But now, on his ears as their voices and tramp of their coming brake,
He knew that the men were at hand whereof Zeus’ oracle spake
That their coming should bring for him respite, in peace to eat his bread.
And he rose from his couch, as a shadowy dream might rise from a bed,
Bowed over his staff, and with wrinkled feet ’gan creep to the door
Groping along the walls; and for helplessness trembled sore
And for age his limbs as he moved, and with filth was his parchèd skin
All leprous, and nought save this enwrapped the bones within.
So forth of the hall he came, and he bowed on the threshold-stone
His weary knees; and a swoon, like a dark pall over him thrown,
Enshrouded him; under his feet him seemed that the earth reeled round;
And he lay in a strengthless trance, and his lips could frame no sound.
And the heroes beheld him, and round about in a throng they pressed
And marvelled; until at the last the man from the depth of his breast
Drew laboured and difficult breath, and uttered his prophecy:
“Hearken, ye noblest of Hellas’ sons, if ye verily be
The selfsame heroes that Jason leadeth forth on the Quest
Of the Golden Fleece in Argo the ship at a King’s grim hest.
Of a surety ye be: my soul hath knowledge of everything
By her divination yet. Thanks therefore to thee, O King,
O Son of Lêto, I render from depths of affliction and woe!
O friends, by the Suppliants’ Zeus, who is ever the sternest foe
Of transgressors—for Phoebus’ sake, and in awful Hêrê’s name
I beseech—by the Gods I implore you in whose care hither ye came,
Help me: deliver from anguish a most ill-fated man,
Neither hasten away uncaring and leave me in bale and ban,
As ye find me: for not on mine eyes alone hath the fierce foot trode
Of the Vengeance-fiend, and I drag to the end eld’s weary load;
But a curse more bitter than all still hangeth over mine head,
For the Harpies are wont evermore to snatch from my lips my bread,
Swooping adown from a den of destruction, a viewless lair.
Neither find I any device for mine help: nay, easier it were
To escape the ken of mine own heart’s thoughts when I crave to be fed,
Than theirs; so swift through the welkin on hovering wings are they sped.
But if haply ever they leave but a morsel of meat on my board,
It reeketh with most unendurable strength of a stench abhorred.
No man, no, not for an instant, might dare draw nigh to the same,
Not though in his breast were a heart forged all of adamant frame.
But me of a surety doth hard compelling of hunger constrain
To abide, and abiding to stay this famine’s gnawing pain.
But those my tormentors, an oracle saith, shall be made to flee
By Boreas’ sons; neither strangers shall my deliverers be,
If indeed I be Phineus, renowned among men in the days long gone
For my wealth and my soothsaying lore, if Agênor called me son,
If the sister of these, Kleopatra, when over the Thracians I reigned,
Came to mine halls, a bride by a royal bride-price gained.”
So ended Agênor’s son, and compassion’s o’ermastering pain
Thrilled all the heroes, but chiefly the North-wind’s scions twain.
Brushing the tears from their eyes they drew nigh him, and Zethes spake;
And the hand of the grief-worn sire in his hand with the word did he take:
“O hapless, none other is more afflicted than thou, I trow,
Among men!—ah, wherefore on thee is there heaped such a burden of woe?
Baleful in sooth was the folly wherewith through thy prophecy-lore
Against Gods thou transgressedst: for this was their anger exceeding sore.
Howbeit our spirit within us, although we be fain, is afraid
To help thee, if on us indeed a God this honour hath laid.
For to dwellers on Earth the rebukes of Immortals be plain to discern;
And we dare not chase yon Harpies from thee, howsoever we yearn
For thine help, in the hour of their coming, except thou swear to us first
That for this we shall lose not the high Gods’ favour, as men accurst.”
So spake he: the stricken in years uplifted and opened wide
His sightless eyes straightway, and with swift words Phineus replied:
“Hush!—thrust not such thoughts, my son, on a spirit affliction-filled!
Be witness Latona’s son, who taught to me gracious-willed
Prophecy-lore; and be witness this mine ill-starred doom,
And this dark cloud on mine eyes, and the Gods of the Underworld Gloom—
May their curse, if I die with a lie on my tongue, be upon me for aye!—
That on you no wrath of the Gods shall descend for your help this day.”
Then by the oath were they kindled to help him, and fled their fears.
And the young men straightway made ready the meat for the stricken in years—
The last ordained for the Harpies’ spoil—and anigh to him stood
Those twain, to smite with the sword those fiends when they swooped on the food.
Then first his hands on the meats did he lay, that grey-haired sire:—
But sudden as bitter blasts, or as flashes of levin-fire,
Unawares from the clouds they had darted, and swooping adown they yelled
Their awful scream, fierce-eager for prey; but the heroes beheld,
And shouted amidst of their onrush. The fiends at the challenge of war
Swift ravined the meats from the boards, and over the sea afar
Soared they away, but there did their foul sick stench remain.
Then straightway hard on their track did the North-wind’s scions twain
Uplifting their swords follow after them fast, for with tireless might
Zeus filled them: howbeit they had not prevailed to follow their flight
But with Zeus’s help, for that faster than Zephyrus’ blasts they darted
Evermore, when on Phineus they swooped, and whene’er from the wretch they departed.
And as when on the mountain-ridges keen hounds cunning in chase
On the track of the hornèd goats or the deer hard-following race
Swiftly, and ever a little behind the prey as they strain,
Snap at the haunch of the quarry, and clash their teeth in vain;
So Zetes and Kalaïs rushed ever nearer with eager grip,
Clutched at them, smote at them, missed but by sword-point or finger-tip.
Yea, even despite Heaven’s will had they rent
