When direful meteors spread through glowing air
Long trails of light, and shake their blazing hair.
Thy rage the Phrygian felt, who durft afpire
T'excel the music of thy heavenly lyre ;
Thy shafts aveng'd lewd Tityus' guilty flame;
Th’immortal victim of thy mother's fame.
Thy hand flew Python, and the dame who lost
Her ñumeroûs offspring for a fatal boast.
In Phlegya's doom thy just revenge appears,
Condemn’d to furies and eternal fears;
He views his food, but dreads, with lifted eye,
The mouldering rock that trembles from on high.
Propitious hear our prayer, O Power divine !
And on thy hospitable Argos shine,
Whether the style of Titan please thee more,
Whose purple rays th' Achæmenes adore ;
Or great Osiris, who first taught the swain
In Pharian fields to fow the golden grain ;
Tu Phryga submittis citharae. tu matris honori
Terrigenam Tityon Stygiis extendis arenis.
Te viridis Python, Thebanaque mater ovantem,
Horruit in pharetris, ultrix tibi torva Megaera
Jejunum Phlegyam subter cava faxa jacentem
Aeterno premit accubitu, dapibusque profanis
Instimulat : sed mista famem fastidia vincunt.
Adlis o memor hofpitii, Junoniaque arva
Dexter ames ; seu te roseum Titana vocari
Gentis Achaemeniae ritu, seu praestat Ofirin
Or Mitra, to whose beams the Persian bows,
And pays, in hollow rocks, his awful vows;
Mitra, whose head the blaze of light adorns,
Who grasps the struggling heifer's lunar horns.
Frugiferum, seu Persei sub rupibus antri
Indignata sequi torquentem cornua Mitram,
She said, and for her loff Galanthis fighs,
When the
Since you a fervant's ravish'd form bemoan,
And kindly sigh for sorrows not your own ;
Let me (if tears and grief permit) relate
A nearer woe, a sister's stranger fate.
No Nymph of all Oechalia could compare
For beauteous form with Dryope the fair,
Her tender mother's only hope and pride,
(Myself the offspring of a second bride)
This Nymph compressd by him who rules the day,
Whom Delphi and the Delian isle obey,
Andræmon
DIXIT: et, admonitu veteris commota miniftrae,
Ingemuit; quam fic nurus est adfata dolentem : Te tamen, o genitrix, alienae fanguine vestro Rapta movet facies. quid fi tibi mira sororis Fata meae referam ? quanquam lacrymaeque dolorque Impediunt, prohibentque loqui. fuit unica matri (Me pater ex alia genuit) notissima forma
Andræmon lov'd; and, bless'd in all those charms
That pleas’d a God, succeeded to her arms.
A lake there was, with shelving banks around, 15
Whose verdant fummit fragrant myrtles crown'd.
These shades, unknowing of the fates, she fought,
And to the Naiads flowery garlands brought;
Her smiling babe (a pleasing charge) The prest
Within her arms, and nourish'd at her breast.
Not distant far, a watery Lotos grows,
The spring was new, and all the verdant boughs,
Adorn’d with blossoms, promis'd fruits that vie
In glowing colours with the Tyrian dye :
Of these she cropp'd to please her infant son, 25
And I myself the same rash act had done :
But lo! I saw (as near her side I stood)
The violated blossoms drop with blood.
Upon
Oechalidum Dryope: quam virginitate carentem,
Vimque Dei passam, Delphos Delonque tenentis,
Excipit Andraemon ; et habetur conjuge felix.
Eft lacus, acclivi devexo margine formam
Littoris efficiens: summum myrteta coronant.
Venerat huc Dryope fatorum nescia ; quoque
Indignere magis, Nymphis latura coronas.
Inque sinu puerum, qui nondum impleverat annum,
Dulce ferebat onus; tepidique ope lactis alebat.
Haud procul a stagno, Tyrios imitata colores,
In spem baccarum florebat aquatica lotos.
Carpferat hinc Dryope, quos oblectamina nato
Porrigeret, fores: et idem factura videbar;
Upon the tree I cast a frightful lock;
The trembling tree with sudden horror shook.
Lotis the nymph (if rural tales be true)
As from Priapus' lawless luft she flew,
Forsook her form ; and fixing here became
A flowery plant, which still preserves her name.
This change unknown, astonish'd at the fight,
35
My trembling sister strove to urge her flight:
And first the pardon of the nymphs implor'd,
And those offended fylvan powers ador'd :
But when the backward would have fled, she found
Her stiffening feet were rooted in the ground:
In vain to free her fasten'd feet she strove,
And, as she struggles, only moves above;
She feels th’ encroaching bark around her grow
By quick degrees, and cover all below :
Surpriz'd
Namque aderam. vidi guttas e flore cruentas
Decidere; et tremulo ramos horrore moveri.
Scilicet, ut referunt tardi nunc denique agrestes,
Lotis in hanc Nymphe, fugiens obfcoena Priapi,
Contulerat versos, servato nomine, vultus.
Nescierat soror hoc; quae cum perterrita retro 35
Ire, et adoratis vellet discedere Nymphis,
Haeserunt radice pedes. convellere pugnat:
40 Nec quidquam, nisi summa, movet. fuccrescit ab imo. , Totaque paulatim lentus premit inguina cortex. Ut vidit, conata manu laniare capillos,
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