‘Now, monster, now by proof it shall appear
Whether thy horns are sharper, or my spear.’
At this, I threw: for want of other ward,
He lifted up his hand, his front to guard:
His hand it pass’d, and fix’d it to his brow:
Loud shouts of ours attend the lucky blow.
Him Peleus finish’d, with a second wound,
Which through the navel pierced: he reel’d around,
And dragg’d his dangling bowels on the ground;
Trod what he dragg’d, and what he trod, he crush’d,
And to his mother earth with empty belly rush’d.”
Story of Cyllarus and Hylonome
The centaur Cyllarus is mortally wounded in the conflict with the Lapithae; and his mistress Hylonome expires in his arms.
“Nor could thy form, oh Cyllarus, foreslow
Thy fate: (if form to monsters men allow:)
Just bloom’d thy beard; thy beard of golden hue:
Thy locks in golden waves about thy shoulders flew:
Sprightly thy look! Thy shapes in every part
So clean, as might instruct the sculptor’s art,
As far as man extended: where began
The beast, the beast was equal to the man:
Add but a horse’s head and neck, and he,
Oh Castor, was a courser worthy thee:
So was his back proportion’d for the seat;
So rose his brawny chest; so swiftly moved his feet:
Coal black his colour, but like jet it shone;
His legs and flowing tail were white alone:
Beloved by many maidens of his kind;
But fair Hylonome possess’d his mind;
Hylonome, for features, and for face,
Excelling all the nymphs of double race:
Nor less her blandishments than beauty move;
At once both living, and confessing love.
For him she dress’d; for him, with female care,
She comb’d, and set in curl her auburn hair:
Of roses, violets, and lilies mix’d,
And sprigs of flowing rosemary betwixt,
She form’d the chaplet that adorn’d her front:
In waters of the Pegasaean fount,
And in the streams that from the fountain play,
She wash’d her face, and bathed her twice a day.
The scarf of furs, that hung below her side,
Was ermine, or the panther’s spotted pride:
Spoils of no common beast. With equal flame
They loved: their sylvan pleasures were the same.
“Uncertain from what hand, a flying dart
At Cyllarus was sent, which pierced his heart.
The javelin drawn from out the mortal wound,
He faints with stagg’ring steps, and seeks the ground:
The fair within her arms received his fall,
And strove his wandering spirits to recall;
And while her hand the streaming blood opposed,
Join’d face to face, his lips with hers she closed.
Stifled with kisses, a sweet death he dies:
She fills the fields with undistinguish’d cries;
At last her words were in her clamour drown’d;
For my stunn’d ears received no vocal sound.
In madness of her grief, she seized the dart
New drawn, and reeking from her lover’s heart;
To her bare bosom the sharp point applied,
And wounded fell; and falling by his side,
Embraced him in her arms; and thus embracing died.
“Ev’n still methinks I see Phaeocomes;
Strange was his habit, and as odd his dress:
Six lions’ hides, with thongs together fast,
His upper part defended to his waist:
And where man ended, the continued vest,
Spread on his back, the houss and trappings of a beast.
A stump too heavy for a team to draw,
(It seems a fable, though the fact I saw,)
He threw at Pholon; the descending blow
Divides the scull, and cleaves his head in two.
The brains, from nose, and mouth, and either ear,
Came issuing out, as through a colander
The curdled milk, or from the press the whey,
Driven down by weights above, is drain’d away.
“But him, while stooping down to spoil the slain,
Pierced through the paunch, I tumbled on the plain.
Then Chthonius and Teleboas I slew:
A fork the former arm’d; a dart his fellow threw.
The javelin wounded me; (behold the scar:
Then was my time to seek the Trojan war;
Then I was Hector’s match in open field;
But he was then unborn, at least a child:
Now I am nothing.) I forbear to tell
By Periphantas how Pyretus fell;
The centaur by the knight: nor will I stay
On Amphyx, or what deaths he dealt that day:
What honour, with a pointless lance, he won,
Stuck in the front of a four-footed man:
What fame young Macareus obtain’d in fight;
Or dwell on Nessus, now return’d from flight:
How Prophet Mopsus not alone divined,
Whose valour equall’d his foreseeing mind.”
Caeneus Transformed to an Eagle
The nymph Caenis, whose name is changed to Caeneus, pursues the centaurs with great slaughter, who at length crush the hero with huge forests of trees—The gods, however, in compassion, change him into an eagle.
“Already Caeneus, with his conquering hand,
Had slaughter’d five, the boldest of their band,
Pyrachmus, Helymus, Antimachus,
Bromus the brave, and stronger Stiphelus.
Their names I number’d, and remember well,
No trace remaining, by what wounds they fell.
“Latreus, the bulkiest of the double race,
Whom the spoil’d arms of slain Halesus grace;
In years retaining still his youthful might,
Though his black hairs were interspersed with white,
Between the embattled ranks began to prance,
Proud of his helm, and Macedonian lance,
And rode the ring around, that either host
Might hear him, while he made this empty boast:
‘And from a female shall we suffer shame?
For Caenis still, not Caeneus, is thy name;
And still the native softness of thy kind
Prevails, and leaves the woman in thy mind:
Remember what thou wert; what price was paid
To change thy sex; to make thee not a maid
And but a man in show: go, card and spin,
And leave the business of the war to men.’
“While thus the boaster exercised his pride,
The fatal spear of Caeneus reach’d his side;
Just in the mixture of the kinds it ran,
Between the nether beast and upper man:
The monster, mad with rage, and stung with smart,
His lance directed at the hero’s heart:
It struck; but bounded from his hardened breast,
Like hail from tiles, which the safe house invest:
Nor seem’d the stroke with more effect to come,
Than a small pebble falling on a drum.
He next his falchion tried, in closer fight;
But the keen falchion had no power to bite:
He thrust; the blunted point return’d again;
‘Since downright blows,’ he cried, ‘and thrusts are vain,
I’ll prove his side:’ in strong embraces held,
He proved his side; his side the sword repell’d:
His hollow belly echoed to the stroke,
Untouch’d his body as a solid rock:
Aim’d at his neck, at last the blade in shivers broke.
“The
