SCENE III.
SICILIAN SEA.
(Nereids sing.)
Strophe.
Far off the storms were dying;
The Sea-nymphs and Sea-gods
On new-lulled billows lying,
With tridents and pearl-rods:
Upon their sliding thrones
And beds of waving waters
Reclined august, old Ocean's sons,
And the choir of his foam-white daughters.
Antistrophe.
Into their deep conchs blowing,
They smoothed the scowling waves,
And the great sea-music forth flowing
Was echoed in glassy caves.
There was no sound but song
Save now and then far under,
When an ocean monster streamed along
With a roll of Ocean's thunder.
Epode.
Then Iris, lightly dropping,
Leaped from her cloudy screen,
And lit on a wave down-sloping
In floods of crimson-green:
A moment its neck she trod,
And cried, ‘The Gods of Heaven
Are coming to feast with the Ocean-God,
So Jove has sworn, this even.’
GLAUCE.
Fair Sisters, ocean-cradled, wave-revered!
Holds not this evening well the morning's pledge?
Salt gust no more; nor airy arc, down-showering
Into the dim green, rain of sunny gems
Or crowns celestial; crystal chasm no more
By harsh winds crushed to murmuring foam abysses;
But, wide o'er all, a plenitude of light
Serene as that which sits on Jove's great brow;
And breeze as equable as Juno's breath.
AUTONOE.
And, Sisters, mark! along yon opal Heaven,
And sea of agate and chalcedony
The promised pageant spreads. We shall behold
The mighty head of Jove, rich-tressed, supreme,
Sacred and strong and fair and venerable,
With golden sceptre and obedient eagle:
And we shall gaze on Juno's large mild eyes,
And the sea-born Queen of Beauty, her who runs
Over the swelling hearts of Gods and men
As Thetis glides over the ocean waves;
And, dearer still to us, the graceful form
Of Hebe, solitary nymph of Heaven,
Alone among the Gods and yet not lonely.
Thus Iris spake.
EUDORA.
Fair Iris! dropped she then
This morn from Heaven, her ocean spoils to gather?
I knew it not, for on the Libyan sands
All day I rolled a great smooth shell, too great
To clasp or carry: but my tears are past,
Since we shall gaze upon high Gods.
GLAUCE.
Lo, there!
How the red west inflames the deep! Methinks
That merry God, conqueror of many a land,
His banners over ocean too is waving;
To Britain will he drive us, end of earth?
See, I have dropped my bracelet!
AUTONOE.
Over ocean
That God advances; dark-rimmed Naxian shores
Already with his tendril nets are swathed,
Yea and the Naxian billows; all day long
We toss them backward from our foam-white bosoms,
And beds of billows, to their beds of sand.
EUDORA.
And maids of earth he mocks at worse than us.
Last eve, by yonder meadow I was floating,
Pillowing my cheek upon a sleepy wave,
And hearkening to an inland pipe remote,
When suddenly the purpled shore resounded
With tumult harsh; and concourse I beheld
Of Wood-gods on the sands, leaping and laughing!
And why? because a gentle maid of earth
That with her mortal playmate had been straying,
Beneath the bank, oppressed perhaps with sleep,
(Who knows? I know not), when she thought not of it,
In vine-nets prisoned lay: The Wood-gods mocked!
Bacchus such puissance hath—
GLAUCE.
How wretched those
That dwell on Earth! alas, I pity them!
On that rough, heavy, element opaque
What lovely light can glimmer? None can tell
Wherefore the high Gods shaped the hump-backed Earth!
EUDORA.
Nay, Sister, when the forests slant as now
From the round mountains to the wine-black sea,
And Phœbus on their gold and vermeil roof
Looks brightly, while the winds rush under them,
Then hath the Earth her beauty—yea, a gleam
Like our Autonoe, when her sun-loved tresses
Upon a green rock loosening she flings forth,
Laughing, into some monster's briny eyes.
AUTONOE.
You speak well, Sister, courteous like the Gods;
And blossoming fruit-trees, spangled with sea spray,
Are fair indeed at sunrise: Earth hath gleams,
As Nubian slaves their gems; yet how forlorn
And like a slave's her downcast countenance!
Her hues are not like ocean's, coloured lights,
But coloured shades, dim shadows painted o'er;
Yea and the motions of her trees and harvests
Resemble those of slaves, reluctant, slow,
By outward force compelled; not like our billows,
Springing elastic in impetuous joy,
Or indolently swayed.
EUDORA.
Not less o'erawed
Are those that dwell on Earth, harsh-speaking Mortals.
One eve, it chanced, into a glen I wandered,
In garb a boy: unwonted weight I felt;
The shades moved not; dull odours thronged the air;
Up from the ground a dense, blunt sound was rushing;
All creatures ranged, as though beneath their feet
Down to earth's centre chains unseen were hung,
And languid browsed as from necessity,
Not joy, their faint sighs leaving on the grass.
All things were sad; sadly I wandered on
To where there lay a something large and black,
And panting; some Immortal deeming it,
With reverence I was passing, when, behold!
Hard by there stood a company of Mortals,
Wailing; and myrrh on myrrh, and oil on oil,
O'er it in grief they flung; it was a pyre.
Homeward I turned abashed, and weeping much
For Man's unhappy race, so fair, yet sad,
By Jove's great wrath oppressed and shame of death.
Yes, and weep still; for know you, gentle Sisters,
Though Gods themselves should dwell upon the Earth,
Grief they must feel; the affliction men call love,
Or hunger, or the grave.
AUTONOE.
Down, Sisters, down!
In sorrow footing the bright ocean-way
I see that form half human, all divine:
'Tis Ceres; plunge we down! No nymph she loves
Save her child's mates.
GLAUCE.
Yea, and of those is jealous.
