godhead's shrine requires ? 
 
 ATHENIAN HERALD 
 
 Death's or victory's be it, a funeral torch feeds all its 
 festal fires. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Like a star should burn the beacon flaming from our 
 city's head. 
 
 ATHENIAN HERALD 
 
 Like a balefire should the flame go up that says the 
 king is dead. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Out of heaven, a wild-haired meteor, shoots this new 
 sign, scattering fear. 
 
 ATHENIAN HERALD 
 
 Yea, the word has wings of fire that hovered, loth to 
 burn thine ear. 
 VOL. IV. 3C 
 
154 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 From thy lips it leapt forth loosened on a shrill and 
 shadowy wing- 
 
 ATHENIAN HERALD 
 
 Long- they faltered, fain to hide it deep as death that 
 hides the king-. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Dead with him blind hope lies blasted by the lig-ht- 
 ning of one sword. 
 
 ATHENIAN HERALD 
 
 On thy tongfue truth wars with error ; no man's edg-e 
 hath touched thy lord. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 False was thine then, jangling- menace like a war- 
 steed's brow-bound bell ? 
 
 ATHENIAN HERALD 
 
 False it rang- not joy nor sorrow ; but by no man's 
 hand he fell. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Vainly then g-ood news and evil through so faint a 
 trumpet spake. 
 
 ATHENIAN HERALD 
 
 All too long- thy soul yet labours, as who sleeping 
 
 fain would wake, 
 Waking, fain would fall on sleep again ; the woe 
 
 thou knowest not yet, 
 When thou knowest, shall make thy memory thirst 
 
 and hungfer to forg-et. 
 
ERECHTHEUS 155 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 Long my heart has hearkened, hanging- on thy 
 clamorous ominous cry, 
 
 Fain yet fearful of the knowledge whence it looks to 
 live or die ; 
 
 Now to take the perfect presage of thy dark and side- 
 long flight 
 
 Comes a surer soothsayer sorrowing, sable-stoled as 
 birds of night. 
 
 PRAXITHEA 
 
 Man, what thy mother bare thee born to say 
 Speak ; for no word yet wavering on thy lip 
 Can wound me worse than thought forestalls or fear. 
 
 ATHENIAN HERALD 
 
 I have no will to weave too fine or far, 
 
 O queen, the weft of sweet with bitter speech, 
 
 Bright v/ords with darkling ; but the brief truth 
 
 shown 
 Shall plead my pardon for a lingering tongue. 
 Loth yet to strike hope through the heart and slay. 
 The sun's light still was lordly housed in heaven 
 When the twain fronts of war encountering smote 
 First fire out of the battle ; but not long 
 Had the fresh wave of windy fight begun 
 Heaving, and all the surge of swords to sway. 
 When timeless night laiJ hold of heaven, and took 
 With its great gorge the noon as in a gulf. 
 Strangled ; and thicker than the shrill-winged shafts 
 Flew the fleet lightnings, held in chase through heaven 
 By headlong heat of thunders on their trail 
 Loosed as on quest of quarry ; that our host 
 Smit with sick presage of some wrathful God 
 
156 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 Quailed, but the foe as from one iron throat 
 With one great sheer sole thousand-throated cry 
 Shook earth, heart- staggered from their shout, and 
 
 clove 
 The eyeless hollow of heaven ; and breached there- 
 with 
 As with an onset of strength-shattering sound 
 The rent vault of the roaring noon of night 
 From her throned seat of usurpation rang 
 Reverberate answer ; such response there pealed 
 As though the tide's charge of a storming sea 
 Had burst the sky's wall, and made broad a breach 
 In the ambient girth and bastion flanked with stars 
 Guarding the fortress of the Gods, and all 
 Crashed now together on ruin ; and through that cry 
 And higher above it ceasing one man's note 
 Tore its way like a trumpet : Charge, make end, 
 Charge, halt not, strike, rend up their strength by the 
 
 roots. 
 Strike, break them, make your birthrights prom,ise 
 
 sure, 
 S flow your hearts hardier than the fenced land breeds 
 And souls breathed in you from, no spirit of earth. 
 Sons of the sea^s waves ; and all ears that heard 
 Rang with that fiery cry, that the fine air 
 Thereat was fired, and kindling filled the plain 
 Full of that fierce and trumpet-quenching breath 
 That spake the clarions silent ; no glad song 
 For folk to hear that wist how dire a God 
 Begat this peril to them, what strong race 
 Fathered the sea-born tongue that sang them death, 
 Threatening ; so raged through the red foam of fight 
 Poseidon's son Eumolpus ; and the war 
 Quailed round him coming, and our side bore back, 
 
ERECHTHEUS 157 
 
 As a stream thwarted by the wind and sea 
 That meet it midway mouth to mouth, and beat 
 The flood back of its issue ; but the king- 
 Shouted ag-ainst them, crying-, O Father-God, 
 Source of the God my father , from thine hand 
 Send me what end seems good rww in thy sight. 
 But death from mine to this m.an ; and the word 
 Quick on his lips yet Hke a blast of fire 
 Blew them together ; and round its lords that met 
 Paused all the reeling battle ; two main waves 
 Meeting, one hurled sheer from the sea-wall back 
 That shocks it sideways, one right in from sea 
 Charging, that full in face takes at one blow 
 That whole recoil and ruin, with less fear 
 Startle men's eyes late shipwrecked ; for a breath, 
 Crest fronting crest hung, wave to wave rose poised, 
 Then clashed, breaker to breaker ; cloud with cloud 
 In heaven, chariot with chariot closed on earth, 
 One fourfold flash and thunder ; yet a breath. 
 And with the king's spear through his red heart's 
 
 root 
 Driven, like a rock split from its hill-side, fell 
 Hurled under his own horsehoofs dead on earth 
 The sea-beast that made war on earth from sea, 
 Dumb, with no shrill note left of storming song-, 
 Eumolpus ; and his whole host with one stroke 
 Spear-stricken through its dense deep iron heart 
 Fell hurtling from us, and in fierce recoil 
 Drew seaward as with one wide wai! of waves, 
 Resorbed with reluctation ; such a groan 
 Rose from the fluctuant refluence of its ranks, 
 Sucked sullen back and strengthless ; but scarce yet 
 The steeds had sprung and wheels had bruised their 
 
 lord 
 
158 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 Fallen, when from hig-hest height of the sundering 
 
 heaven 
 The Father for his brother's son's sake slain 
 Sent a sheer shaft of lig-htning- writhen and smote 
 Right on his son's son's forehead, that unhelmed 
 Shone like the star that shines down storm, and gave 
 Light to men's eyes that saw thy lord their king 
 Stand and take breath from battle ; then too soon 
 Saw sink down as a sunset in sea-mist 
 The high bright head that here in van of the earth 
 Rose like a headland, and through storm and night 
 Took all the sea's wrath on it ; and now dead 
 They bring thee back by war-forsaken ways 
 The strength called once thy husband, the great 
 
 guard 
 That was of all men, stay of all men's lives, 
 They bear him slain of no man but a God, 
 Godlike ; and toward him dead the city's gates 
 Fling their arms open mother-like, through him 
 Saved ; and the whole clear land is purged of war 
 What wilt thou say now of this weal and woe ? 
 
 PRAXITHEA 
 
 I praise the Gods for Athens. O sweet Earth, 
 Mother, what joy thy soul has of thy son, 
 Thy life of my dead lord, mine own soul knows 
 That knows thee godlike ; and what grief should mine, 
 What sorrow should my heart have, who behold 
 Thee made so heavenlike happy ? This alone 
 I only of all these blessed, all thy kind, 
 Crave this for blessing to me, that in theirs 
 Have but a part thus bitter ; give me too 
 Death, and the sight of eyes that meet not mine. 
 And thee too from no godless heart or tongue 
 
ERECHTHEUS 159 
 
 Reproachful, thee too by thy living- name, 
 
 Father divine, merciful God, I call, 
 
 Springf of my life-springs, fountain of my stream. 
 
 Pure and poured forth to one g^reat end with thine, 
 
 Sweet head sublime of triumph and these tears, 
 
 Cephisus, if thou seest as g-ladly shed 
 
 Thy blood in mine as thine own waves are given 
 
 To do this great land g"ood, to give for love 
 
 The same lips drink and comfort the same hearts, 
 
 Do thou then, O my father, white-souled God, 
 
 To thy most pure earth-hallowing" heart eterne 
 
 Take what thou gavest to be given for these, 
 
 Take thy child to thee ; for her time is full, 
 
 For all she hath borne she hath g^iven, seen all she 
 
 had 
 Flow from her, from her eyes and breasts and hand-= 
 Flow forth to feed this people ; but be thou, 
 Dear God and gracious to all souls alive. 
 Good to thine own seed also ; let me sleep. 
 Father ; my sleepless darkling day is done, 
 My day of life like night, but slumberless : 
 For all my fresh fair springs, and his that ran 
 In one stream's bed with mine, are all run out 
 Into the deep of death. The Gods have saved 
 Athens ; my blood has bought her at their hand, 
 And ye sit safe ; be glorious and be glad 
 As now for all time always, countrymen. 
 And love my dead for ever ; but me, me. 
 What shall man give for these so good as death ? 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 From the cup of my heart I pour throug'h my lips 
 along- [Sir. i. 
 
 The mingled wine of a joyful and sorrowful song- ; 
 
x6o ERECHTHEUS 
 
 Wine sweeter than honey and bitterer than blood that 
 
 is poured 
 From the chalice of g"old, from the point of the two- 
 edged sword. 
 For the city redeemed should joy flow forth as a flood, 
 And a dirge make moan for the city polluted with 
 
 blood. 
 Great praise should the Gods have surely, my 
 country, of thee, [Ani. i. 
 
 Were thy brow but as white as of old for thy sons to 
 
 see, 
 Were thy hands as bloodless, as blameless thy cheek 
 
 divine ; 
 But a stain on it stands of the life-blood offered for 
 
 thine. 
 What thanks shall we give that are mixed not and 
 
 marred with dread 
 For the price that has ransomed thine own with thine 
 own child's head ? 
 For a taint there cleaves to the people redeemed 
 with blood, ISir. 2. 
 
 And a plague to the blood-red hand. 
 The rain shall not cleanse it, the devr nor the 
 sacred flood 
 That blesses the glad live land. 
 In the darkness of earth beneath, in the world with- 
 out sun, [Ani. 2. 
 The shadows of past things reign ; 
 And a cry goes up from the ghost of an ill deed done, 
 And a curse for a virgin slain. 
 
 ATHENA 
 
 Hear, men that mourn, and woman without mate, 
 Hearken ; ye sick of soul with fear, and thou 
 
 A 
 
ERECHTHEUS i6i 
 
 Dumb-stricken for thy children ; hear ye too, 
 Earth, and the g"Iory of heaven, and winds of the air. 
 And the most holy heart of the deep sea. 
 Late wrath, now full of quiet ; hear thou, sun, 
 Rolled round with the upper fire of rolling- heaven 
 And all the stars returning- ; hills and streams, 
 Springs and fresh fountains, day that seest these deeds. 
 Night that shalt hide not ; and thou child of mine. 
 Child of a maiden, by a maid redeemed, 
 Blood-guiltless, though bought back with innocent 
 
 blood. 
 City mine own ; I Pallas bring thee word, 
 I virgin daughter of the most high God 
 Give all you charge and lay command on all 
 The word I bring be wasted not ; for this 
 The Gods have stablished and his soul hath sworn, 
 That time nor earth nor changing sons of man 
 Nor waves of generations, nor the winds 
 Of ages risen and fallen that steer their tides 
 Through light and dark of birth and lovelier death 
 From storm toward haven inviolable, shall see 
 So great a light alive beneath the sun 
 As the awless eye of Athens ; all fame else 
 Shall be to her fame as a shadow in sleep 
 To this wide noon at waking ; men most praised 
 In lands most happy for their children found 
 Shall hold as highest of honours given of God 
 To be but likened to the least of thine, 
 Thy least of all, my city ; thine shall be 
 The crown of all songs sung, of all deeds done 
 Thine the full flower for all time ; in thine hand 
 Shall time be like a sceptre, and thine head 
 Wear worship for a garland ; nor one leaf 
 Shall change or winter cast out of thy crown 
 
 VOL. IV. T 
 
i62 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 Till all flowers wither in the world ; thine eyes 
 
 Shall first in man's flash lightning- liberty, 
 
 Thy tongue shall first say freedom ; thy first hand 
 
 Shall loose the thunder terror as a hound 
 
 To hunt from sunset to the springs of the sun 
 
 Kings that rose up out of the populous east 
 
 To make their quarry of thee, and shall strew 
 
 With multitudinous limbs of myriad herds 
 
 The foodless pastures of the sea, and make 
 
 With wrecks immeasurable and unsummed defeat 
 
 One ruin of all their many-folded flocks 
 
 111 shepherded from Asia ; by thy side 
 
 Shall fight thy son the north wind, and the sea 
 
 That was thine enemy shall be sworn thy friend 
 
 And hand be struck in hand of his and thine 
 
 To hold faith fast for aye ; with thee, though each 
 
 Make war on other, wind and sea shall keep 
 
 Peace, and take truce as brethren for thy sake 
 
 Leagued with one spirit and single-hearted strength 
 
 To break thy foes in pieces, who shall meet 
 
 The wind's whole soul and might of the main sea 
 
 Full in their face of battle, and become 
 
 A laughter to thee ; like a shower of leaves 
 
 Shall their long galleys rank by staggering rant. 
 
 Be dashed adrift on ruin, and in thy sight 
 
 The sea deride them, and that lord of the air 
 
 Who took by violent hand thy child to wife 
 
 With his loud lips bemock them, by his breath 
 
 Swept out of sight of being ; so great a grace 
 
 Shall this day give thee, that makes one in heart 
 
 With mine the deep sea's godhead, and his son 
 
 With him that was thine helmsman, king with king, 
 
 Dead man with dead ; such only names as these 
 
 Shalt thou call royal, take none else or less 
 
ERECHTHEUS 163 
 
 To hold of men in honour ; but with me 
 Shall these be worshipped as one God, and mix 
 With mine the might of their mysterious names 
 In one same shrine served singly, thence to keep 
 Perpetual guard on Athens ; time and change, 
 Masters and lords of all men, shall be made 
 To thee that knowest no master and no lord 
 Servants ; the days that lighten heaven and nights 
 That darken shall be ministers of thine 
 To attend upon thy glory, the great years 
 As light-engraven letters of thy name 
 Writ by the sun's hand on the front of the earth 
 For world-beholden witness ; such a gift 
 For one fair chaplet of three lives enwreathed 
 To hang for ever from thy storied shrine. 
 And this thy steersman fallen with tiller in hand 
 To stand for ever at thy ship's helm seen, 
 Shall he that bade their threefold flower be shorn 
 And laid him low that planted, give thee back 
 In sign of sweet land reconciled with sea 
 And heavenlike earth with heaven ; such promise- 
 pledge 
 I daughter without mother born of God 
 To the most woful mother born of man 
 Plight for continual comfort. Hail, and live 
 Beyond all human hap of mortal doom 
 Happy ; for so my sire hath sworn and I. 
 
 PRAXITHEA 
 
 O queen Athena, from a heart made whole 
 Take as thou givest us blessing ; never tear 
 Shall stain for shame nor groan untune the song 
 That as a bird shall spread and fold its wings 
 Here in thy praise for ever, and fulfil 
 
i64 ERECHTHEUS 
 
 The whole world's crowning- city crowned with thee 
 As the sun's eye fulfils and crowns with sig-ht 
 The circling- crown of heaven. There is no g-rief 
 Great as the joy to be made one in will 
 With him that is the heart and rule of life 
 And thee, God born of God ; thy name is ours, 
 And thy larg-e grace more g-reat than our desire. 
 
 CHORUS 
 
 From the depth of the springs of my spirit a fountain 
 is poured of thanksgiving, 
 My country, my mother, for thee, 
 That thy dead for their death shall have life in thy 
 sight and a name everliving 
 At heart of thy people to be 
 In the darkness of change on the waters of time they 
 
 shall turn from afar 
 To the beam of this dawn for a beacon, the light of 
 
 these pyres for a star. 
 They shall see thee who love and take comfort, who 
 hate thee shall see and take warning, 
 Our mother that makest us free ; 
 And the sons of thine earth shall have help of the 
 Waves that made war on their morning, 
 And friendship and fame of the sea. 
 
NOTES 
 
 ▼• 497-503. Ct Eurip. Fr. Erechtheuit 46-49^ 
 
 V. 522-530. Id. 32-40, 
 
 V. 778. ^sch. Supp. 524-6. 
 
 V. 983. Soph. Fr. {Oreithyia) 055. 
 
 vTfip re icivTOv raw* hf faxcera x^ovbt 
 
 vvKTos Tc 7n/7cts oi/pavov r ayatervx^t 
 
 ^olfiov vaXaihv Krjvov. 
 V. 1163. ^sch. Fr. (Daiiaides) 38. 
 
 Ofifipos S' air' fiiydfvTos oipecvov vtcribp 
 
 tKwre ytuay. 
 V. 1 168. Id. 
 
 BeySp&ris Sipa S* Ik votI^ovtos yifunt 
 
 Te\ei6s iari, 
 V. I749> ' God bom of God* Soph. Ant, 854. 0r(s r«i tvH itoyewiis. 
 
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