Part 18

ULY. A wondrous privilege is this, O Cyclops, Which on the stranger you bestow.

POL. What mean’st thou? Ha! art thou drinking up the wine by stealth?

SIL. Only the gentle Bacchus gave that kiss, Because I look so blooming.

POL. Thou shalt weep, Because thy lips were to the wine applied, Nor did it seek thy mouth.

SIL. Not thus, by Jove; I drank because the generous god of wine Declared that he admired me for my beauty.

POL. Pour forth; give me a bumper.

SIL. I must taste To see what mixture it requires.

POL. Damnation! Give it me pure.

SIL. Not so, the heavens forbid! Till you the wreath bind on your ample front, And I again have tasted.

POL. What a knave Is this my cupbearer!

SIL. Accuse me not; The wine is sweet: you ought to wipe your mouth Before you drink.

POL. My lips and beard are clean.

SIL. Loll thus upon your elbow with a grace, Drink as you see me drink, and imitate My every gesture.

POL. What art thou about?

SIL. I swallowed then a most delicious bumper.

POL. Take thou the cask, O stranger, and perform The office of my cupbearer.

ULY. These hands Have been accustomed to the pleasing office.

POL. Now pour it forth.

ULY. Be silent: I obey.

POL. Thou hast proposed a difficult restraint To him who largely drinks.

ULY. Now drain the bowl; Leave nought behind: the toper must not prate Before his liquor’s ended.

POL. In the vine There’s wisdom.

ULY. When to plenteous food you add An equal share of liquor, and well drench The throat beyond what thirst demands, you sink Into sweet sleep: but if you leave behind Aught of th’ unfinished beverage in your cup, Bacchus will scorch your entrails.

POL. ’Tis a mercy How I swam out; the very heavens whirl round Mingled with earth. I view Jove’s throne sublime, And the whole synod of encircling gods. Were all the Graces to solicit me, I would not kiss them: Ganymede himself Appears in matchless beauty.

SIL. I, O Cyclops, Am Jove’s own Ganymede.

POL. By Heaven thou art! Whom from the realms of Dardanus I bore.

[_Exit_ POLYPHEME.

SIL. Ruin awaits me.

CHOR. Dost thou loathe him now?

SIL. Ah me! I from this sleep shall soon behold The most accursed effects.

[_Exit_ SILENUS.

ULY. Come on, ye sons Of Bacchus, generous youths; for soon dissolved In slumber shall the monster from those jaws Vomit forth flesh, within the hall now smokes The brand, and nought remains but to burn out The Cyclops’ eye: act only like a man.

CHOR. The firmness of my soul shall equal rocks And adamant. But go into the cave With speed, before tumultuous sounds assail Our aged father’s ears; for to effect Your purpose, all is ready.

ULY. Vulcan, king Of Ætna, from this impious pest, who haunts Thy sacred mountain, free thyself at once, By burning out his glaring eye; and thou Nurtured by sable night, O sleep, invade With thy resistless force this beast abhorred By Heaven; nor after all the glorious deeds Achieved at Ilion, with his faithful sailors, Destroy Ulysses’ self, by him who heeds Nor god nor mortal. Else must we hold fortune A goddess, and all other deities Inferior to resistless fortune’s power.

[_Exit_ ULYSSES.

CHOR. The neck of him who slays his guest, With burning pincers shall be prest, And fire bereaving him of sight Soon shall destroy that orb of light. Within the embers near at hand Lies concealed a smoking brand, Torn from its parental tree. Maron, we depend on thee; May th’ exasperated foe With success direct the blow! May the Cyclops lose his eye, And curse his ill-timed jollity! Thee, Bromius, how I long to meet Thy front adorned with ivy twine; Leaving this abhorred retreat. Ah, when shall such delight be mine?

ULYSSES, CHORUS.

ULY. Be silent, O ye savages, restrain Those clamorous tongues: by Heaven ye shall not breathe, Nor wink your eyes, nor cough, lest ye awaken This pest, the Cyclops, ere he of his eyesight Is by the fire bereft.

CHOR. We will be silent, And in our jaws confine the very air.

ULY. The ponderous weapon seize with dauntless hands, Entering the cavern; for ’tis fully heated.

CHOR. Will you not give directions who shall first Manage the glowing lever, and burn out The Cyclops’ eye, that in one common fortune We all may share.

1st SEMICHOR. We who before the portals Are stationed, are not tall enough to drive Full on its destined mark the hissing brand.

2nd SEMICHOR. But I am with a sudden lameness seized.

1st SEMICHOR. The same calamity which you experience To me hath also happened; for my feet Are by convulsions tortured, though the cause I know not.

ULY. If ye feel such dreadful spasms, How can ye stand?

CHOR. Our eyes are also filled With dust or ashes.

ULY. These allies of mine Are worthless cowards.

CHOR. We forsooth want courage Because we feel compassion for our shoulders, Nor would be beaten till our teeth drop out. But I a magic incantation know, Devised by Orpheus, which hath such effect, That of its own accord the brand shall pierce The skull of him, the one-eyed son of earth.

ULY. Long have I known ye are by nature such; But more than ever do I know you now. On my own friends I therefore must rely. Yet if thou hast no vigour in that arm, Exhort my drooping friends to act with valour And let thy counsels aid the bold emprise.

[_Exit_ ULYSSES.

CHOR. Such be my province: we this Carian’s life Will hazard. But my counsels shall induce them To burn the Cyclops. Ho! with courage whirl The brand, delay not to scorch out the eye Of him who banquets on the stranger’s flesh. With fire assail the savage, pierce the front Of Ætna’s shepherd, lest, with anguish stung, On you he perpetrate some deed of horror.

POL. [_within._] Ah me! by burning coals I am deprived Of eyesight.

CHOR. That was a melodious pæan: To me, O Cyclops, sing th’ enchanting strain.

POLYPHEME, CHORUS.

POL. Ah, how am I insulted and destroyed! Yet shall ye never from this hollow rock Escape triumphant, O ye things of nought: For in my station rooted, where this cleft Opens a door, will I spread forth my hands And stop your passage!

CHOR. Ha! what means these outcries, O Cyclops?

POL. I am ruined.

CHOR. You appear To have much been abused.

POL. Deplorably.

CHOR. When fuddled, did you fall ’mid burning coals?

POL. Noman hath ruined me.

CHOR. To you then no one Hath offered any wrong.

POL. These lids hath Noman Deprived of sight.

CHOR. You therefore are not blind.

POL. Would thou couldst see as little.

CHOR. How can no man Put out your eye?

POL. Thou art disposed to jest. But where is Noman?

CHOR. He is nowhere, Cyclops.

POL. That execrable stranger, mark me well, Is author of my ruin, who produced The fraudful draught, and burned my visual nerves.

CHOR. Wine is invincible.

POL. By all the gods, Answer me I conjure you; did they fly, Or are they here within?

CHOR. They on the top Of yonder rock which screens them from your reach, In silence take their stand.

POL. But on which side?

CHOR. Your right.

POL. Where, where?

CHOR. Upon that very rock. Have you yet caught them?

POL. To mischance succeeds Mischance; I have fallen down and cracked my skull.

CHOR. They ’scape you now.

POL. Ye misinformed me sure; They are not here.

CHOR. I say not that they are.

POL. Where then?

CHOR. They wheel around you on your left.

POL. Ah me! I am derided, ye but mock At my affliction.

CHOR. They are there no longer: But Noman stands before you.

POL. O thou villain, Where art thou?

ULYSSES, POLYPHEME, CHORUS.

ULY. Keeping cautiously aloof, Thus I, Ulysses, guard my threatened life.

POL. What saidst thou? Wherefore hast thou changed thy name T’ assume a new one?

ULY. Me my father named Ulysses. It was destined you should suffer A just requital for your impious feast; For I in vain had with consuming flames Laid Ilion waste, had I forborne t’ avenge On you the murder of my valiant friends.

POL. Now is that ancient oracle, alas! Accomplished, which foretold, that I by thee, On thy return from Troy, should be deprived Of sight: but that thou also for a deed So cruel, shalt be punished, and full long Endure the beating of tempestuous waves.

ULY. Go weep, my actions justify these words. But to the shore I haste; and to my country Will steer the vessel o’er Sicilia’s waves.

POL. Thou shalt not; with this fragment of the rock Hurled at thy head, thee and thy perjured crew Will I demolish: for I yet, though blind, Can mount the cliff which overhangs the port, And in its wonted crannies fix my steps.

CHOR. But we, blest partners in Ulysses’ voyage, Henceforth the laws of Bacchus will obey.

HELEN.

PERSONS OF THE DRAMA.

HELEN. TEUCER. CHORUS OF GRECIAN DAMES (HELEN’S ATTENDANTS). MENELAUS. FEMALE SERVANT. MESSENGER. THEOCLYMENUS. THEONOE. CASTOR AND POLLUX.

SCENE.—PROTEUS’ TOMB, AT THE ENTRANCE OF THEOCLYMENUS’ PALACE IN PHAROS, AN ISLAND AT THE MOUTH OF THE NILE.

HELEN.

Bright are these virgin currents of the Nile Which water Egypt’s soil, and are supplied, Instead of drops from heaven, by molten snow. But Proteus, while he lived, of these domains Was lord, he in the isle of Pharos dwelt, King of all Ægypt; for his wife he gained One of the nymphs who haunt the briny deep, Fair Psamathe, after she left the bed Of Æacus; she in the palace bore To him two children, one of them a son Called Theoclymenus, because his life Is passed in duteous homage to the gods; A daughter also of majestic mien, Her mother’s darling, in her infant years (Eidothea called by her enraptured sire): But when the blooming maid became mature For nuptial joys, Theonoe was the name They gave her; all the counsels of the gods, The present and the future, well she knew, Such privilege she from her grandsire Nereus Inherited. But not to fame unknown Are Sparta’s realm, whence I derive my birth, And my sire, Tyndarus. There prevails a rumour That to my mother Leda Jove was borne On rapid wings, the figure of a swan Assuming, and by treachery gained admission To her embraces, flying from an eagle, If we may credit such report. My name Is Helen; but I also will recount What woes I have endured; three goddesses, For beauty’s prize contending, in the cave Of Ida, came to Paris; Juno, Venus, And Pallas, virgin progeny of Jove, Requesting him to end their strife, and judge Whose charms outshone her rivals. But proposing For a reward, my beauty (if the name Of beauty suit this inauspicious form) And promising in marriage to bestow me On Paris, Venus conquered: for the swain Of Ida, leaving all his herds behind, Expecting to receive me for his bride, To Sparta came. But Juno, whose defeat Fired with resentment her indignant soul, Our nuptials frustrated; for to the arms Of royal Priam’s son, she gave not me, But in my semblance formed a living image Composed of ether. Paris falsely deemed That he possessed me; from that time these ills Have been increased by the decrees of Jove, For he with war hath visited the realms Of Greece, and Phrygia’s miserable sons, That he might lighten from th’ unrighteous swarms Of its inhabitants the groaning earth, And on the bravest of the Grecian chiefs Confer renown. While in the Phrygian war, As the reward of their victorious arms, I to the host of Greece have been displayed, Though absent, save in likeness and in name. But Mercury, receiving me in folds Of air, and covering with a cloud (for Jove Was not unmindful of me), in this house Of royal Proteus, who of all mankind Was in his judgment the most virtuous, placed me, That undefiled I might preserve the bed Of Menelaus. I indeed am here; But with collected troops my hapless lord Pursues the ravisher to Ilion’s towers. Beside Scamander’s stream hath many a chief Died in my cause; but I, who have endured All these afflictions, am a public curse; For ’tis supposed, that treacherous to my lord, I have through Greece blown up the flames of war. Why then do I prolong my life? these words I heard from Mercury: “That I again In Sparta, with my husband shall reside, When he discovers that I never went To Troy:” he therefore counselled me to keep A spotless chastity. While Proteus viewed The solar beams, I from the nuptial yoke Still lived exempt; but since the darksome grave Hath covered his remains, the royal son Of the deceased solicits me to wed him: But honouring my first husband, at this tomb Of Proteus, I a suppliant kneel, to him, To him I sue, to guard my nuptial couch, That if through Greece I bear a name assailed By foul aspersions, no unseemly deed May cover me with real infamy.

TEUCER, HELEN.

TEU. Who rules this fortress? such a splendid dome With royal porticos and blazoned roofs Seems worthy of a Plutus for its lord. But, O ye gods, what vision! I behold That hateful woman who hath ruined me, And all the Greeks. Heaven’s vengeance on thy head! Such a resemblance bear’st thou to that Helen, That if I were not in a foreign land, I with this stone would smite thee; thou shouldst bleed For being like Jove’s daughter.

HEL. Wretched man, Whoe’er you are, why do you hate me thus Because of her misfortunes?

TEU. I have erred In giving way to such unseemly rage. All Greece abhors Jove’s daughter. But forgive me, O woman, for the words which I have uttered.

HEL. Say who you are, and from what land you come?

TEU. One of that miserable race the Greeks.

HEL. No wonder is it then, if you detest The Spartan Helen. But to me declare, Who are you, whence, and from what father sprung?

TEU. My name is Teucer, Telamon my sire; The land which nurtured me is Salamis.

HEL. But wherefore do you wander o’er these meads Laved by the Nile?

TEU. I from my native land Am banished.

HEL. You, alas! must needs be wretched. Who drove you thence?

TEU. My father Telamon. What friend canst thou hold dearer?

HEL. For what cause Were you to exile doomed? your situation Is most calamitous.

TEU. My brother Ajax, Who died at Troy, was author of my ruin.

HEL. How? by your sword deprived of life?

TEU. He fell, On his own blade, and perished.

HEL. Was he mad? Who could act thus whose intellects are sound?

TEU. Know’st thou Achilles, Peleus’ son?

HEL. He erst, I heard, to Helen as a suitor came.

TEU. He, at his death, his comrades left to strive Which should obtain his arms.

HEL. But why was this Hurtful to Ajax?

TEU. When another won Those arms, he gave up life.

HEL. Do your afflictions Rise from his fate?

TEU. Because I died not with him.

HEL. O stranger, went you then to Troy’s famed city?

TEU. And having shared in laying waste its bulwarks, I also perished.

HEL. Have the flames consumed, And utterly destroyed them?

TEU. Not a trace Of those proud walls is now to be discerned.

HEL. Through thee, O Helen, do the Phrygians perish.

TEU. The Greeks too: for most grievous are the mischiefs Which have been wrought.

HEL. What length of time’s elapsed Since Troy was sacked?

TEU. Seven times the fruitful year Hath almost turned around her lingering wheel.

HEL. But how much longer did your host remain Before those bulwarks?

TEU. Many a tedious moon; There full ten years were spent.

HEL. And have ye taken That Spartan dame?

TEU. By her dishevelled hair, Th’ adult’ress, Menelaus dragged away.

HEL. Did you behold that object of distress, Or speak you from report?

TEU. These eyes as clearly Witnessed the whole, as I now view thy face.

HEL. Be cautious, lest for her ye should mistake Some well-formed semblance which the gods have sent.

TEU. Talk if thou wilt on any other subject; No more of her.

HEL. Believe you this opinion To be well-grounded?

TEU. With these eyes I saw her, And she e’en now is present to my soul.

HEL. Have Menelaus and his consort reached Their home.

TEU. They are not in the Argive land, Nor on Eurotas’ banks.

HEL. Alas! alas! The tale you have recounted, is to her Who hears you, an event most inauspicious.

TEU. He and his consort, both they say are dead.

HEL. Did not the Greeks in one large squadron sail?

TEU. Yes; but a storm dispersed their shattered fleet.

HEL. Where were they, in what seas?

TEU. They at that time Through the mid waves of the Ægean deep Were passing.

HEL. Can none tell if Menelaus Escaped this tempest?

TEU. No man; but through Greece ’Tis rumoured he is dead.

HEL. I am undone. Is Thestius’ daughter living?

TEU. Mean’st thou Leda? She with the dead is numbered.

HEL. Did the shame Of Helen cause her wretched mother’s death?

TEU. Around her neck, ’tis said the noble dame Entwined the gliding noose.

HEL. But live the sons Of Tyndarus, or are they too now no more?

TEU. They are, and are not, dead; for two accounts Are propagated.

HEL. Which is best confirmed? O wretched me!

TEU. Some say that they are gods Under the semblance of two radiant stars.

HEL. Well have you spoken. But what else is rumoured?

TEU. That on account of their lost sister’s guilt They died by their own swords. But of these themes Enough: I wish not to renew my sorrows. But O assist me in the great affairs On which I to these royal mansions came, Wishing to see the prophetess Theonoe, And learn, from Heaven’s oracular response, How I may steer my vessel with success To Cyprus’ isle, where Phœbus hath foretold That I shall dwell, and on the walls I rear Bestow the name of Salamis, yet mindful Of that dear country I have left behind.

HEL. This will your voyage of itself explain: But fly from these inhospitable shores, Ere Proteus’ son, the ruler of this land, Behold you: fly, for he is absent now Pursuing with his hounds the savage prey. He slays each Grecian stranger who becomes His captive: ask not why, for I am silent; And what could it avail you to be told?

TEU. O woman, most discreetly hast thou spoken; Thy kindness may the righteous gods repay! For though thy person so resemble Helen, Thou hast a soul unlike that worthless dame. Perdition seize her; never may she reach The current of Eurotas: but mayst thou, Most generous woman, be for ever blest.

[_Exit_ TEUCER.

HEL. Plunged as I am ’midst great and piteous woes, How shall I frame the plaintive strain, what Muse With tears, or doleful elegies, invoke?

ODE.

I. 1.

Ye syrens, winged daughters of the earth, Come and attune the sympathetic string, Expressive now no more of mirth, To soothe my griefs, the flute of Libya bring; Record the tortures which this bosom rend, And echo back my elegiac strains: Proserpine next will I invoke, to send Numbers adapted to her votary’s pains; So shall her dark abode, while many a tear I shed, Waft the full dirge to soothe th’ illustrious dead.

CHORUS, HELEN.

CHORUS.

I. 2.

Near the cerulean margin of our streams I stood, and on the tufted herbage spread My purple vestments in those beams Which from his noontide orb Hyperion shed, When on a sudden from the waving reeds I heard a plaintive and unwelcome sound Of bitter lamentation; o’er the meads Groans inarticulate were poured around: Beneath the rocky cave, dear scene of past delight, Some Naiad thus bewails Pan’s hasty flight.

HELEN.

II. 1.

Ye Grecian nymphs, whom those barbarians caught, And from your native land reluctant bore, The tidings which yon sailor brought Call forth these tears; for Ilion is no more, By him of Ida, that predicted flame Destroyed; through me, alas! have myriads bled, If not through me, through my detested name. By th’ ignominious noose is Leda dead Who my imaginary guilt deplored; And doomed by the relentless Fates in vain To tedious wanderings, my unhappy lord At length hath perished ’midst the billowy main: The twin protectors of their native land, Castor and Pollux, from all human eyes Are vanished, they have left Eurotas’ strand, And fields, in playful strife where each young wrestler vies.

CHORUS.

II. 2.

My royal mistress, your disastrous fate With many a groan and fruitless tear I mourn. I from that hour your sorrows date When amorous Jove on snowy pinions borne, In form a swan, by Leda was carest. Is there an evil you have not endured? Your mother is no more, through you unblest Are Jove’s twin sons. Nor have your vows procured Of your dear country the enchanting sight. A rumour too through various realms hath spread, Caught by the envious vulgar with delight, Assigning you to the barbarian’s bed. Amid the waves, far from the wished-for shore, Your husband hath been buried in the main. You shall behold your native walls no more Nor under burnished roofs your wonted state maintain.

HELEN.

III.