Some few commission’d were with speed to treat;
We to his court repair; his guards we meet.
Two, friendly flight preserved, the third was doom’d
To be by those cursed cannibals consumed.
Inhumanly our hapless friends they treat;
Our men they murder, and destroy our fleet.
In time the wise Ulysses bore away,
And dropp’d his anchor in yon faithless bay.
The thoughts of perils past we still retain,
And fear to land, till lots appoint the men.
Polites true, Elpenor given to wine,
Eurylochus, myself, the lots assign.
Design’d for dangers, and resolved to dare,
To Circe’s fatal palace we repair.
“Before the spacious front a herd we find
Of beasts, the fiercest of the savage kind.
Our trembling steps with blandishments they meet,
And fawn, unlike their species, at our feet.
Within, upon a sumptuous throne of state,
On golden columns raised, the enchantress sate;
Rich was her robe, and amiable her mien,
Her aspect awful, and she look’d a queen;
Her maids not mind the loom, nor household care,
Nor wage in needlework a Scythian war,
But cull, in canisters, disastrous flowers,
And plants from haunted heaths, and fairy bowers,
With brazen sickles reap’d at planetary hours.
Each dose the goddess weighs with watchful eye,
So nice her art in impious pharmacy.
Entering, she greets us with a gracious look,
And airs, that future amity bespoke.
Her ready nymphs serve up a rich repast;
The bowl she dashes first, then gives to taste.
Quick, to our own undoing we comply;
Her power we prove, and show the sorcery.
“Soon, in a length of face, our head extends,
Our chine stiff bristles bears, and forward bends,
A breadth of brawn new burnishes our neck;
Anon we grunt, as we begin to speak.
Alone Eurylochus refused to taste,
Nor to a beast obscene the man debased.
Hither Ulysses hastes, (so fates command,
And bears the powerful moly in his hand,
Unsheaths his cimeter, assaults the dame,
Preserves his species, and remains the same.
The nuptial rite this outrage straight attends;
The dower desired is his transfigured friends.
The incantation backward she repeats,
Inverts her rod, and what she did defeats.
“And now our skin grows smooth, our shape upright,
Our arms stretch up, our cloven feet unite;
With tears our weeping general we embrace,
Hang on his neck, and melt upon his face.
Twelve silver moons in Circe’s court we stay,
While there they waste the unwilling hours away.
’Twas here I spied a youth in Parian stone,
His head a pecker bore, the cause unknown
To passengers. A nymph of Circe’s train
The mystery thus attempted to explain:
Story of Picus and Canens
Picus, king of Latium, becomes the husband of Canens, whom he tenderly loves—Shortly after the nuptials, the youth, while indulging in the pleasures of the chase, is met by Circe, who becomes deeply enamoured of him—Picus meets the advances of the goddess with coldness; and she, in revenge, transforms him into a woodpecker, and his companions into wild beasts; while Canens, in despair, wastes away, and is changed into a voice.
“ ‘Picus, who once the Ausonian sceptre held,
Could rein the steed, and fit him for the field.
So like he was to what you see, that still
We doubt if real, or the sculptor’s skill.
The graces in the finish’d piece, you find,
Are but the copy of his fairer mind.
Four lustres scarce the royal youth could name,
Till every lovesick nymph confess’d a flame.
Oft for his love the mountain dryads sued,
And every silver sister of the flood:
Those of Numicus, Albula, and those
Where Almo creeps, and hasty Nar o’erflows;
Where sedgy Anio glides through smiling meads,
Where shady Farfar rustles in the reeds;
And those that love the lakes, and homage owe
To the chaste goddess of the silver bow.
“ ‘In vain each nymph her brightest charms put on,
His heart no sovereign would obey but one,
She whom Venilia, on Mount Palatine,
To Janus bore, the fairest of his line;
Nor did her face alone her charms confess,
Her voice was ravishing, and pleased no less.
Whene’er she sung, so melting were her strains,
The flocks, unfed, seem’d listening on the plains;
The rivers would stand still, the cedars bend;
And birds neglect their pinions to attend;
The savage kind in forest wilds grow tame;
And Canens, from her heavenly voice, her name.
“ ‘Hymen had now, in some ill-fated hour,
Their hands united, as their hearts before.
While their soft moments in delights they waste,
And each new day was dearer than the past,
Picus would sometimes o’er the forests rove,
And mingle sports with intervals of love.
It chanced, as once the foaming boar he chased,
His jewels sparkling on his Tyrian vest,
Lascivious Circe well the youth survey’d,
As simpling on the flowery hills she stray’d:
Her wishing eyes their silent message tell,
And from her lap the verdant mischief fell.
As she attempts at words, his courser springs
O’er hills, and lawns, and ev’n a wish outwings.
“ ‘ “Thou shalt not ’scape me so,” pronounced the dame,
“If plants have power, and spells be not a name.”
She said, and forthwith form’d a boar of air,
That sought the covert with dissembled fear.
Swift to the thicket Picus wings his way,
On foot, to chase the visionary prey.
“ ‘Now she invokes the daughters of the night,
Does noxious juices smear, and charms recite,
Such as can veil the moon’s more feeble fire,
Or shade the golden lustre of her sire.
In filthy fogs she hides the cheerful noon.
The guard at distance, and the youth alone—
“By those fair eyes,” she cries, “and every grace
That finish all the wonders of your face,
Oh! I conjure thee, hear a queen complain,
Nor let the sun’s soft lineage sue in vain.”
“ ‘ “Whoe’er thou art,” replied the king, “forbear!
None can my passion with my Canens share:
She first my every tender wish possess’d,
And found the soft approaches to my breast;
In nuptials bless’d, each loose desire we shun,
Nor time can end what innocence begun.”
“ ‘ “Think not,” she cried, “to saunter out a life
Of form, with that domestic drudge—a wife;
My just revenge, dull fool, ere long shall show
What ills we women, if refused, can do.
Think me a woman and a lover too.
From dear successful spite we hope for ease,
Nor fail to punish where we fail to please.”
“ ‘Now twice to east she turns, as oft to west;
Thrice waves her wand, as oft a charm express’d.
On the lost youth her magic power she tries,
Aloft he springs, and wonders how he flies.
On painted plumes the woods he seeks, and still
The monarch oak he pierces with his bill.
Thus changed,
