University of Virginia Library

Beneath a tree, whose heaped-up burthen swayed
In the high wind, and made a hustling sound,
As of a distant host that scale a hill,
Hormetes and Encolyon gravely sat,
Sometimes they spake aloud, then murmured low,
Then paused as if perplexed,—looked round and snuffed
The odour of wood-fires in the fresh forest air,—
And then again addressed them to their theme.
Of cloudy-brained Orion they discoursed,
Lost to companionship, and led by dreams.

‘Once,’ said Hormetes, ‘he was great on earth;
A worker in iron, and a hunter fleet
Who oft ran down the stag; when, by some chance,
He pleaseth Artemis, and in her train,
All his high worth resigning, and his friends,
Dwindles to suit her fancy, and becomes
A giant of lost mind.’ Encolyon thrust
His heavy heel into the soil, and spake
With serious gesture. ‘Ever Orion sought
Some new device, some hateful onward deed
Through strange ways hurrying, scorning wise delay.
A victim fell he soon to Artemis
And her cold spells, for of his Ocean-sire
Orion's soul hath many a headlong tide.
But most of all her gleamy illusions fell
Upon his mind, which soon became a maze
For ghostly wanderings, and wild echoes heard
Through mists; and none could comprehend his speech.’

‘Methought the orgie had recalled his sense,
So fairly he bespake us to the mirth;
So full and giant-like was his disport
Throughout the night,’ Hormetes now rejoined.
Encolyon raised one hand:—‘That orgie's waste
Of energies,’ he murmured, ‘and the hours
Far better given to rest, I much deplore.
Why joined I in the mirth?—how was I lost!
But when a regulated mind sedate,
Its perfect poise permits to waver aside
One tittle, certainly the man must fall
Somewhat in dignity, howe'er retrieved.
Hence, when a regulated’—Here his speech
Hormetes interrupted hastily,
Since, for his share, no self-reproach felt he.
‘I say the orgie, and his high disport,
Showed in Orion some return to sense:
And when next morn I saw him near a brook,
Where I had stooped to drink—by him unseen—
Down ran he like a panther close pursued,
Then stopped and listened—now looked up on high—
Now stared into the brook as he would drink,
And drain its ripplings to the last white stone—
Then went away forgetful. This methought,
E'en by its wildness and its strenuous throes,
Savoured of hope, and of his safe return
To corporal sense, by shaking off these nets
Of moonbeams from his soul; but when I rose
And crossed his path, and bade him speak to me,
Again 't was all of vapour and dark thoughts,
Unlike the natural thoughts of bone and thews,
As we of yore were taught, and found enough
For all our needs, and for our songs and prayers.
Yet had he, as it seemed, some plan within,
And ever tended to some central point
In some place—nought more could I understand:
Wherefore I deem that he is surely mad.’
‘And so deem I,’ rejoined Encolyon:
‘Ever advancing—working a new way—
Tasking his heart, forgetful of his life
And present good—of madness the sure sign.’

While thus they talked, Harpax with speed approached,
Shouting his tidings—‘Meropé loves Orion—
Orion hath gone mad for Meropé!’
The twain who had erewhile the cause discerned,
And signs of reason's loss, at this fresh news,
So little dreamed of from his recent mood,
A minute looked each other in the face
With sheep-like gravity, then backward sank
Against the tree, loud laughing. ‘This were good,’
Checking his laughter with a straight-lined face,
Encolyon said, ‘if not too deeply burning,
And that a power he hold within himself
To pause at will.’ But Harpax quick rejoined,
‘I, for myself, would have this Meropé,
And force Oinopion render up his crown,
If ye will aid me.’ ‘We will give our aid,’
Hormetes cried—‘and yet methinks this love
Affecting doubly, as by the self-same blow,
Might from some spells in the orgie-fumes arise?
Ye marked, wise Akinetos would not move.’
‘Doubtless 't was wise,’ Encolyon said. ‘More care
Befits our steps.’ They rose and strode away.

There is a voice that floats upon the breeze
From a heathed mountain; voice of sad lament
For love left desolate ere its fruits were known,
Yet by the memory of its own truth sweetened,
If not consoled. To this Orion listens
Now, while he stands within the mountain's shade.

‘The scarf of gold you sent to me, was bright
As any streak on cloud or sea, when morn
Or sunset light most lovely strives to be.
But that delicious hour can come no more,
When, on the wave-lulled shore, mutely we sat,
And felt love's power, which melted in fast dews
Our being and our fate, as doth a shower
Deep foot-marks left upon a sandy moor.
We thought not of our mountains and our streams,
Our birth-place, and the home of our life's date,
But only of our dreams—and heaven's blest face.
Never renew thy vision, passionate lover—
Heart-rifled maiden—nor the hope pursue,
If once it vanish from thee; but believe
'T is better thou shouldst rue this sweet loss ever
Than newly grieve, or risk another chill
On false love's icy river, which betraying
With mirrors bright to see, and voids beneath,
Its broken spell should find no faith in thee.’

Thus sang a gentle Oread, who had loved
A River-god with gold-reflecting streams,
But found him all too cold—while yet she stood
Scarce ankle-deep—and droopingly retired
To sing of fond hopes past. Orion's hand
A jewelled armlet held, whereon his eyes
Earnestly rested. By a lovely boy,
Smiling, 't was brought to him while he reclined
Desponding, o'er a rock. ‘This gift, still warm,
My mistress sends thee, giant son of Ocean,
Once having seen thee in the hunting train
Of Artemis. Her name, if thou wouldst know,
Is Meropé, daughter of Chios' king,
The proud Oinopion, lord of a hundred ships.’

Orion to the palace of the king
Forthwith departed. Meropé once seen,
His eyes resign their clear external power.
And see through feeling, utterly possessed
With her rare image; and his deep desire,
Deeper by energies so long confused,
When half his earth-born nature was subdued,
Struggled and bounded onward to the goal.

Her beauty awed the common race of men.
Her's was a shape made for a serpent dance,
Which charmed to stillness and to burning dreams,
But she herself the illusive charm o'erruled
As doth an element, merging for a time,
Ne'er lost; and none could steadily confront
Her sphynx-like bosom, and high watchful head.
Dark were her eyes, and beautiful as Death's,
With a mysterious meaning, such as lurks
In that pale Ecstasy, the Queen of Shades.
All deemed her passion was a mortal flame,
Volcanic, corporal, ending with its hour
Of sacrifice, dissolving in fine air;
Save one bald sage, who said that human nerves,
And what they wrought, were wondrous as the mind,
And in the eye of Zeus none could decide
Which held the higher place. For, to the nerves
Perfect abstraction and pure bliss belonged,
As parent of all life, and might in death
Continuance through some subtler medium find,—
Whence, life renewed, and heaven at length attained.

Nought of this sage's lore recked Meropé,
And, for Orion, he was sick of thought,
Save that which round his present object played
Delicious gambols and high phantasies.
Together they, the groves and templed glades
That, like old Twilight's vague and gleamy abode,
In mist and maze clung round the palace towers,
Roved, mute with passion's inward eloquence.
They loitered near the founts that sprang elate
Into the dazzled air, or pouring rolled
A crystal torrent into oval shapes
Of blood-veined marble; and oft gazed within
Profoundly tranquil and secluded pools,
Whose lovely depths of mirrored blackness clear—
Oblivion's lucid-surfaced mystery—
Their earnest faces and enraptured eyes
Visibly, and to each burning heart, revealed.
‘And art thou mine to the last gushing drop
Of these high throbbing veins?’ each visage said.
Orion straightway sought Oinopion's court,
And his life's service to the gloomy king
He proffered for the hand of Meropé.

Oinopion strode about his pillared hall,
And the dun chequers of its marble floor
Counted perplexed, while pondering his reply.
Orion's strength and giant friends he feared;
Nor to accept the alliance, nor refuse,
Seemed wise. Thereto, Poseidon's empire rolled
Too near, and might surround his towers with waves;
Wherefore the king a double face assumed.
‘Orion, I consent,’ mildly he said:
‘Thy service I accept, and to thee give,
When thou shalt have performed it, Meropé.
Clear me our Chios of its savage beasts,
Dragon and hippogrif, wolves, serpents dire,
Within six days, and Meropé is thine.’

Through the high palace-gates Orion passed,
Speeding to seek strong aid for this hard task
Among his forest friends. Old memories
Slumbrously hung above the purple line
Of distance, to the east, while odorously
Glistened the tear-drops of a new-fallen shower;
And sunset forced its beams through strangling boughs,
Gilding green shadows, till it blazed athwart
The giant-caves, and touched with watery fires
The heavy foot-marks which had plashed the sward
On vacant paths, through foliaged vistas steep,
Where gloom was mellowing to a grand repose.
At intervals, as from beneath the ground,
Far in the depth of these primeval cells,
Low respirations came. There, in great shade,
The Giants sleep. Lost sons are they of Time.

There is no hour when rest is sacred held
By him who works and builds; and eve and night,
Alike with day, his toil oft-times will claim.
‘Awake, companions! 'tis Orion calls!’
And straight the giants rose, and came to him,
Save Akinetos, into whose low cave
They with a torch now entered, there to hold
The conference, for he was very wise,
And ne'er proposed, nor did a thing that failed.

Orion's tale is told; Hormetes then
For Meropé proposed fair lots to draw,
Whereat Orion glared,—but speech refrained
When Harpax fiercely on Hormetes turned
With loud reproach, since he had sworn to him
Far different purpose; so Orion smiled,
And of Rhexergon and Biastor sought
Aid in his heavy task. They promised this—
When each one, by an arm, Encolyon
Grasped, and reminded of the darkness. ‘Night
Is the fit time,’ Orion cried, ‘to dig
The pitfalls, throw up mounds with bristling stakes
At top, as barriers, and the nets and toils
Fix and prepare, and choose our clubs and spears.’
But still Encolyon urged a day's delay,
For dignity of movements thus combined,
If not for need. To Akinetos now
All turned with reverence, waiting the result
Of silent wisdom and of calm profound;
But from these small things he had long withdrawn
His godlike mind, and was again abstract.

Orion took the torch, and led the way
Into the dark damp air. Each to his post
Assigning; one, for the chief mountain pass,
Soon as the grey dawn touched the highest peaks;
One, in the plains below; two, for the woods;
The while Biastor and himself would range
The island, driving to the centre all
That should escape their spears. 'T was thus resolved.
Meantime, Rhexergon and Biastor joined
Orion, who went forth to dig the pits,
Break down high tops of trees, and weave their boughs
In barrier walls, and fix sharp stakes on mounds
And river banks. When they were gone, a yell,
Mocking the wild beasts doomed to be destroyed,
Harpax sent forth. ‘Mine be the task,’ he said,
‘To ravage the King's pastures—slay his bulls—
And into our own woods and meadows drive
His goats and stags.’ ‘Rather collect alive,’
Hormetes interposed, ‘with strong-meshed nets,
All the mad beasts, and loose them suddenly
Within Oinopion's palace! That were sport
Worthy our toil; small joy for us to aid
Orion's freaks for love of Meropé,—
Whom yet, methinks, he wisely hath preferred
To crystal-bosomed, wintry Artemis,—
Pale huntress, exiled from our sunny woods,
With crescent trembling bloody in eclipse,
Had my will power—’ ‘But all her nymphs detained,
And, like our vines, of the ripe golden fruit
Deep rifled through their leaves,’ Harpax rejoined:
‘Or placed,’ Encolyon muttered to himself,
‘On pedestals, until they changed to stone,’—
And something worse he said, not safe to tell;—
‘All votive statues to the Goddess famed
For cruel purity and marble heart!—’
Hormetes shouted, staring up on high.

All this heard Artemis, who o'er the caves
Rolled her faint orb before the coming dawn,
In lonely sadness; and with an inward cry
Of jealous anguish and of vengeful ire,
Like an electric spark that knows not space,
Shot from her throne into the eastern heaven.

The Sun-god's tresses o'er the whirling reins
That scarcely ruled the swift-ascending steeds,
Fell, like a golden torrent, while his head,
Answering his goddess sister's brief request,
Smiling, he bowed,—and the clouds closed behind
His blazing wheels. Four of those giants' sires
Were gods, who with their earth-born sons might hold
Communion; wherefore Artemis, alone,
Deemed not her power sufficed for safe revenge;
Of which now sure, her course to earth she bent.

The night-work done, his friends Orion left
Their further preparations to complete,
And to the caves returned, hopeful that now
The others would assist. There sat the three,
Listening the slow speech of Encolyon,
Who with change-hating eyes, fixed on the earth,
Discoursed, and to Orion's anxious looks
Thus made reply:—‘We have resolved to give
Our utmost aid—or aid that may suffice,—
In furtherance of thy task, which many days
Rightly requires.’ ‘Six days,’ Orion said,—
And turned to go; when Harpax interposed:
‘Be it then six, but our conditions hear.
Take Meropé, thy prize; the rest be ours.
Oinopion's kingdom we shall duly share,
And make Encolyon king, as fitted best
For cares of state and governance of men.’
‘Not altogether King,’ Encolyon said
With meekness—‘but, in sooth, I would return
Among mankind, and dictate to small towns.’

Orion answered, ‘This were breach of faith
In me; the King and all his subjects, still
Must as I found them rest, until he die;
Then, as ye will, among ye take the crown,
Which, having Meropé, I ne'er shall claim.
Away now to our work!’ Hormetes rose.
‘This we accept,’ he said, ‘for brief is life
Of man—and insecure. But further thought
Should prompt us rather choose Encolyon
As guiding minister and staid high priest,
While Akinetos rule as Chios' king.’

At mention of the name so reverenced,
Silently all assented. ‘See, the light
Of day spreads warmly down the valley slopes!’
Orion cried. Now Phoibos through the cave
Sent a broad ray! Harpax arose, and then,—
Pondering on rules for safest monarchy,—
Encolyon heavily. The solar beam
Filled the great cave with radiance equable,
And not a cranny held one speck of shade.
A moony halo round Orion came,
As of some pure protecting influence,
While with intense light glared the walls and roof,
The heat increasing. The three giants stood
With glazing eyes, fixed. Terribly the light
Beat on the dazzled stone, and the cave hummed
With reddening heat, till the red hair and beard
Of Harpax showed no difference from the rest,
Which once were iron-black. The sullen walls
Then smouldered down to steady oven-heat,
Like that with care attained when bread has ceased
Its steaming, and displays an angry tan.
The appalled faces of the giants showed
Full consciousness of their immediate doom!
And soon the cave a potter's furnace glowed,
Or kiln for largest bricks, and thus remained
The while Orion, in his halo clasped
By some invisible power, beheld the clay,
Of these his early friends, change. Life was gone!

Now sank the heat—the cave-walls lost their glare—
The red lights faded, and the halo pale
Around him, into chilly air expanded.
There stood the three great images, in hue
Of chalky white and red, like those strange shapes
In Egypt's regal tombs;—but presently
Each visage and each form with cracks and flaws
Was seamed, and the lost countenance brake up,
As, with brief toppling, forward prone they fell,—
And, in dismay, uttering a sudden cry,
Orion headlong from the cavern fled!

Fierce Harpax, and wind-steered Hormetes, reft
Of life thus early, may by few be wept;
But long laments by the chief rulers made,
Of Chios, for the sage Encolyon,
Far echoed, and still echo through the world—
Which feels, e'en now, for his great principle
A secret reverence. ‘Chainer of the wheel!
Hater of all new things!—to whom the acts
Of men seemed erring ever in each hope
And effort to advance, save in a round,
Taught by the high example of the spheres!—
Oh champion grave, who with a boundary stone
Stood'st in improvement's door-way like a god,
Ready by wholesome chastisement to grant
Crushing protection; regulator old
Of science, scorning genius and its dreams,
And all the first ideas and germs of things,—
Time and his broods of children shall prolong
Thy fame, thy maxims, and thy practice staid,
Fraught with experience turning on itself.’

O'er the far rocks, midst gorge and glen profound;
Now from close thickets, now from grassy plains;
The sounds of raging contest, flight and death,
Told where Rhexergon and Biastor wrought
Their well-directed work. Them, quickly joined
Their head in this destruction, and ere night,
Huge forms, ferocious, mighty in the dawn,
When hoar rime glistened on each hairy shape,
Nought fearing, swift, brimfull of raging life,
Lay stiffening in black pools of jellied gore.
Nor with the day ceased their tremendous task,
But all night long Orion led the way
Through moonless passes to most secret lairs,
Where in their deep abodes fierce monsters crouched—
Dragons, and sea-beasts, and compounded forms,—
And in the pitchy blackness madly huddling,
Midst deafening yells and hisses they were slain.

Next day the unabated toil displayed
Like prowess and result; but with the eve
Fatigue o'ercame the giants, and they slept.
Dense were the rolling clouds, starless the glooms,
But o'er a narrow rift, once drawn apart,
Showing a field remote of violet hue,
The high Moon floated, and her downward gleam
Shone on the upturned giant faces. Rigid
Each upper feature, loose the nether jaw;
Their arms cast wide with open palms; their chests
Heaving like some large engine. Near them lay
Their bloody clubs with dust and hair begrimed,
Their spears and girdles, and the long-noosed thongs.
Artemis vanished; all again was dark.

With day's first streak Orion rose, and loudly
His prone companions called. But still they slept.
Again he shouted; yet no limb they stirred,
Though scarcely seven strides distant. He approached,
And found the spot, so sweet with clover-flower
When they had cast them down, was now arrayed
With many-headed poppies, like a crowd
Of dusky Ethiops in a magic cirque,
Which had sprung up beneath them in the night,
And all entranced the air. Orion paced
Around their listless bodies thoughtfully.
‘Three giants slain outright by Phoibos' beams,—
Now hath a dead sleep fallen on my friends.
'T was wise in Akinetos not to move.’
An earthquake would not wake them. Artemis
Rejoices, and the hopes of Meropé,
To whom the news a breathless shepherd bore,
Throbbed fearfully suspended o'er the brink
Of this event. Not long Orion paused:
‘Though all may fail, the utmost shall be tried:
Secure is he who on himself relies.’
This, hastening to his work, was all he said.

Four days remain. Fresh trees he felled, and wove
More barriers and fences; inaccessible
To fiercest charge of droves, and to o'erleap
Impossible. These walls he so arranged,
That to a common centre each should force
The flight of those pursued; and from that centre
Diverged three outlets. One, the wide expanse,
Which from the rocks and inland forests led;
One, was the clear-skied windy gap above
A precipice; the third, a long ravine,
Which, through steep slopes, down to the sea-shore ran
Winding, and then direct into the sea.

Two days remain. Orion, in each hand
Waving a torch, his course at night began,
Through wildest haunts and lairs of savage beasts.
With long-drawn howl before him trooped the wolves—
The panthers, terror-stricken—and the bears,
With wonder and gruff rage; from desolate crags,
Leering hyænas, griffin, hippogrif,
Skulked, or sprang madly, as the tossing brands
Flashed through the midnight hollows and cold nooks,
Sudden as fire from flint; o'er crashing thickets,
With crouched head and curled fangs, dashed the wild boar,
Gnashing forth on with reckless impulses,
While the clear-purposed fox crept closely down
Into the underwood, to let the storm,
Whate'er its cause, pass over. Through dark fens,
Marshes, green rushy swamps, and margins reedy,
Orion held his way,—and rolling shapes
Of serpent and of dragon moved before him
With high-reared crests, swan-like yet terrible,
And often looking back with gem-like eyes.
All night Orion urged his rapid course
In the vexed rear of the swift-droving din,
And when the dawn had peered, the monsters all
Were hemmed in barriers. These he now o'erheaped
With fuel through the day, and when again
Night darkened, and the sea a gulf-like voice
Sent forth, the barriers at all points he fired,
Midst prayers to Hephaistos and his Ocean-sire.

Soon as the flames had eaten out a gap
In the great barrier fronting the ravine
That ran down to the sea, Orion grasped
Two blazing boughs; one high in air he raised,
The other with its roaring foliage trailed
Behind him as he sped. Onward the droves
Of frantic creatures with one impulse rolled
Before this night-devouring thing of flames,
With multitudinous voice and downward sweep
Into the sea, which now first knew a tide,
And, ere they made one effort to regain
The shore, had caught them in its flowing arms,
And bore them past all hope. The living mass,
Dark heaving o'er the waves resistlessly,
At length, in distance, seemed a circle small,
Midst which, one creature in the centre rose,
Conspicuous in the long red quivering gleams
That from the dying brands streamed o'er the waves.
It was the oldest dragon of the fens,
Whose forky flag-wings and horn-crested head
O'er crags and marshes regal sway had held;
And now he rose up, like an embodied curse
From all the doomed, fast sinking—some just sunk—
Looked land-ward o'er the sea, and flapped his vans,
Until Poseidon drew them swirling down.

Along the courts and lofty terraces,
Within Oinopion's palace echoing,
The choral voices and triumphal clang
Of music, ordered by the royal maid,
Advanced to greet Orion. She with flushed neck
And arms; large eyes of flashing jet and fire,
And raven tresses fallen from their bands,
The loud procession led. But soon they met
A phalanx armed with mandate from the king,
And all the triumph ceased. Oinopion then
Gnawed on his lip, and gathered up his robe
In one large knot. Forthwith the whispering guards
His daughter to the strongest tower convey;
Then silently return. Orion comes:
‘The work is done, O King! and Meropé,
My bride, I claim—my second father thou!’
This said, he bent his knee. With wandering eye,—
Like one who seems to seek within the air
An object, while his thoughts would gather tiem.
For guile—and with averted face, the king
Answered, ‘Thou claim'st too soon!’ and inwardly
Oinopion said, ‘Three of his giant friends
Are dead; the others spell-bound sleep.’ The voice
Of wronged Orion rose within the hall,
Demanding Meropé; but image-like,
Hard as if hewn out from a flinty cliff,
And stately, stood the king, as he replied,
‘She waits the voice of our mute oracles.’

In a deep forest, where the night-black spires
Of pines begin to swing, and breathe a dirge
Whose pauses are filled up with yearning tones
Of oaks, that few external throes display
Midst their robust unyielding boughs—the winds
Are flying now in gusts, and soon a storm
Bursts howling through them, like a Fury sent
In quest of one who hath outstripped his fate,
And been caught up to heaven. But no escape
Or premature release his course attends
Whose passions boil above mortality;
Nor till those mortal struggles have transpired
Can satisfaction or repose be found.
Vainly shall he, with self-deluding pride
Of weakness, masked with power, seek solitude
And high remoteness from his fellow-men,
In all their bitter littleness and strife;
Their noble efforts, suffering, martyrdom.
He conquers not who flies, except he bear
Conquest within; nor flies he who believes
The object of his passion he can grasp,
Save for design to consummate the end.

‘O raging forest, do I seek once more
Your solitude for my secure abode.?’
Orion cried, with wild arms cast abroad,
Fronting a tree whose branches lashed the air,
While its leaves showered around;—‘And shall I not
In your direct communion with the earth
And heavens, find sympathy with this branched frame
I bear, thus shaken; yet unlike your storm,
Which may be wholesome, coming from without,
And from the operative round of things,
While mine is centred in myself, and rends
But does not remedy. Let me then shun
The baleful haunts of men—worse than the beasts
Whom I have exiled, and to shadows changed—
Savage as beasts, with less of open force;
As wily, with less skill and promptitude;
As little reasoning, save for selfish ends;
Less faithful, true, and honest, than the dog;
But hypocritical, which beasts are not,
Save in the fables which men make for them!
Into myself will I henceforth retire,
And find the world I dreamed of when a child.
Nor this alone; but worlds of higher mould
And loftier attributes shall roll before
My constant contemplation, in the cave
Of Akinetos, whom at times I'll seek,
And emulate his wisdom; ever right
In never moving, more than absolute need.
Thus shall I find my solace in disdain
Of earth's inhabitants, whom through city and field
I've found sheer clay, save in the visions bright
Of Goddess, and of Nymph,—O Meropé!
And where art thou, while idly thus I rave?
Runs there no hope—no fever through thy veins,
Like that which leaps and courses round my heart?
Shall I resign thee, passion-perfect maid,
Who in mortality's most finished work
Rank'st highest—and lov'st me, even as I love?
Rather possess thee with a tenfold stress
Of love ungovernable, being denied!
'Gainst fraud what should I cast down in reply?—
What but a sword, since force must do me right,
And strength was given unto me with my birth,
In mine own hand, and by ascendancy
Over my giant brethren. Two remain,
Whom prayers to dark Hephaistos and my sire
Poseidon, shall awaken into life;
And we will tear up gates, and scatter towers,
Until I bear off Meropé. Sing on!
Sing on, great tempest! in the darkness sing!
Thy madness is a music that brings calm
Into my central soul; and from its waves
That now with joy begin to heave and gush,
The burning Image of all life's desire,
Like an absorbing fire-breath'd phantom-god,
Rises and floats!—here touching on the foam,
There hovering over it; ascending swift
Starward, then swooping down the hemisphere
Upon the lengthening javelins of the blast!
Why paused I in the palace-groves to dream
Of bliss, with all its substance in my reach?
Why not at once, with thee enfolded, whirl
Deep down the abyss of ecstasy, to melt
All brain and being where no reason is,
Or else the source of reason? But the roar
Of Time's great wings, which ne'er had driven me
By dread events, nor broken-down old age,
Back on myself, the close experience
Of false mankind, with whispers cold and dry
As snake-songs midst stone hollows, thus has taught me,—
The giant hunter, laughed at by the world,
Not to forget the substance in the dream
Which breeds it. Both must melt and merge in one.
Now shall I overcome thee, body and soul,
And like a new-made element brood o'er thee
With all devouring murmurs! Come, my love!
Come, life's blood-tempest!—come, thou blinding storm,
And clasp the rigid pine—this mortal frame
Wrap with thy whirlwinds, rend and wrestle down,
And let my being solve its destiny,
Defying, seeking, thine extremest power,—
Famished and thirsty for the absorbing doom
Of that immortal death which leads to life,
And gives a glimpse of Heaven's parental scheme.’

In parching summer, when the mulberry-leaves
Drooped broad and gleaming, and the myrtles curled,
While the pomegranate's rind grew thin and hard,
The vegetation of the isle looked pale,
Flaccid, and fading in despondency
For rain, and the young corn in every field,
With dry and rustling murmur as it waved,
Glistened impatiently, till autumn's tomb
Received the husky voice, and spring's dead hopes.
The vine-hills, and wild turpentines that grew
Along the road beneath, all basked content,
As did the lentisk-trees; but many a pant
And sultry sigh came from the fields and meads,
The city's gardens, where no fountains played,
And hot stone temples in the sacred groves.
Such lack of moisture oft had been endured,
And even the latest winter, whose thick breath
Solemnly wafted o'er the Ægean sea,
Had not resigned a single peak of snow
To melt and flow down for the brooks of spring.

But since the breath of spring had stirred the woods,
Through which the joyous tidings busily ran,
And oval buds of delicate pink and green
Broke, infant-like, through bark of sapling boughs,—
The vapours from the ocean had ascended,
Fume after fume, wreath upon wreath, and floor
On floor, till a grey curtain upward spread
From sea to sky, and both as one appeared.
Now came the snorting and intolerant steeds
Of the Sun's chariot tow'rds the summer signs;
At first obscurely, then with dazzling beams;
And cleared the heavens, but held the vapours there,
In cloudy architecture of all hues.
The stately fabrics and the Eastern pomps,
Tents, tombs, processions veiled, and temples vast,
Remained not long in their august repose,
But sank to ruins, and re-formed in likeness
Of monstrous beasts in lands and seas unknown.
These gradually dilating, limb from limb,
And head from bulk, were drawn apart, and floated
Hither and thither, till in ridges strewn,
Like to a rich and newly-furrowed field—
Then breaking into purple isles and spots,
Faded to faintness, and dissolved in air.

One midnight dark a spirit electric came,
And shot an invisible arrow through the sky,
Which instantly the wide-spread moisture called
To congregate in heavy drops, that fell
As suddenly. Like armies, host on host,
Pouring upon the mountains, vales, and plains,
The showers clashed down. Each runnel and thin stream
A branching brook became, or flowing river;
Each once small river rolled a goodly flood
With laughing falls; and many a Naiad bright,
And rush-crowned River-god, was newly born,
While all the land-veins with fresh spirit ran
In this quick season of Orion's life.

The snows on every height had drunk the showers,
Till, heavy with the moisture, each steep ridge
Lost its pure whiteness and transparent frost;
Sank down as humbly as a maid once proud,
Who droops, and kneels, and weeps; and from beneath
Its stagnant foam melted quick-running rills,
Down slopes, with sunny music and loud hum,
Precipitous, ere through dark craggy rifts
Sparkling it dashed, and poured towards the plain.
Unusual growth of corn was in the land,
Whose fields with tender-flowing greenness smiled,
As winds with shades ran dances over them;
And even the vineyards, oliveyards, and groves
Of citron, were in their abundant fruits
Abundantly increased: all works increased.

Dark as an eagle on a cloudy rock,
Oinopion sat upon his ancient throne.
Fixed was his face, while, through a distant gate,
Upon the ruins of a tower he gazed,
That like a Titan's shattered skeleton
Still in its place stuck fast. But she was gone.
His daughter Meropé was borne away;
And willingly he knew; and whither fled,
He knew. But how recover, or revenge
The loss?—new dangers, outrage, how avert?
Infuriate were his people at the deed,
For by the giants many had been slain,
Ere they had won their prize. 'Gainst Meropé,
Some spake aloud; against Orion, all,—
Save the bald sage, who said ‘'T was natural.’
‘Natural!’ they cried: ‘O wretch!’ The sage was stoned.

Within his cave, in his accustomed place,
With passive dignity that ever holds
Unwise activity in check and awe—
And active wisdom where the will's not strong—
Sat Akinetos, listening to the tale
Thus by Rhexergon told; Biastor leaning
Against a rock, with folded arms, the while.

‘We from our trance with aching brows awoke
Starting, and on our elbows raised, with chins
Set in our hands, collected our mazed minds.
We both had dreamed one dream. In Chios' walls
A feast we held in honour of the king,
Encolyon, newly chosen—as we thought—
By the chief rulers, while Orion stood
Chained to the throne. But Meropé, 't was said,
Should still be his, if loyal, hand and soul.
Yet ere Orion answered, rushing came
A small dark shape—some airy messenger—
Darting on all sides, diving, nestling, leaping,
Swift as a mullet coursing the sea-hare,
And strong, as when within the shore-hauled net
It searches, like a keen hound, to and fro,
And no gap finding, bounds o'er the high-drawn line:
One leaps—all follow like a flock of sheep
Over a wattle. So, this headlong shape,
Which, in our dream, now multiplied to shoals,
And thus confused the feasters. But what 't was
None saw, nor knew; but all the feast they marred,
While, in the place of meats and fruits, we found
Dust—dry-baked dust; the dust of the gone king,
Encolyon—as a bird in the air screamed forth—
By Phoibos smitten. Now a sound we heard,
Like to some well-known voice in prayer; and next
An iron clang that seemed to break great bonds
Beneath the earth, shook us to conscious life.
A briny current passing through our hearts
Stung all our faculties back to former power;
And as we rose, across a distant field
We saw Orion coming with a sword.
Our dream thus ended in reality,
Without a boundary line. What followed seemed
Continuous, for Orion urged us on.
Fresh work had he in hand; few words explained;
And to Oinopion's city we repaired,
Entering at eve of a great festival,
I with a club, iron bound, of ponderous weight;
Biastor with a shield, forged by Orion,
Whose disk enormous would protect all three,
And, set with ray-like spikes around the rim,
Looked like a fallen star. Onward we drove
Behind this threatening orb, down-trampling all
Who fled not, or our impulse strove to oppose;
Feasters and dancers, chieftains, priests, and guards;
I tell it as it happened—blow by blow—
Till near a high tower, doubtful of our course,
At bay, like bulls, within a circle clear
By terror made, we paused. The archers soon,
With bow-arm forward thrust, on all sides twanged,
Around, below, above. Behind the shield,
That on its spikes stood grimly, we retired,
And heard the rattling storm; when from the tower
A light flashed down one side, and at the top
Stood Meropé, who cried, “Orion, see!
My prison I have fired, and in my haste
Fired first below. I cannot pass the flames!”
E'en while she spake a hydra-wreath of smoke
Ran coiling up the stony stair, and peered
Into each chamber with its widening head,
As if to seek its prey. Again she cried,—
“I will leap down into thine arms!” “Forbear!”
Shouted Orion. “First let us try our strength
With skill.” I on the groaning gate-posts smote,
Until their bolts and nails started like tusks
From battered jaws, and inward sank the gates,
Crushing armed men behind. O'er all we passed.
Orion, now in front, amidst a cloud
Of smoke, dust, slaughter, and confusing cries,
The blackened slabs of winding stair ascended;
And, in the same fierce uproar and dismay
Of men, not fit to cope with sons of Gods,
Unscathed came down with Meropé. 'T was good.
He bore her to the cedar-grove afar,
Where in brief space a palace he had built,
While we, remaining midway, called a rout
Around us, and great revel held that night.’

Rhexergon ceased, while in the sunny air
His large eyes shone, and, pleased with what he told—
For well he spake with deep-voiced cadences—
Looked like a monarch who hath made a verse.
Now Akinetos spake. ‘Your efforts done,
What good to ye is wrought? To him, what good?
Not long will Meropé be his: if long,
What good, since both must tire? Oinopion soon,
The king of ships and armies, may reclaim
This Meropé by force: perchance her own
Inconstant will may save these ships and men.’
‘If we defend the prize,’ Biastor said,
‘Substantial good unto ourselves were due;
Wise are thy words; wherefore large terms of spoil
We with Orion will in future make,
That shall secure our constant revelry,
As in Dodona, once, ere driven thence
By Zeus, for that Rhexergon burnt some oaks.
Thrust we the king from off his throne, or thrust
His throne from under him to some fresh place,
And with our daily fancies we'll sit crowned,
And feast, and order armies to march forth,
And ships to sail, and music, and more feast.’

‘Better pull down the city, and destroy
The fleet,’ Rhexergon said. ‘Then, all despoiled,
And made as slaves, leave we our woodland homes:
There live, with Akinetos for our king!
Aught we destroy Orion can rebuild,
If we should need; or frame aught else we need:
Rise, therefore, Akinetos; thou art king!’
So saying, in his hand he placed a spear.

As though against a wall 't were set aslant,
Flatly the long spear fell upon the ground.
‘He will not be a king; nor will he aid
Your purposes,’ murmured the Great Unmoved.
‘Hormetes, Harpax, aided, and both died;
Orion's work will shortly work his end;
Encolyon, ever meddling to prevent,
Wasted his mind and care, and found his death.
Those who have wisdom aid not, nor prevent.
Nought good has followed aught that ye have done,
Nor will good follow aught that ye can do,
Or I can do,—or any one can do,—
Except such good as of itself will come,
If so 't was ordered. Leave Zeus to his work,
The Supreme Mover of all things, and best,
Who, if we move not, must Himself sustain
His scheme: hence, never moved by hands unskilled,
But moved as best may be. Be warned; sit still.’

Within the isle, far from the walks of men,
Where jocund chase was never heard, nor hoof
Of Satyr broke the moss, nor any bird
Sang, save at times the nightingale—but only
In his prolonged and swelling tones, nor e'er
With wild joy and hoarse laughing melody,
Closing the ecstasy, as is his wont,—
A forest, separate and far withdrawn
From all the rest, there grew. Old as the earth,
Of cedar was it, lofty in its glooms
When the sun hung o'erhead, and, in its darkness,
Like Night when giving birth to Time's first pulse.
Silence had ever dwelt there; but of late
Came faint sounds, with a cadence droning low,
From the far depths, as of a cataract
Whose echoes midst incumbent foliage died.
From one high mountain gushed a flowing stream,
Which through the forest passed, and found a fall
Within, none knew where, then rolled tow'rds the sea.

There, underneath the boughs, mark where the gleam
Of sunrise through the roofing's chasm is thrown
Upon a grassy plot below, whereon
The shadow of a stag stoops to the stream
Swift rolling tow'rds the cataract, and drinks deeply.
Throughout the day unceasingly it drinks,
While ever and anon the nightingale,
Not waiting for the evening, swells his hymn—
His one sustained and heaven-aspiring tone—
And when the sun hath vanished utterly,
Arm over arm the cedars spread their shade,
With arching wrist and long extended hands,
And graveward fingers lengthening in the moon,
Above that shadowy stag whose antlers still
Hang o'er the stream. Now came a rich-toned voice
Out of the forest depths, and sang this lay,
With deep speech intervalled and tender pause.

‘If we have lost the world what gain is ours!
Hast thou not built a palace of more grace
Than marble towers? These trunks are pillars rare,
Whose roof embowers with far more grandeur. Say;
Hast thou not found a bliss with Meropé,
As full of rapture as existence new?
'Tis thus with me. I know that thou art blest.
Our inmost powers, fresh winged, shall soar and dream
In realms of Elysian gleam, whose air—light—flowers,
Will ever be, though vague, most fair—most sweet—
Better than memory.—Look yonder, love!
What solemn image through the trunks is straying?
And now he doth not move, yet never turns
On us his visage of rapt vacancy!
It is Oblivion. In his hand—though nought
Knows he of this—a dusky purple flower
Droops over its tall stem. Again, ah see!
He wanders into mist, and now is lost.—
Within his brain what lovely realms of death
Are pictured, and what knowledge through the doors
Of his forgetfulness of all the earth
A path may gain? Then turn thee, love, to me:
Was I not worth thy winning, and thy toil,
O earth-born son of Ocean? Melt to rain.’

No foot may enter midst these cedar glooms:
Passion is there—a spell is on the place—
It hath its own protecting atmosphere,
Needing no walls nor bars. But Chios' king
Hath framed his purpose; the sworn instruments
Chosen; and from the palace now depart
In brazen chariots, richly armed, ten chiefs.
‘Watch well your moment!’—lastly spake the King;
‘Slay not outright—but make his future life
A blot—a blank!’ They bent their plumed helms,
And through the gates in thunder whirled away.

Beyond the cedar forest lay the cliffs
That overhung the beach, but midway swept
Fair swelling lands, some green with brightest grass,
Some golden in the sun. Mute was the scene,
And moveless. Not a breeze came o'er the edge
Of the high-heaving fields and fallow lands;
Only the zephyrs at long intervals
Drew a deep sigh, as of some blissful thought,
Then swooned to silence. Not a bird was seen
Nor heard: all marble gleamed the steadfast sky.
Hither Orion slowly walked alone,
And passing round between two swelling slopes
Of green and golden light, beheld afar
The broad grey horizontal wall o' the dead-calm sea.

O'ersteeped in bliss; prone on its ebbing tide;
With hope's completeness vaguely sorrowful,
And sense of life-bounds too enlarged; his thoughts
Sank faintly through each other, fused and lost,
Till his o'ersatisfied existence drooped;
Like fruit-boughs heavily laden above a stream,
In which they gaze so closely on themselves,
That, touching, they grow drowsy, and submerge,
Losing all vision. Sense of thankful prayers
Came over him, while downward to the shore
Slowly his steps he bent, seeking to hold
Communion with his sire. The eternal Sea
Before him passively at full length lay,
As in a dream of the uranian Heavens.
With hands stretched forward he began his prayer;
‘Receive, Poseidon!’—but no further words
Found utterance. And again he prayed, and said,
‘Receive, O Sire!’—yet still the emotion rose
Too full for words, and with no meaning clear.
He turned, and sinking on a sandy mound,
With dim look o'er the sea, deeply he slept.

What altars burn afar—what smoke arises
Beyond the swelling lands above the cliffs
Or is it but a rolling cloud of dust
That onward moves, driven by the wind? And now
A rumbling sound is gathering in the breeze,
And nearer swells—now dies away—like wheels
That pass from stony ground to grassy plains.
Again!—it rings and jars—and passing swift
Along the cliffs, till lost in a ravine,
Five brazen chariots fling the sunset rays
Angrily back upon the startled air!
In one, the last, struggles a lovely form,
Half pinioned by a chieftain's broidered scarf,
Her wild black tresses coiling round an arm
Which still she raises, striving to make a sign.
All disappeared. No voice, no sound, was heard.
The moon arose, and still Orion slept,—
The profound sleep of life's satiety,
In him whose senses else had quick regained
The sure protection of his healthy powers.

Forth from a dark chasm issue figures armed.
Close conference they hold, like ravens met
For ominous talk of death. No more: their shields,
Plumed helms, and swords, two chieftains lay aside,
Then stoop, and softly creep tow'rds him who sleeps;
While o'er their heads the long protecting spears
Are held by seven, who noiselessly and slow
Follow their stealthy progress. Step by step
The deadly crescent moves behind the twain,
Who, flat as reptiles, and with face thrust out,
Breathless, all senses sharpen. Now!—'t is done!
The poison falls upon the dreamer's lids.

Away, aghast at their own evil deed,
As though some dark curse on themselves had fallen,
Flashed the mailed moon-lit miscreants into shade,
Like fish at sudden dropping of a stone!
The Moon now hid her face. The sea-shore lay
In hollowness beneath the rising stars,
And blind Orion, starting at once erect
Amid his darkness, with extended arms,
And open mouth that uttered not a word,
Stood statue-like, and heard the Ocean moan.