University of Virginia Library

THE TRIUMPH FOR SALAMIS.

The Sea-shore of Attica opposite Salamis: Two Choruses, one of Athenian Youths, the other of Athenian Virgins, circling the Trophy.
BOTH CHORUSES.
Joy, Athene—let thy hymns,
Tempest-voiced, exulting rise,
Virgin choirs and bounding youths
Shout thy triumphs to the skies;
Good is of the mighty Gods;
Mortals it becometh well
All their joy and thankful praise
Thus in holy songs to tell.
Shout we then a song of gladness
Unto earth and sky and sea;
To the eternal ones our praises
Hymn we—red from victory.

CHORUS OF YOUTHS.
Hark—the measured tramp
Of armëd feet I hear;
Comes the billowy toss of crests,
The gleam of many a spear.
Hark!
Through the gorges of Taurus
The countless hosts pour;
Lo, Sardis hath feasted
And rolled on the war;
Over Helle's bridged billows
The horror accurst,
Over Thrace's fierce borders
The tempest hath burst;
Through wild Macedonia
The deluge hath swept,
And trampled Pieria
Its ravage hath wept;
Base terror Bœotia
And Argolis know;
Thessalia is swelling
The hosts of the foe;
Shakes the earth with their tramp;
With their oars foams the sea;
Yet dareth Athene
To boast her the free?

CHORUS OF VIRGINS.
Woe—woe, Athene, woe!
Crouched for his spring comes stealing on the foe;
Wrath's red right arm is lifted up to slay;
Who save the Gods its threatening fall may stay,
Who save the gracious Gods may shield thee from the blow?
Woe—woe, Athene, woe!
Hark! it comes—the storm of war,
Clang of mail and clash of spear,
Swelling on with deepening roar;
Fear behind—before it, fear;
Lo! the brazen waves of shields,
Surge on surge, along they pour;
Blazing towns and ruined fields
Groan the march of Asia's war;
There the chariots' thunder's rolled;
Crested Media's spears are there;
There the Persians' helms of gold
Throng with dread the trembling air.
From the glare of Afric's sands,
Far to farthest India's coasts,
Swarm the tongues of myriad lands,
Mingling in the mighty hosts;
Far from reedy Oxus' tide,
Wandering Scythia's tribes have come;
Hosts of Thebes—the Nile's great pride,
Swell the unnumbered nations' hum.
And he whom all obey,
High on yon ivory car
Whose gems burn back the fiery glare of day,
He comes—the Great King—like to Gods in sway;
Who—who shall dare his onward road to bar,
Who from his wrath shall shield his destined prey?
Woe—woe, Athene, woe!

CHORUS OF YOUTHS.
Yet this unto the wise is known,
Who loftiest stand are marked to fall;
The envious thrones of Heaven for ruin single all
Whose mortal state has quaffed unmingled good alone.
Lo, blown with swelling pride,
Unknowing aught of ill,
Along the current of their life they ride
Exultant—blind to what the breakers hide,
Till dashed upon the rocks, with awe the wise they fill,
Telling how mortal good with ill is mingled still.
So should the prosperous tread
Their way with trembling dread
Nor with insensate pride
Misfortune dare deride,
Beyond whose hate are none except the untroubled dead.
Shall he then 'scape whom power hath taught,
Insane beyond the flight of thought,
To hurl his insults 'gainst the throned Gods?
O'er him the Thunderer nods
Ruin, and on his state
Shame and destruction wait,
And swift he headlong falls, the mock of vengeful fate.

CHORUS OF VIRGINS.
Ah, thrice unhappy we,
Wretches to whom 'twas given
To writhe beneath the heaviest doom of fate!
Land of our birth, to see
Thy dwellers from thee driven,
Thy pleasant homes in flames—thy cities desolate,
Sounding the strangers' tread—prey of the strangers' hate;
O miserable day
That tore our grief away
From the green sun-bathed haunts where we no more might dwell!
O Earth!—O Heaven! ye saw,
With woe and shuddering awe,
Temple and shrine crash down, loved of the Gods so well.
Where's now each murmuring grove
Through whose dim shadowy depths the wood-dove's wail
Stole softly clear,
Where our young feet so long had loved to rove
What time the plaint of the lorn nightingale
Through the hushed night to hear,
The floating moon paused 'mid her radiance pale!
In vain—in vain
The swallow seeks the well-known nested eaves;
The happy homestead, hid in sheltering leaves,
No foot shall tread again;
Where green it stood but ashes heaped remain.
Hewn are the fruitful trees;
The bunched vines uptorn;
In fields that plenty heaped, sits want forlorn,
And nought around but desolation sees;
Mourn—mourn, Athene, mourn!

CHORUS OF YOUTHS.
Hence afar be sadness,
Thought of woe and pain;
Thrilled be all with gladness;
Joy be every strain;
What though, accursed of God,
The fell barbarian trod,
Unsparing, hill and plain,
Loosed was the fury on his track;
His bloody due he might not lack;
Triumph and vengeance unto us remain.
Joy—joy exultant swells
The laurelled hymn that tells
The wonders of our might;
Trumpet-voiced, it burns to shout
Vaunting Asia's hideous rout
And Salamis' red fight.
Io Pæan—on they sweep;
Foams with wrath the angry deep
Beneath their flashing oars;
Io Pæan—fierce the song
Bursts our gallies' ranks along;
Loud Io Pæan, shout the fierce exulting shores.
Swift, brazen beaks on beaks
Dash roaring and with shrieks
And wreck and gurgling groans, the war reels to and fro;
By the strong swoop of Tyre,
'Neath fierce Athene's ire,
How many a spear-thronged bark is hurled the waves below!
Hark—bathed in slaughter, where
Swart Ares fires the air
And hungering still to slay, grim, thunders through the roar;
And see not human eyes
Your more than mortal size,
Ye sprung of ancient Telamon, amid the hurtling war?
Thou sea beneath us spread,
Flesh-gorged, with victory red,
How burden we your waves with heaps of ghastly slain!
Buckler and helm of gold,
How are they plunging rolled
Adown thy stormy depths, O ever-sounding main!
Io Pæan—on their prey
Loosed are the avengers now,
Choking gory gulf and bay
With broken oar and shattered prow;
Wedged within the crowded strait,
Crushed, the foe but strive to fly;
Victims bound, their doom they wait;
'Mid the slaughtered press they die.
Swarthy Egypt's courage pales;
Purpled Sidon turns to flight;
With flying Caria's pirate sails
Far the ploughed Ægean's white.
Ha—heard we not them say,
Vaunt of their boastful tales,
Hellas' free strength their hands should prostrate lay,
Athene should the tyrant's breath obey?
Lo,—soon their purpose fails.

CHORUS OF VIRGINS.
Let there be weeping and a sound of woe,
Of wailing and despair;
Rending of robes—in dust a crouching low;
A scattering of bright hair.
How many in the bloom of youth we saw,
In manhood's golden prime,
Go forth, whose noble forms we see no more,
Death-stricken ere their time!
The ears of those who loved them pine in vain
To drink their stately tread;
No footfall from them shall be heard again;
Low lies each dear-loved head.
The god-like, where are they who bounded by,
The shapes whose golden hair,
Like young Apollo's, the soft breeze on high
With joy uplifted? where?
They come not back whom we had looked to see
High o'er the mighty throng,
Proud conquerors in the holy games, with glee
And triumph borne along
With linked dance and song and flashing torch,
The veiled bride we thought
For them through flower-strewn streets—through each white porch
With shouting should be brought.
The daughters of Athene who shall tell
Of their untimely fall,
So well beloved by those they loved so well,
For ever lost to all!
How will they rend their braided hair with shrieks!
For them no Phrygian flute
By Samian virgin touched, of nuptials speaks;
For them the hymn is mute.
Up to the unpitying heavens let shrieks ascend,
The cry of ceaseless woe;
Beat your white breasts—your cherished tresses rend;
Weep—in the dust lie low.
No more Ilissus by thy mazy stream,
By green Cephissus' side,
More fair than forms that haunt the maiden's dream,
Shall bound Athene's pride;
The river nymphs in many a sparry grot,
In many a dewy cave,
Swell their bright streams with tears for their sad lot
Whose limbs they loved to lave.
Dumb be the voice of love, that voice so sweet;
The tongue of joy be mute;
Let, through the dance, no snowy tinkling feet
Bound to the deep-voiced flute.
How wearily will life—how sad and slow
The drooping hours go by!
Alas—alas—of old they went not so
When those we mourn were nigh!
Oh, for the pleasant hours that never more
We now again may know!
Oh, for the vanished hours!—shrieks wildly pour,
The fondly loved lie low;
How through the city's streets the laughing throng,
Through the high tower-crowned gate,
With jest and whispered word and mingling song,
Swept on, unfearing fate!
How in the time of blossoms did we love
Far from her towers to rove,
While bent the cloudless sapphire sky above,
Through field and shadowy grove!
Then fled the winged hours lightning-sandalled by;
No more, alas, they climb
Hymettus' grassy sides or basking lie
Where haunts the bee the thyme;
No more their hands the many-tinted flowers
In wreaths sweet-scented weave
To deck their high-arched brows or garland ours;
Weep; for the fallen grieve.

CHORUS OF YOUTHS.
Wherefore mourn the dead;
In glory now they sleep;
Lulled by ocean's tread,
They slumber by the deep;
Mourn them not—mourn them not.
Fortunate alone
Are they who happy live;
Every good they own,
All the Gods can give,
The Gods in wrath may, envious, take and hapless make their lot.
Only blest are they
Who tread the earth no more;
Their last their happiest day;
Their chance of evil o'er;
Beyond misfortune's utmost reach, in life o'ershadowing all.
But who, oh who as they are blest,
The loved of heaven—the band
Who smiling sank to endless rest
While battling for their land,
Rejoicing 'mid the storm of fight in freedom's cause to fall?
Tell me not of life's sweet pleasures,
Thrilling love and maddening wine;
Who such joys with glory measures?
Who to change them would repine,
Nor for all after-coming time, life's few short years resign?
What is life? a feverish dream;
Pleasures? shadows fleeting by;
Blest his lot who would not deem,
Grasping deathless fame, to die,
And in his country's festal songs to live unendingly?
Life is short and onward fastly
Speed earth's dwellers towards the tomb;
Lightning feet the hour hath, lastly
Seen before we seek the gloom,
The night that haunts the nether realms and learn our endless doom.
Life is passing; death comes leaping
Towards us, beckoned on by fate;
Why goes up the voice of weeping?
Swift the end comes, soon or late,
For numbered are our earthly hours nor far their latest date.
Rejoice—we will not mourn the dead;
No tears shall dim our eyes;
Be theirs the fame for which they bled;
Our choral songs shall rise,
Our voices swell their god-like deeds in triumph to the skies.
The hurlers of the beamy spear,
The lifters of the shield,
How poured with them red flight and fear
And slaughter through the field?
Who with their resistless might
Through the thickest throng of fight
With reeking falchion, storm-like, cleft their gory crimsoned way?
What voices thundered out
As theirs, the horrid shout
That smote the warring foe with fear—with terror 'mid the fray?
When spear on buckler rung,
And the pæan from each tongue
Leapt, hurling flight and dread dismay our charging ranks before,
Who joyed as they, to pour
With the wintry ocean's roar
Upon the fierce embattled foe and plunge amid the war?
Sought we the fallen? there
We surely found them where
Was rent by howls of agony the hell of sounds in air;
The short sharp wild death-shrick,
The groan told where to seek
The lowly-laid whose battle-path was trodden by despair.

BOTH CHORUSES.
The mighty Gods are just,
The power of those who lust
To crush the guiltless and the free, they tumble to the dust;
With awe and gladness raise
The hymn of thankful praise
To those who proudest kings confound with fright and dread amaze.
Ægis-bearer—Zeus—to thee,
Lowly bending thus the knee,
At thy feet we bow;
Let—oh let our praise and prayer
Not in vain be poured in air,
Thunderer, hear us now.
God of Gods, thee, all who dwell
In the dread abyss of hell
Or ocean's depths, obey;
All the halls of heaven behold
Throned on high in burning gold,
Trembling own thy sway.
Zeus—deliverer—thee before,
Earthward bending, we adore
For all for Hellas done;
Giver thou of matchless might
In the armour-cleaving fight,
We thank for freedom won.
If the odours that uprise,
Steaming from the sacrifice,
Grateful be to thee,
Grant that all in Hellas born
Life with chains for ever scorn
And bear the future free.
And thou in thine own city's love,
Goddess, shrined all Gods above,
Pallas, to thee the many-voiced hymn
Grateful we raise
Fond offering of our praise,
Telling how in thy honour the white steer,
Flushed with wreathed blooms, the brightest of the year,
Shall quivering fall
And the thronged city hold high festival,
With incense burned to thee the white air making dim.

CHORUS OF VIRGINS.
Tread we yet a blither measure,
Timed to joy, while flute and voice
Fling abroad abounding pleasure,
Bidding earth and heaven rejoice.
See—upon the raptured sight
Bursts a vision of delight;
Gone are war and war's alarms;
Rusting are the soldier's arms;
Laughing valley—jocund hill
Song again and gladness fill;
Tasked again, the glad earth yields
Plenty to the jocund fields;
Cot and barn and homestead green
Peeping through their leaves are seen;
In the vale the anvil rings;
On the wave the fisher sings;
Morning hears the horn once more
Fright to bay the foaming boar;
Through the shadowing olive grove
Evening woos the feet of love;
Mirth and music fill the air
Home the blushing bride they bear;
Flowers again the sunshine crowd;
Orchards with their fruit are bowed;
Summer smites the clanging brass
Lest her swarming bees should pass;
Heaped upon the labouring wain,
Creaks the harvest home again;
Drunk with sport and wine and song,
Roars the vintage rout along;
Happy hours and happy earth!
All is sunshine—all is mirth,
Mirth and joys that never cease,
All the bliss that dwells with peace.

CHORUS OF YOUTHS.
Back the wild rejoicing strain
Toss we swift in joy again;
Lo—a vision too I see
Of the glory that shall be;
List—the sound is in mine ears
Of the sights of coming years;
Hark, the crowded quarries hum;
Down, the snowy blocks, they come;
Saw and chisel din the air;
Rises slow the temple fair;
On the lofty rock-hewn base,
Step and glistening floor they place;
Columns white in stately row,
Round about in beauty go;
Architrave and cornice lie
In their strength in majesty;
Colours bright as eyes behold
Streak them 'mid their shields of gold;
Hush thee, song, nor strive to tell
What no mortal hymn may swell,
Beauty unimagined; thought
Fairer than was ever wrought;
Forms that only heaven have trod,
Each an earth-created God;
From the marble's white womb rent,
Throng they frieze and pediment;
Over all, the mighty roof
Rises, glistening in the sun,
Rises, to the thunder proof,
And the wondrous work is done,
Where for aye, in praise unending,
Is the holy hymn ascending
Unto her—the azure—eyed,
Joy of Zeus—her city's guide.
Nor blind thee yet, O hymn, but with far-seeing eye
The coming glory all descry;
Mast-thronged port and towered wall;
Game and gorgeous festival;
Dionusus' stately rite
In the seated city's sight,
While the laurelled victory
Mightiest bards with contest buy,
And in lofty verse are told
Deeds of heroes—woes of old,
And gods and god-like forms with awe their eyes behold.

BOTH CHORUSES.
Thine, Hellas, is glory
All glory transcending,
Till earth's brightest story,
Till time have an ending,
Till dim grow the memory of all, lustre lending
The world's mighty being,
Till o'er the past flow
The future, unseeing
The deeds hid below,
The glory of Hellas—the shame of her foe.
And thou of fair lands
That engirdle thee round
The fairest—where stands,
Over all high-renowned,
Ionian Athene—through earth sweeps the sound
Of thy triumphs, high swelling,
Swift-leaping along;
The nations are telling
Thy glory in song,
And tongues that thou know'st not thy praises prolong.
Enshrined in the wonder
Of strangers afar
That broad regions sunder,
Thy mighty deeds are;
When the gloom of the past shall be round thee, thou star,
The robe of their fame thou
Shalt wear and the light
That haloes thy name, thou
Shalt flash down the night,
Till with awe the earth's dwellers bow down in thy sight.