And here like some weird Archimage sit I,Plotting dark spells, and devilish enginery,The self-impelling steam-wheels of the mindWhich pump up oaths from clergymen, and grindThe gentle spirit of our meek reviews _110Into a powdery foam of salt abuse,Ruffling the ocean of their self-content;—I sit—and smile or sigh as is my bent,But not for them—Libeccio rushes roundWith an inconstant and an idle sound, _115I heed him more than them—the thunder-smokeIs gathering on the mountains, like a cloakFolded athwart their shoulders broad and bare;The ripe corn under the undulating airUndulates like an ocean;—and the vines _120Are trembling wide in all their trellised lines—The murmur of the awakening sea doth fillThe empty pauses of the blast;—the hillLooks hoary through the white electric rain,And from the glens beyond, in sullen strain, _125The interrupted thunder howls; aboveOne chasm of Heaven smiles, like the eye of LoveOn the unquiet world;—while such things are,How could one worth your friendship heed the warOf worms? the shriek of the world’s carrion jays, _130Their censure, or their wonder, or their praise?
You are not here! the quaint witch Memory sees,In vacant chairs, your absent images,And points where once you sat, and now should beBut are not.—I demand if ever we _135Shall meet as then we met;—and she replies.Veiling in awe her second-sighted eyes;‘I know the past alone—but summon homeMy sister Hope,—she speaks of all to come.’But I, an old diviner, who knew well _140Every false verse of that sweet oracle,Turned to the sad enchantress once again,And sought a respite from my gentle pain,In citing every passage o’er and o’erOf our communion—how on the sea-shore _145We watched the ocean and the sky together,Under the roof of blue Italian weather;How I ran home through last year’s thunder-storm,And felt the transverse lightning linger warmUpon my cheek—and how we often made _150Feasts for each other, where good will outweighedThe frugal luxury of our country cheer,As well it might, were it less firm and clearThan ours must ever be;—and how we spunA shroud of talk to hide us from the sun _155Of this familiar life, which seems to beBut is not:—or is but quaint mockeryOf all we would believe, and sadly blameThe jarring and inexplicable frameOf this wrong world:—and then anatomize _160The purposes and thoughts of men whose eyesWere closed in distant years;—or widely guessThe issue of the earth’s great business,When we shall be as we no longer are—Like babbling gossips safe, who hear the war _165Of winds, and sigh, but tremble not;—or howYou listened to some interrupted flowOf visionary rhyme,—in joy and painStruck from the inmost fountains of my brain,With little skill perhaps;—or how we sought _170Those deepest wells of passion or of thoughtWrought by wise poets in the waste of years,Staining their sacred waters with our tears;Quenching a thirst ever to be renewed!Or how I, wisest lady! then endued _175The language of a land which now is free,And, winged with thoughts of truth and majesty,Flits round the tyrant’s sceptre like a cloud,And bursts the peopled prisons, and cries aloud,‘My name is Legion!’—that majestic tongue _180Which Calderon over the desert flungOf ages and of nations; and which foundAn echo in our hearts, and with the soundStartled oblivion;—thou wert then to meAs is a nurse—when inarticulately _185A child would talk as its grown parents do.If living winds the rapid clouds pursue,If hawks chase doves through the aethereal way,Huntsmen the innocent deer, and beasts their prey,Why should not we rouse with the spirit’s blast _190Out of the forest of the pathless pastThese recollected pleasures?You are nowIn London, that great sea, whose ebb and flowAt once is deaf and loud, and on the shoreVomits its wrecks, and still howls on for more. _195Yet in its depth what treasures! You will seeThat which was Godwin,—greater none than heThough fallen—and fallen on evil times—to standAmong the spirits of our age and land,Before the dread tribunal of “to come” _200The foremost,—while Rebuke cowers pale and dumb.You will see Coleridge—he who sits obscureIn the exceeding lustre and the pureIntense irradiation of a mind,Which, with its own internal lightning blind, _200Flags wearily through darkness and despair—A cloud-encircled meteor of the air,A hooded eagle among blinking owls.—You will see Hunt—one of those happy soulsWhich are the salt of the earth, and without whom _210This world would smell like what it is—a tomb;Who is, what others seem; his room no doubtIs still adorned with many a cast from Shout,With graceful flowers tastefully placed about;And coronals of bay from ribbons hung, _215And brighter wreaths in neat disorder flung;The gifts of the most learned among some dozensOf female friends, sisters-in-law, and cousins.And there is he with his eternal puns,Which beat the dullest brain for smiles, like duns _220Thundering for money at a poet’s door;Alas! it is no use to say, ‘I’m poor!’Or oft in graver mood, when he will lookThings wiser than were ever read in book,Except in Shakespeare’s wisest tenderness.— _225You will see Hogg,—and I cannot expressHis virtues,—though I know that they are great,Because he locks, then barricades the gateWithin which they inhabit;—of his witAnd wisdom, you’ll cry out when you are bit. _230He is a pearl within an oyster shell.One of the richest of the deep;—and thereIs English Peacock, with his mountain Fair,Turned into a Flamingo;—that shy birdThat gleams i’ the Indian air—have you not heard _235When a man marries, dies, or turns Hindoo,His best friends hear no more of him?—but youWill see him, and will like him too, I hope,With the milk-white Snowdonian AntelopeMatched with this cameleopard—his fine wit _240Makes such a wound, the knife is lost in it;A strain too learned for a shallow age,Too wise for selfish bigots; let his page,Which charms the chosen spirits of the time,Fold itself up for the serener clime _245Of years to come, and find its recompenseIn that just expectation.—Wit and sense,Virtue and human knowledge; all that mightMake this dull world a business of delight,Are all combined in Horace Smith.—And these. _250With some exceptions, which I need not teaseYour patience by descanting on,—are allYou and I know in London.I recallMy thoughts, and bid you look upon the night.As water does a sponge, so the moonlight _255Fills the void, hollow, universal air—What see you?—unpavilioned Heaven is fair,Whether the moon, into her chamber gone,Leaves midnight to the golden stars, or wanClimbs with diminished beams the azure steep; _260Or whether clouds sail o’er the inverse deep,Piloted by the many-wandering blast,And the rare stars rush through them dim and fast:—All this is beautiful in every land.—But what see you beside?—a shabby stand _265Of Hackney coaches—a brick house or wallFencing some lonely court, white with the scrawlOf our unhappy politics;—or worse—A wretched woman reeling by, whose curseMixed with the watchman’s, partner of her trade, _270You must accept in place of serenade—Or yellow-haired Pollonia murmuringTo Henry, some unutterable thing.I see a chaos of green leaves and fruitBuilt round dark caverns, even to the root _275Of the living stems that feed them—in whose bowersThere sleep in their dark dew the folded flowers;Beyond, the surface of the unsickled cornTrembles not in the slumbering air, and borneIn circles quaint, and ever-changing dance, _280Like winged stars the fire-flies flash and glance,Pale in the open moonshine, but each oneUnder the dark trees seems a little sun,A meteor tamed; a fixed star gone astrayFrom the silver regions of the milky way;— _285Afar the Contadino’s song is heard,Rude, but made sweet by distance—and a birdWhich cannot be the Nightingale, and yetI know none else that sings so sweet as itAt this late hour;—and then all is still— _290Now—Italy or London, which you will!
Next winter you must pass with me; I’ll haveMy house by that time turned into a graveOf dead despondence and low-thoughted care,And all the dreams which our tormentors are; _295Oh! that Hunt, Hogg, Peacock, and Smith were there,With everything belonging to them fair!—We will have books, Spanish, Italian, Greek;And ask one week to make another weekAs like his father, as I’m unlike mine, _300Which is not his fault, as you may divine.Though we eat little flesh and drink no wine,Yet let’s be merry: we’ll have tea and toast;Custards for supper, and an endless hostOf syllabubs and jellies and mince-pies, _305And other such lady-like luxuries,—Feasting on which we will philosophize!And we’ll have fires out of the Grand Duke’s wood,To thaw the six weeks’ winter in our blood.And then we’ll talk;—what shall we talk about? _310Oh! there are themes enough for many a boutOf thought-entangled descant;—as to nerves—With cones and parallelograms and curvesI’ve sworn to strangle them if once they dareTo bother me—when you are with me there. _315And they shall never more sip laudanum,From Helicon or Himeros (1);—well, come,And in despite of God and of the devil,We’ll make our friendly philosophic revelOutlast the leafless time; till buds and flowers _320Warn the obscure inevitable hours,Sweet meeting by sad parting to renew;—‘To-morrow to fresh woods and pastures new.’
NOTES: _13 must Bos. manuscript; most edition 1824. _27 philanthropic Bos. manuscript; philosophic edition 1824. _29 so 1839, 2nd edition; They owed… edition 1824. _36 Which fishers Bos. manuscript; Which fishes edition 1824; With fishes editions 1839. _38 rarely transcript; seldom editions 1824, 1839. _61 lava—cry]lava-cry editions 1824, 1839. _63 towers transcript; towns editions 1824, 1839. _84 queer Bos. manuscript; green transcript, editions 1824, 1839. _92 odd hooks transcript; old books editions 1839 (an evident misprint); old hooks edition 1824. _93 A]An edition 1824. _100 those transcript; them editions 1824, 1839. _101 lead Bos. manuscript; least transcript, editions 1824, 1839. _127 eye Bos. manuscript, transcript, editions 1839; age edition 1824. _140 knew Bos. manuscript; know transcript, editions 1824, 1839. _144 citing Bos. manuscript; acting transcript, editions 1824, 1839. _151 Feasts transcript; Treats editions 1824, 1839. _153 As well it]As it well editions 1824, 1839. _158 believe, and]believe; or editions 1824, 1839. _173 their transcript; the editions 1824, 1839. _188 aethereal transcript; aereal editions 1824, 1839. _197-201 See notes Volume 3. _202 Coleridge]C— edition 1824. So too H—t l. 209; H— l. 226; P— l. 233; H.S. l. 250; H— — and — l. 296. _205 lightning Bos. manuscript, transcript; lustre editions 1824, 1839. _224 read Bos. manuscript; said transcript, editions 1824, 1839. _244 time Bos. manuscript, transcript; age editions 1824, 1839. _245 the transcript: a editions 1824, 1839. _272, _273 found in the 2nd edition of P. W., 1839; wanting in transcript, edition 1824 and 1839, 1st. edition. _276 that transcript; who editions 1824, 1839. _288 the transcript; a editions 1824, 1839. _296 See notes Volume 3. _299, _300 So 1839, 2nd edition; wanting in editions 1824, 1839, 1st. _301 So transcript; wanting in editions 1824, 1839. _317 well, come 1839, 2nd edition; we’ll come editions 1824, 1839. 1st. _318 despite of God] transcript; despite of… edition 1824; spite of… editions 1839.
(_317 Imeros, from which the river Himera was named, is, with some slight shade of difference, a synonym of Love.—[SHELLEY’S NOTE.]
***
[Composed at the Baths of San Giuliano, near Pisa, August 14-16, 1820; published in Posthumous Poems, edition Mrs. Shelley, 1824. The dedication To Mas-y first appeared in the Poetical Works, 1839, 1st edition Sources of the text are (1) the editio princeps, 1824; (2) editions 1839 (which agree, and, save in two instances, follow edition 1824); (3) an early and incomplete manuscript in Shelley’s handwriting (now at the Bodleian, here, as throughout, cited as B.), carefully collated by Mr. C.D. Locock, who printed the results in his Examination of the Shelley manuscripts, etc., Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1903; (4) a later, yet intermediate, transcript by Mrs. Shelley, the variations of which are noted by Mr. H. Buxton Forman. The original text is modified in many places by variants from the manuscripts, but the readings of edition 1824 are, in every instance, given in the footnotes.]
1.How, my dear Mary,—are you critic-bitten(For vipers kill, though dead) by some review,That you condemn these verses I have written,Because they tell no story, false or true?What, though no mice are caught by a young kitten, _5May it not leap and play as grown cats do,Till its claws come? Prithee, for this one time,Content thee with a visionary rhyme.
2.What hand would crush the silken-winged fly,The youngest of inconstant April’s minions, _10Because it cannot climb the purest sky,Where the swan sings, amid the sun’s dominions?Not thine. Thou knowest ’tis its doom to die,When Day shall hide within her twilight pinionsThe lucent eyes, and the eternal smile, _15Serene as thine, which lent it life awhile.
3.To thy fair feet a winged Vision came,Whose date should have been longer than a day,And o’er thy head did beat its wings for fame,And in thy sight its fading plumes display; _20The watery bow burned in the evening flame.But the shower fell, the swift Sun went his way—And that is dead.—O, let me not believeThat anything of mine is fit to live!
4.Wordsworth informs us he was nineteen years _25Considering and retouching Peter Bell;Watering his laurels with the killing tearsOf slow, dull care, so that their roots to HellMight pierce, and their wide branches blot the spheresOf Heaven, with dewy leaves and flowers; this well _30May be, for Heaven and Earth conspire to foilThe over-busy gardener’s blundering toil.
5.My Witch indeed is not so sweet a creatureAs Ruth or Lucy, whom his graceful praiseClothes for our grandsons—but she matches Peter, _35Though he took nineteen years, and she three daysIn dressing. Light the vest of flowing metreShe wears; he, proud as dandy with his stays,Has hung upon his wiry limbs a dressLike King Lear’s ‘looped and windowed raggedness.’ _40
6.If you strip Peter, you will see a fellowScorched by Hell’s hyperequatorial climateInto a kind of a sulphureous yellow:A lean mark, hardly fit to fling a rhyme at;In shape a Scaramouch, in hue Othello. _45If you unveil my Witch, no priest nor primateCan shrive you of that sin,—if sin there beIn love, when it becomes idolatry.
1.Before those cruel Twins, whom at one birthIncestuous Change bore to her father Time, _50Error and Truth, had hunted from the EarthAll those bright natures which adorned its prime,And left us nothing to believe in, worthThe pains of putting into learned rhyme,A lady-witch there lived on Atlas’ mountain _55Within a cavern, by a secret fountain.
2.Her mother was one of the Atlantides:The all-beholding Sun had ne’er beholdenIn his wide voyage o’er continents and seasSo fair a creature, as she lay enfolden _60In the warm shadow of her loveliness;—He kissed her with his beams, and made all goldenThe chamber of gray rock in which she lay—She, in that dream of joy, dissolved away.
3.’Tis said, she first was changed into a vapour, _65And then into a cloud, such clouds as flit,Like splendour-winged moths about a taper,Round the red west when the sun dies in it:And then into a meteor, such as caperOn hill-tops when the moon is in a fit: _70Then, into one of those mysterious starsWhich hide themselves between the Earth and Mars.
4.Ten times the Mother of the Months had bentHer bow beside the folding-star, and biddenWith that bright sign the billows to indent _75The sea-deserted sand—like children chidden,At her command they ever came and went—Since in that cave a dewy splendour hiddenTook shape and motion: with the living formOf this embodied Power, the cave grew warm. _80
5.A lovely lady garmented in lightFrom her own beauty—deep her eyes, as areTwo openings of unfathomable nightSeen through a Temple’s cloven roof—her hairDark—the dim brain whirls dizzy with delight. _85Picturing her form; her soft smiles shone afar,And her low voice was heard like love, and drewAll living things towards this wonder new.
6.And first the spotted cameleopard came,And then the wise and fearless elephant; _90Then the sly serpent, in the golden flameOf his own volumes intervolved;—all gauntAnd sanguine beasts her gentle looks made tame.They drank before her at her sacred fount;And every beast of beating heart grew bold, _95Such gentleness and power even to behold.
7.The brinded lioness led forth her young,That she might teach them how they should foregoTheir inborn thirst of death; the pard unstrungHis sinews at her feet, and sought to know _100With looks whose motions spoke without a tongueHow he might be as gentle as the doe.The magic circle of her voice and eyesAll savage natures did imparadise.
8.And old Silenus, shaking a green stick _105Of lilies, and the wood-gods in a crewCame, blithe, as in the olive copses thickCicadae are, drunk with the noonday dew:And Dryope and Faunus followed quick,Teasing the God to sing them something new; _110Till in this cave they found the lady lone,Sitting upon a seat of emerald stone.
9.And universal Pan, ’tis said, was there,And though none saw him,—through the adamantOf the deep mountains, through the trackless air, _115And through those living spirits, like a want,He passed out of his everlasting lairWhere the quick heart of the great world doth pant,And felt that wondrous lady all alone,—And she felt him, upon her emerald throne. _120
10.And every nymph of stream and spreading tree,And every shepherdess of Ocean’s flocks,Who drives her white waves over the green sea,And Ocean with the brine on his gray locks,And quaint Priapus with his company, _125All came, much wondering how the enwombed rocksCould have brought forth so beautiful a birth;—Her love subdued their wonder and their mirth.
11.The herdsmen and the mountain maidens came,And the rude kings of pastoral Garamant— _130Their spirits shook within them, as a flameStirred by the air under a cavern gaunt:Pigmies, and Polyphemes, by many a name,Centaurs, and Satyrs, and such shapes as hauntWet clefts,—and lumps neither alive nor dead, _135Dog-headed, bosom-eyed, and bird-footed.
12.For she was beautiful—her beauty madeThe bright world dim, and everything besideSeemed like the fleeting image of a shade:No thought of living spirit could abide, _140Which to her looks had ever been betrayed,On any object in the world so wide,On any hope within the circling skies,But on her form, and in her inmost eyes.
13.Which when the lady knew, she took her spindle _145And twined three threads of fleecy mist, and threeLong lines of light, such as the dawn may kindleThe clouds and waves and mountains with; and sheAs many star-beams, ere their lamps could dwindleIn the belated moon, wound skilfully; _150And with these threads a subtle veil she wove—A shadow for the splendour of her love.
14.The deep recesses of her odorous dwellingWere stored with magic treasures—sounds of air,Which had the power all spirits of compelling, _155Folded in cells of crystal silence there;Such as we hear in youth, and think the feelingWill never die—yet ere we are aware,The feeling and the sound are fled and gone,And the regret they leave remains alone. _160
15.And there lay Visions swift, and sweet, and quaint,Each in its thin sheath, like a chrysalis,Some eager to burst forth, some weak and faintWith the soft burthen of intensest bliss.It was its work to bear to many a saint _165Whose heart adores the shrine which holiest is,Even Love’s:—and others white, green, gray, and black,And of all shapes—and each was at her beck.
16.And odours in a kind of aviaryOf ever-blooming Eden-trees she kept, _170Clipped in a floating net, a love-sick FairyHad woven from dew-beams while the moon yet slept;As bats at the wired window of a dairy,They beat their vans; and each was an adept,When loosed and missioned, making wings of winds, _175To stir sweet thoughts or sad, in destined minds.
17.And liquors clear and sweet, whose healthful mightCould medicine the sick soul to happy sleep,And change eternal death into a nightOf glorious dreams—or if eyes needs must weep, _180Could make their tears all wonder and delight,She in her crystal vials did closely keep:If men could drink of those clear vials, ’tis saidThe living were not envied of the dead.
18.Her cave was stored with scrolls of strange device, _185The works of some Saturnian Archimage,Which taught the expiations at whose priceMen from the Gods might win that happy ageToo lightly lost, redeeming native vice;And which might quench the Earth-consuming rage _190Of gold and blood—till men should live and moveHarmonious as the sacred stars above;
19.And how all things that seem untameable,Not to be checked and not to be confined,Obey the spells of Wisdom’s wizard skill; _195Time, earth, and fire—the ocean and the wind,And all their shapes—and man’s imperial will;And other scrolls whose writings did unbindThe inmost lore of Love—let the profaneTremble to ask what secrets they contain. _200
20.And wondrous works of substances unknown,To which the enchantment of her father’s powerHad changed those ragged blocks of savage stone,Were heaped in the recesses of her bower;Carved lamps and chalices, and vials which shone _205In their own golden beams—each like a flower,Out of whose depth a fire-fly shakes his lightUnder a cypress in a starless night.
21.At first she lived alone in this wild home,And her own thoughts were each a minister, _210Clothing themselves, or with the ocean foam,Or with the wind, or with the speed of fire,To work whatever purposes might comeInto her mind; such power her mighty SireHad girt them with, whether to fly or run, _215Through all the regions which he shines upon.
22.The Ocean-nymphs and Hamadryades,Oreads and Naiads, with long weedy locks,Offered to do her bidding through the seas,Under the earth, and in the hollow rocks, _220And far beneath the matted roots of trees,And in the gnarled heart of stubborn oaks,So they might live for ever in the lightOf her sweet presence—each a satellite.
23.‘This may not be,’ the wizard maid replied; _225‘The fountains where the Naiades bedewTheir shining hair, at length are drained and dried;The solid oaks forget their strength, and strewTheir latest leaf upon the mountains wide;The boundless ocean like a drop of dew _230Will be consumed—the stubborn centre mustBe scattered, like a cloud of summer dust.
24.‘And ye with them will perish, one by one;—If I must sigh to think that this shall be,If I must weep when the surviving Sun _235Shall smile on your decay—oh, ask not meTo love you till your little race is run;I cannot die as ye must—over meYour leaves shall glance—the streams in which ye dwellShall be my paths henceforth, and so—farewell!’— _240
25.She spoke and wept:—the dark and azure wellSparkled beneath the shower of her bright tears,And every little circlet where they fellFlung to the cavern-roof inconstant spheresAnd intertangled lines of light:—a knell _245Of sobbing voices came upon her earsFrom those departing Forms, o’er the sereneOf the white streams and of the forest green.
26.All day the wizard lady sate aloof,Spelling out scrolls of dread antiquity, _250Under the cavern’s fountain-lighted roof;Or broidering the pictured poesyOf some high tale upon her growing woof,Which the sweet splendour of her smiles could dyeIn hues outshining heaven—and ever she _255Added some grace to the wrought poesy.
27.While on her hearth lay blazing many a pieceOf sandal wood, rare gums, and cinnamon;Men scarcely know how beautiful fire is—Each flame of it is as a precious stone _260Dissolved in ever-moving light, and thisBelongs to each and all who gaze upon.The Witch beheld it not, for in her handShe held a woof that dimmed the burning brand.
28.This lady never slept, but lay in trance _265All night within the fountain—as in sleep.Its emerald crags glowed in her beauty’s glance;Through the green splendour of the water deepShe saw the constellations reel and danceLike fire-flies—and withal did ever keep _270The tenour of her contemplations calm,With open eyes, closed feet, and folded palm.
29.And when the whirlwinds and the clouds descendedFrom the white pinnacles of that cold hill,She passed at dewfall to a space extended, _275Where in a lawn of flowering asphodelAmid a wood of pines and cedars blended,There yawned an inextinguishable wellOf crimson fire—full even to the brim,And overflowing all the margin trim. _280
30.Within the which she lay when the fierce warOf wintry winds shook that innocuous liquorIn many a mimic moon and bearded starO’er woods and lawns;—the serpent heard it flickerIn sleep, and dreaming still, he crept afar— _285And when the windless snow descended thickerThan autumn leaves, she watched it as it cameMelt on the surface of the level flame.
31.She had a boat, which some say Vulcan wroughtFor Venus, as the chariot of her star; _290But it was found too feeble to be fraughtWith all the ardours in that sphere which are,And so she sold it, and Apollo boughtAnd gave it to this daughter: from a carChanged to the fairest and the lightest boat _295Which ever upon mortal stream did float.
32.And others say, that, when but three hours old,The first-born Love out of his cradle lept,And clove dun Chaos with his wings of gold,And like a horticultural adept, _300Stole a strange seed, and wrapped it up in mould,And sowed it in his mother’s star, and keptWatering it all the summer with sweet dew,And with his wings fanning it as it grew.
33.The plant grew strong and green, the snowy flower _305Fell, and the long and gourd-like fruit beganTo turn the light and dew by inward powerTo its own substance; woven tracery ranOf light firm texture, ribbed and branching, o’erThe solid rind, like a leaf’s veined fan— _310Of which Love scooped this boat—and with soft motionPiloted it round the circumfluous ocean.
34.This boat she moored upon her fount, and litA living spirit within all its frame,Breathing the soul of swiftness into it. _315Couched on the fountain like a panther tame,One of the twain at Evan’s feet that sit—Or as on Vesta’s sceptre a swift flame—Or on blind Homer’s heart a winged thought,—In joyous expectation lay the boat. _320
35.Then by strange art she kneaded fire and snowTogether, tempering the repugnant massWith liquid love—all things together growThrough which the harmony of love can pass;And a fair Shape out of her hands did flow— _325A living Image, which did far surpassIn beauty that bright shape of vital stoneWhich drew the heart out of Pygmalion.
36.A sexless thing it was, and in its growthIt seemed to have developed no defect _330Of either sex, yet all the grace of both,—In gentleness and strength its limbs were decked;The bosom swelled lightly with its full youth,The countenance was such as might selectSome artist that his skill should never die, _335Imaging forth such perfect purity.
37.From its smooth shoulders hung two rapid wings,Fit to have borne it to the seventh sphere,Tipped with the speed of liquid lightenings,Dyed in the ardours of the atmosphere: _340She led her creature to the boiling springsWhere the light boat was moored, and said: ‘Sit here!’And pointed to the prow, and took her seatBeside the rudder, with opposing feet.
38.And down the streams which clove those mountains vast, _345Around their inland islets, and amidThe panther-peopled forests whose shade castDarkness and odours, and a pleasure hidIn melancholy gloom, the pinnace passed;By many a star-surrounded pyramid _350Of icy crag cleaving the purple sky,And caverns yawning round unfathomably.
39.The silver noon into that winding dell,With slanted gleam athwart the forest tops,Tempered like golden evening, feebly fell; _355A green and glowing light, like that which dropsFrom folded lilies in which glow-worms dwell,When Earth over her face Night’s mantle wraps;Between the severed mountains lay on high,Over the stream, a narrow rift of sky. _360
40.And ever as she went, the Image layWith folded wings and unawakened eyes;And o’er its gentle countenance did playThe busy dreams, as thick as summer flies,Chasing the rapid smiles that would not stay, _365And drinking the warm tears, and the sweet sighsInhaling, which, with busy murmur vain,They had aroused from that full heart and brain.
41.And ever down the prone vale, like a cloudUpon a stream of wind, the pinnace went: _370Now lingering on the pools, in which abodeThe calm and darkness of the deep contentIn which they paused; now o’er the shallow roadOf white and dancing waters, all besprentWith sand and polished pebbles:—mortal boat _375In such a shallow rapid could not float.
42.And down the earthquaking cataracts which shiverTheir snow-like waters into golden air,Or under chasms unfathomable everSepulchre them, till in their rage they tear _380A subterranean portal for the river,It fled—the circling sunbows did upbearIts fall down the hoar precipice of spray,Lighting it far upon its lampless way.
43.And when the wizard lady would ascend _385The labyrinths of some many-winding vale,Which to the inmost mountain upward tend—She called ‘Hermaphroditus!’—and the paleAnd heavy hue which slumber could extendOver its lips and eyes, as on the gale _390A rapid shadow from a slope of grass,Into the darkness of the stream did pass.
44.And it unfurled its heaven-coloured pinions,With stars of fire spotting the stream below;And from above into the Sun’s dominions _395Flinging a glory, like the golden glowIn which Spring clothes her emerald-winged minions,All interwoven with fine feathery snowAnd moonlight splendour of intensest rime,With which frost paints the pines in winter time. _400
45.And then it winnowed the Elysian airWhich ever hung about that lady bright,With its aethereal vans—and speeding there,Like a star up the torrent of the night,Or a swift eagle in the morning glare _405Breasting the whirlwind with impetuous flight,The pinnace, oared by those enchanted wings,Clove the fierce streams towards their upper springs.
46.The water flashed, like sunlight by the prowOf a noon-wandering meteor flung to Heaven; _410The still air seemed as if its waves did flowIn tempest down the mountains; loosely drivenThe lady’s radiant hair streamed to and fro:Beneath, the billows having vainly strivenIndignant and impetuous, roared to feel _415The swift and steady motion of the keel.
47.Or, when the weary moon was in the wane,Or in the noon of interlunar night,The lady-witch in visions could not chainHer spirit; but sailed forth under the light _420Of shooting stars, and bade extend amainIts storm-outspeeding wings, the Hermaphrodite;She to the Austral waters took her way,Beyond the fabulous Thamondocana,—
48.Where, like a meadow which no scythe has shaven, _425Which rain could never bend, or whirl-blast shake,With the Antarctic constellations paven,Canopus and his crew, lay the Austral lake—There she would build herself a windless havenOut of the clouds whose moving turrets make _430The bastions of the storm, when through the skyThe spirits of the tempest thundered by:
49.A haven beneath whose translucent floorThe tremulous stars sparkled unfathomably,And around which the solid vapours hoar, _435Based on the level waters, to the skyLifted their dreadful crags, and like a shoreOf wintry mountains, inaccessiblyHemmed in with rifts and precipices gray,And hanging crags, many a cove and bay. _440
50.And whilst the outer lake beneath the lashOf the wind’s scourge, foamed like a wounded thing,And the incessant hail with stony clashPloughed up the waters, and the flagging wingOf the roused cormorant in the lightning flash _445Looked like the wreck of some wind-wanderingFragment of inky thunder-smoke—this havenWas as a gem to copy Heaven engraven,—
51.On which that lady played her many pranks,Circling the image of a shooting star, _450Even as a tiger on Hydaspes’ banksOutspeeds the antelopes which speediest are,In her light boat; and many quips and cranksShe played upon the water, till the carOf the late moon, like a sick matron wan, _455To journey from the misty east began.
52.And then she called out of the hollow turretsOf those high clouds, white, golden and vermilion,The armies of her ministering spirits—In mighty legions, million after million, _460They came, each troop emblazoning its meritsOn meteor flags; and many a proud pavilionOf the intertexture of the atmosphereThey pitched upon the plain of the calm mere.
53.They framed the imperial tent of their great Queen _465Of woven exhalations, underlaidWith lambent lightning-fire, as may be seenA dome of thin and open ivory inlaidWith crimson silk—cressets from the sereneHung there, and on the water for her tread _470A tapestry of fleece-like mist was strewn,Dyed in the beams of the ascending moon.
54.And on a throne o’erlaid with starlight, caughtUpon those wandering isles of aery dew,Which highest shoals of mountain shipwreck not, _475She sate, and heard all that had happened newBetween the earth and moon, since they had broughtThe last intelligence—and now she grewPale as that moon, lost in the watery night—And now she wept, and now she laughed outright. _480
55.These were tame pleasures; she would often climbThe steepest ladder of the crudded rackUp to some beaked cape of cloud sublime,And like Arion on the dolphin’s backRide singing through the shoreless air;—oft-time _485Following the serpent lightning’s winding track,She ran upon the platforms of the wind,And laughed to hear the fire-balls roar behind.
56.And sometimes to those streams of upper airWhich whirl the earth in its diurnal round, _490She would ascend, and win the spirits thereTo let her join their chorus. Mortals foundThat on those days the sky was calm and fair,And mystic snatches of harmonious soundWandered upon the earth where’er she passed, _495And happy thoughts of hope, too sweet to last.
57.But her choice sport was, in the hours of sleep,To glide adown old Nilus, where he threadsEgypt and Aethiopia, from the steepOf utmost Axume, until he spreads, _500Like a calm flock of silver-fleeced sheep,His waters on the plain: and crested headsOf cities and proud temples gleam amid,And many a vapour-belted pyramid.
58.By Moeris and the Mareotid lakes, _505Strewn with faint blooms like bridal chamber floors,Where naked boys bridling tame water-snakes,Or charioteering ghastly alligators,Had left on the sweet waters mighty wakesOf those huge forms—within the brazen doors _510Of the great Labyrinth slept both boy and beast,Tired with the pomp of their Osirian feast.
59.And where within the surface of the riverThe shadows of the massy temples lie,And never are erased—but tremble ever _515Like things which every cloud can doom to die,Through lotus-paven canals, and wheresoeverThe works of man pierced that serenest skyWith tombs, and towers, and fanes, ’twas her delightTo wander in the shadow of the night. _520
60.With motion like the spirit of that windWhose soft step deepens slumber, her light feetPassed through the peopled haunts of humankind.Scattering sweet visions from her presence sweet,Through fane, and palace-court, and labyrinth mined _525With many a dark and subterranean streetUnder the Nile, through chambers high and deepShe passed, observing mortals in their sleep.
61.A pleasure sweet doubtless it was to seeMortals subdued in all the shapes of sleep. _530Here lay two sister twins in infancy;There, a lone youth who in his dreams did weep;Within, two lovers linked innocentlyIn their loose locks which over both did creepLike ivy from one stem;—and there lay calm _535Old age with snow-bright hair and folded palm.
62.But other troubled forms of sleep she saw,Not to be mirrored in a holy song—Distortions foul of supernatural awe,And pale imaginings of visioned wrong; _540And all the code of Custom’s lawless lawWritten upon the brows of old and young:‘This,’ said the wizard maiden, ‘is the strifeWhich stirs the liquid surface of man’s life.’
63.And little did the sight disturb her soul.— _545We, the weak mariners of that wide lakeWhere’er its shores extend or billows roll,Our course unpiloted and starless makeO’er its wild surface to an unknown goal:—But she in the calm depths her way could take, _550Where in bright bowers immortal forms abideBeneath the weltering of the restless tide.
64.And she saw princes couched under the glowOf sunlike gems; and round each temple-courtIn dormitories ranged, row after row, _555She saw the priests asleep—all of one sort—For all were educated to be so.—The peasants in their huts, and in the portThe sailors she saw cradled on the waves,And the dead lulled within their dreamless graves. _560
65.And all the forms in which those spirits layWere to her sight like the diaphanousVeils, in which those sweet ladies oft arrayTheir delicate limbs, who would conceal from usOnly their scorn of all concealment: they _565Move in the light of their own beauty thus.But these and all now lay with sleep upon them,And little thought a Witch was looking on them.
66.She, all those human figures breathing there,Beheld as living spirits—to her eyes _570The naked beauty of the soul lay bare,And often through a rude and worn disguiseShe saw the inner form most bright and fair—And then she had a charm of strange device,Which, murmured on mute lips with tender tone, _575Could make that spirit mingle with her own.
67.Alas! Aurora, what wouldst thou have givenFor such a charm when Tithon became gray?Or how much, Venus, of thy silver heavenWouldst thou have yielded, ere Proserpina _580Had half (oh! why not all?) the debt forgivenWhich dear Adonis had been doomed to pay,To any witch who would have taught you it?The Heliad doth not know its value yet.
68.’Tis said in after times her spirit free _585Knew what love was, and felt itself alone—But holy Dian could not chaster beBefore she stooped to kiss Endymion,Than now this lady—like a sexless beeTasting all blossoms, and confined to none, _590Among those mortal forms, the wizard-maidenPassed with an eye serene and heart unladen.
69.To those she saw most beautiful, she gaveStrange panacea in a crystal bowl:—They drank in their deep sleep of that sweet wave, _595And lived thenceforward as if some control,Mightier than life, were in them; and the graveOf such, when death oppressed the weary soul,Was as a green and overarching bowerLit by the gems of many a starry flower. _600
70.For on the night when they were buried, sheRestored the embalmers’ ruining, and shookThe light out of the funeral lamps, to beA mimic day within that deathy nook;And she unwound the woven imagery _605Of second childhood’s swaddling bands, and tookThe coffin, its last cradle, from its niche,And threw it with contempt into a ditch.
71.And there the body lay, age after age.Mute, breathing, beating, warm, and undecaying, _610Like one asleep in a green hermitage,With gentle smiles about its eyelids playing,And living in its dreams beyond the rageOf death or life; while they were still arrayingIn liveries ever new, the rapid, blind _615And fleeting generations of mankind.
72.And she would write strange dreams upon the brainOf those who were less beautiful, and makeAll harsh and crooked purposes more vainThan in the desert is the serpent’s wake _620Which the sand covers—all his evil gainThe miser in such dreams would rise and shakeInto a beggar’s lap;—the lying scribeWould his own lies betray without a bribe.
73.The priests would write an explanation full, _625Translating hieroglyphics into Greek,How the God Apis really was a bull,And nothing more; and bid the herald stickThe same against the temple doors, and pullThe old cant down; they licensed all to speak _630Whate’er they thought of hawks, and cats, and geese,By pastoral letters to each diocese.
74.The king would dress an ape up in his crownAnd robes, and seat him on his glorious seat,And on the right hand of the sunlike throne _635Would place a gaudy mock-bird to repeatThe chatterings of the monkey.—Every oneOf the prone courtiers crawled to kiss the feetOf their great Emperor, when the morning came,And kissed—alas, how many kiss the same! _640
75.The soldiers dreamed that they were blacksmiths, andWalked out of quarters in somnambulism;Round the red anvils you might see them standLike Cyclopses in Vulcan’s sooty abysm,Beating their swords to ploughshares;—in a band _645The gaolers sent those of the liberal schismFree through the streets of Memphis, much, I wis,To the annoyance of king Amasis.
76.And timid lovers who had been so coy,They hardly knew whether they loved or not, _650Would rise out of their rest, and take sweet joy,To the fulfilment of their inmost thought;And when next day the maiden and the boyMet one another, both, like sinners caught,Blushed at the thing which each believed was done _655Only in fancy—till the tenth moon shone;
77.And then the Witch would let them take no ill:Of many thousand schemes which lovers find,The Witch found one,—and so they took their fillOf happiness in marriage warm and kind. _660Friends who, by practice of some envious skill,Were torn apart—a wide wound, mind from mind!—She did unite again with visions clearOf deep affection and of truth sincere.
80.These were the pranks she played among the cities _665Of mortal men, and what she did to SpritesAnd Gods, entangling them in her sweet dittiesTo do her will, and show their subtle sleights,I will declare another time; for it isA tale more fit for the weird winter nights _670Than for these garish summer days, when weScarcely believe much more than we can see.
NOTES: _2 dead]deaf cj. A.C. Bradley, who cps. “Adonais” 317. _65 first was transcript, B.; was first edition 1824. _84 Temple’s transcript, B.; tempest’s edition 1824. _165 was its transcript, B.; is its edition 1824. _184 envied so all manuscripts and editions; envious cj. James Thomson (‘B. V.’). _262 upon so all manuscripts and editions: thereon cj. Rossetti. _333 swelled lightly edition 1824, B.; lightly swelled editions 1839; swelling lightly with its full growth transcript. _339 lightenings B., editions 1839; lightnings edition 1824, transcript. _422 Its transcript; His edition 1824, B. _424 Thamondocana transcript, B.; Thamondocona edition 1824. _442 wind’s transcript, B.; winds’ edition 1834. _493 where transcript, B.; when edition 1824. _596 thenceforward B.; thence forth edition 1824; henceforward transcript. _599 Was as a B.; Was a edition 1824. _601 night when transcript; night that edition 1824, B. _612 smiles transcript, B.; sleep edition 1824.
We spent the summer of 1820 at the Baths of San Giuliano, four miles from Pisa. These baths were of great use to Shelley in soothing his nervous irritability. We made several excursions in the neighbourhood. The country around is fertile, and diversified and rendered picturesque by ranges of near hills and more distant mountains. The peasantry are a handsome intelligent race; and there was a gladsome sunny heaven spread over us, that rendered home and every scene we visited cheerful and bright. During some of the hottest days of August, Shelley made a solitary journey on foot to the summit of Monte San Pellegrino—a mountain of some height, on the top of which there is a chapel, the object, during certain days of the year, of many pilgrimages. The excursion delighted him while it lasted; though he exerted himself too much, and the effect was considerable lassitude and weakness on his return. During the expedition he conceived the idea, and wrote, in the three days immediately succeeding to his return, the “Witch of Atlas”. This poem is peculiarly characteristic of his tastes—wildly fanciful, full of brilliant imagery, and discarding human interest and passion, to revel in the fantastic ideas that his imagination suggested.
The surpassing excellence of “The Cenci” had made me greatly desire that Shelley should increase his popularity by adopting subjects that would more suit the popular taste than a poem conceived in the abstract and dreamy spirit of the “Witch of Atlas”. It was not only that I wished him to acquire popularity as redounding to his fame; but I believed that he would obtain a greater mastery over his own powers, and greater happiness in his mind, if public applause crowned his endeavours. The few stanzas that precede the poem were addressed to me on my representing these ideas to him. Even now I believe that I was in the right. Shelley did not expect sympathy and approbation from the public; but the want of it took away a portion of the ardour that ought to have sustained him while writing. He was thrown on his own resources, and on the inspiration of his own soul; and wrote because his mind overflowed, without the hope of being appreciated. I had not the most distant wish that he should truckle in opinion, or submit his lofty aspirations for the human race to the low ambition and pride of the many; but I felt sure that, if his poems were more addressed to the common feelings of men, his proper rank among the writers of the day would be acknowledged, and that popularity as a poet would enable his countrymen to do justice to his character and virtues, which in those days it was the mode to attack with the most flagitious calumnies and insulting abuse. That he felt these things deeply cannot be doubted, though he armed himself with the consciousness of acting from a lofty and heroic sense of right. The truth burst from his heart sometimes in solitude, and he would writes few unfinished verses that showed that he felt the sting; among such I find the following:—
‘Alas! this is not what I thought Life was.I knew that there were crimes and evil men,Misery and hate; nor did I hope to passUntouched by suffering through the rugged glen.In mine own heart I saw as in a glassThe hearts of others…And, whenI went among my kind, with triple brassOf calm endurance my weak breast I armed,To bear scorn, fear, and hate—a woful mass!’
I believed that all this morbid feeling would vanish if the chord of sympathy between him and his countrymen were touched. But my persuasions were vain, the mind could not be bent from its natural inclination. Shelley shrunk instinctively from portraying human passion, with its mixture of good and evil, of disappointment and disquiet. Such opened again the wounds of his own heart; and he loved to shelter himself rather in the airiest flights of fancy, forgetting love and hate, and regret and lost hope, in such imaginations as borrowed their hues from sunrise or sunset, from the yellow moonshine or paly twilight, from the aspect of the far ocean or the shadows of the woods,—which celebrated the singing of the winds among the pines, the flow of a murmuring stream, and the thousand harmonious sounds which Nature creates in her solitudes. These are the materials which form the “Witch of Atlas”: it is a brilliant congregation of ideas such as his senses gathered, and his fancy coloured, during his rambles in the sunny land he so much loved.
***
‘Choose Reform or Civil War,When through thy streets, instead of hare with dogs,A CONSORT-QUEEN shall hunt a king with hogs,Riding on the IONIAN MINOTAUR.’
[Begun at the Baths of San Giuliano, near Pisa, August 24, 1819; published anonymously by J. Johnston, Cheapside (imprint C.F. Seyfang), 1820. On a threat of prosecution the publisher surrendered the whole impression, seven copies—the total number sold—excepted. “Oedipus” does not appear in the first edition of the “Poetical Works”, 1839, but it was included by Mrs. Shelley in the second edition of that year. Our text is that of the editio princeps, 1820, save in three places, where the reading of edition 1820 will be found in the notes.]
This Tragedy is one of a triad, or system of three Plays (an arrangement according to which the Greeks were accustomed to connect their dramatic representations), elucidating the wonderful and appalling fortunes of the SWELLFOOT dynasty. It was evidently written by some LEARNED THEBAN, and, from its characteristic dulness, apparently before the duties on the importation of ATTIC SALT had been repealed by the Boeotarchs. The tenderness with which he treats the PIGS proves him to have been a sus Boeotiae; possibly Epicuri de grege porcus; for, as the poet observes,
‘A fellow feeling makes us wondrous kind.’
No liberty has been taken with the translation of this remarkable piece of antiquity, except the suppressing a seditious and blasphemous Chorus of the Pigs and Bulls at the last Act. The work Hoydipouse (or more properly Oedipus) has been rendered literally SWELLFOOT, without its having been conceived necessary to determine whether a swelling of the hind or the fore feet of the Swinish Monarch is particularly indicated.
Should the remaining portions of this Tragedy be found, entitled, “Swellfoot in Angaria”, and “Charite”, the Translator might be tempted to give them to the reading Public.
SWELLFOOT:Thou supreme Goddess! by whose power divineThese graceful limbs are clothed in proud array[HE CONTEMPLATES HIMSELF WITH SATISFACTION.]Of gold and purple, and this kingly paunchSwells like a sail before a favouring breeze,And these most sacred nether promontories _5Lie satisfied with layers of fat; and theseBoeotian cheeks, like Egypt’s pyramid,(Nor with less toil were their foundations laid),Sustain the cone of my untroubled brain,That point, the emblem of a pointless nothing! _10Thou to whom Kings and laurelled Emperors,Radical-butchers, Paper-money-millers,Bishops and Deacons, and the entire armyOf those fat martyrs to the persecutionOf stifling turtle-soup, and brandy-devils, _15Offer their secret vows! Thou plenteous CeresOf their Eleusis, hail!
NOTE: (_8 See Universal History for an account of the number of people who died, and the immense consumption of garlic by the wretched Egyptians, who made a sepulchre for the name as well as the bodies of their tyrants.—[SHELLEY’S NOTE.])
SWINE:Eigh! eigh! eigh! eigh!
SWELLFOOT:Ha! what are ye,Who, crowned with leaves devoted to the Furies,Cling round this sacred shrine?
SWINE:Aigh! aigh! aigh!
SWELLFOOT:What! ye that areThe very beasts that, offered at her altar _20With blood and groans, salt-cake, and fat, and inwards,Ever propitiate her reluctant willWhen taxes are withheld?
SWINE:Ugh! ugh! ugh!
SWELLFOOT:What! ye who grubWith filthy snouts my red potatoes upIn Allan’s rushy bog? Who eat the oats _25Up, from my cavalry in the Hebrides?Who swill the hog-wash soup my cooks digestFrom bones, and rags, and scraps of shoe-leather,Which should be given to cleaner Pigs than you?
SWINE—SEMICHORUS 1:The same, alas! the same; _30Though only now the nameOf Pig remains to me.
SEMICHORUS 2:If ’twere your kingly willUs wretched Swine to kill,What should we yield to thee? _35
SWELLFOOT:Why, skin and bones, and some few hairs for mortar.
CHORUS OF SWINE:I have heard your Laureate sing,That pity was a royal thing;Under your mighty ancestors, we PigsWere bless’d as nightingales on myrtle sprigs, _40Or grasshoppers that live on noonday dew,And sung, old annals tell, as sweetly too;But now our sties are fallen in, we catchThe murrain and the mange, the scab and itch;Sometimes your royal dogs tear down our thatch, _45And then we seek the shelter of a ditch;Hog-wash or grains, or ruta-baga, noneHas yet been ours since your reign begun.
FIRST SOW:My Pigs, ’tis in vain to tug.
SECOND SOW:I could almost eat my litter. _50
FIRST PIG:I suck, but no milk will come from the dug.
SECOND PIG:Our skin and our bones would be bitter.
THE BOARS:We fight for this rag of greasy rug,Though a trough of wash would be fitter.
SEMICHORUS:Happier Swine were they than we, _55Drowned in the Gadarean sea—I wish that pity would drive out the devils,Which in your royal bosom hold their revels,And sink us in the waves of thy compassion!Alas! the Pigs are an unhappy nation! _60Now if your Majesty would have our bristlesTo bind your mortar with, or fill our colonsWith rich blood, or make brawn out of our gristles,In policy—ask else your royal Solons—You ought to give us hog-wash and clean straw, _65And sties well thatched; besides it is the law!
NOTE: _59 thy edition 1820; your edition 1839.
SWELLFOOT:This is sedition, and rank blasphemy!Ho! there, my guards!
GUARD:Your sacred Majesty.
SWELLFOOT:Call in the Jews, Solomon the court porkman,Moses the sow-gelder, and Zephaniah _70The hog-butcher.
GUARD:They are in waiting, Sire.
SWELLFOOT:Out with your knife, old Moses, and spay those Sows[THE PIGS RUN ABOUT IN CONSTERNATION.]That load the earth with Pigs; cut close and deep.Moral restraint I see has no effect,Nor prostitution, nor our own example, _75Starvation, typhus-fever, war, nor prison—This was the art which the arch-priest of FamineHinted at in his charge to the Theban clergy—Cut close and deep, good Moses.
MOSES:Let your MajestyKeep the Boars quiet, else—
SWELLFOOT:Zephaniah, cut _80That fat Hog’s throat, the brute seems overfed;Seditious hunks! to whine for want of grains.
ZEPHANIAH:Your sacred Majesty, he has the dropsy;—We shall find pints of hydatids in ‘s liver,He has not half an inch of wholesome fat _85Upon his carious ribs—
SWELLFOOT:’Tis all the same,He’ll serve instead of riot money, whenOur murmuring troops bivouac in Thebes’ streetsAnd January winds, after a dayOf butchering, will make them relish carrion. _90Now, Solomon, I’ll sell you in a lumpThe whole kit of them.
SOLOMON:Why, your Majesty,I could not give—
SWELLFOOT:Kill them out of the way,That shall be price enough, and let me hearTheir everlasting grunts and whines no more! _95
PURGANAX:The future looks as black as death, a cloud,Dark as the frown of Hell, hangs over it—The troops grow mutinous—the revenue fails—There’s something rotten in us—for the level _100Of the State slopes, its very bases topple,The boldest turn their backs upon themselves!
MAMMON:Why what’s the matter, my dear fellow, now?Do the troops mutiny?—decimate some regiments;Does money fail?—come to my mint—coin paper,Till gold be at a discount, and ashamed _105To show his bilious face, go purge himself,In emulation of her vestal whiteness.
PURGANAX:Oh, would that this were all! The oracle!!
MAMMON:Why it was I who spoke that oracle,And whether I was dead drunk or inspired, _110I cannot well remember; nor, in truth,The oracle itself!
PURGANAX:The words went thus:—‘Boeotia, choose reform or civil war!When through the streets, instead of hare with dogs,A Consort Queen shall hunt a King with Hogs, _115Riding on the Ionian Minotaur.’
MAMMON:Now if the oracle had ne’er foretoldThis sad alternative, it must arrive,Or not, and so it must now that it has;And whether I was urged by grace divine _120Or Lesbian liquor to declare these words,Which must, as all words must, be false or true,It matters not: for the same Power made all,Oracle, wine, and me and you—or none—’Tis the same thing. If you knew as much _125Of oracles as I do—
PURGANAX:You arch-priestsBelieve in nothing; if you were to dreamOf a particular number in the Lottery,You would not buy the ticket?
MAMMON:Yet our ticketsAre seldom blanks. But what steps have you taken? _130For prophecies, when once they get abroad,Like liars who tell the truth to serve their ends,Or hypocrites who, from assuming virtue,Do the same actions that the virtuous do,Contrive their own fulfilment. This Iona— _135Well—you know what the chaste Pasiphae did,Wife to that most religious King of Crete,And still how popular the tale is here;And these dull Swine of Thebes boast their descentFrom the free Minotaur. You know they still _140Call themselves Bulls, though thus degenerate,And everything relating to a BullIs popular and respectable in Thebes.Their arms are seven Bulls in a field gules;They think their strength consists in eating beef,— _145Now there were danger in the precedentIf Queen Iona—
NOTES:_114 the edition 1820; thy cj. Forman;cf. Motto below Title, and II. i, 153-6. ticket? edition 1820;ticket! edition 1839._135 their own Mrs. Shelley, later editions;their editions 1820 and 1839.
PURGANAX:I have taken good careThat shall not be. I struck the crust o’ the earthWith this enchanted rod, and Hell lay bare!And from a cavern full of ugly shapes _150I chose a LEECH, a GADFLY, and a RAT.The Gadfly was the same which Juno sentTo agitate Io, and which Ezekiel mentionsThat the Lord whistled for out of the mountainsOf utmost Aethiopia, to torment _155Mesopotamian Babylon. The beastHas a loud trumpet like the scarabee,His crooked tail is barbed with many stings,Each able to make a thousand wounds, and eachImmedicable; from his convex eyes _160He sees fair things in many hideous shapes,And trumpets all his falsehood to the world.Like other beetles he is fed on dung—He has eleven feet with which he crawls,Trailing a blistering slime, and this foul beast _165Has tracked Iona from the Theban limits,From isle to isle, from city unto city,Urging her flight from the far ChersoneseTo fabulous Solyma, and the Aetnean Isle,Ortygia, Melite, and Calypso’s Rock, _170And the swart tribes of Garamant and Fez,Aeolia and Elysium, and thy shores,Parthenope, which now, alas! are free!And through the fortunate Saturnian land,Into the darkness of the West.