SCENE IV

_Chorus._ Fear not the power of flame, nor swelling gale, Nor hurtling dart, nor cloudy wain that brings The winter storms; fear not when Danube sweeps 585 Unchecked between its widely severed shores, Nor when the Rhone hastes seaward, and the sun Has broken up the snow upon the hills, And Hermes flows in rivers. A wife deserted, loving while she hates, 590 Fear greatly; blindly burns her anger's flame, For kings she cares not, will not bear the curb. Ye gods, we ask your grace divine for him Who safely crossed the seas; the ocean's lord Is angry for his conquered kingdom's sake; 595 Spare Jason, we entreat! Th' impetuous youth who dared to drive the car Of Phœbus, keeping not the wonted course, Died in the furious fires himself had lit. Few are the evils of the well-known way; 600 Seek the old paths your fathers safely trod, The sacred federations of the world Keep still inviolate. The men who dipped the oars of that brave ship; Who plundered of their shade the sacred groves Of Pelion; passed between the unstable cliffs; Endured so many hardships on the deep; And cast their anchor on a savage coast, Passing again with ravished foreign gold, Atoned with fearful death upon the sea 610 For violated law. The angry deep demanded punishment: Tiphys to an unskillful pilot left The rudder. On a foreign coast he fell, Far from his father's kingdom, and he lies 615 With nameless shades, under a lowly tomb. Becalmed in her still harbor Aulis held The impatient ships, remembering in wrath The king that she lost thence. The fair Camena's son, who touched his lyre 620 So sweetly that the floods stood still, the winds Were silent, and the birds forgot to sing, And forests followed him, on Thracian fields Lies dead, his head borne down by Hebrus' stream. He touched again the Styx and Tartarus, 625 But not again returns. Alcides overthrew the north wind's sons; He slew that son of Neptune who could take Unnumbered forms; but after he had made Peace between land and sea, and opened wide 630 The realm of Dis, lying on Œta's top He gave his body to the cruel fire, Destroyed by his wife's gift--the fatal robe Poisoned with Centaur's blood. Ankæus fell a victim to the boar 635 Of Caledonia; Meleager slew His mother's brother, stained his hands with blood Of his own mother. They have merited Their lot, but what the crime that he atoned By death whom Hercules long sought in vain-- 640 The tender Hylas drawn beneath safe waves? Go now, brave soldiers, boldly plow the main, But fear the gentle streams. Idmon the serpents buried in the sands Of Libya, though he knew the future well. 645 Mopsus, to others true, false to himself, Fell far from Thebes; and he who tried to burn The crafty Greeks fell headlong to the deep: Such death was meet for crime. Oileus, smitten by the thunderbolt, 650 Died on the ocean; and Pheræus' wife Fell for her husband, so averting fate; He who commanded that the golden spoil Be carried to the ships had traveled far, But, plunged in seething cauldron, Pelias died 655 In narrow limits. 'Tis enough, ye gods; Ye have avenged the sea!