But ah, beware, Sicilian nymphs! nor boast That wandering heart which I so lately lost; Nor be with all those tempting words abused, Those tempting words were all to Sappho used.

And you that rule Sicilia's happy plains, Have pity, Venus, on your poet's pains! 70 Shall fortune still in one sad tenor run, And still increase the woes so soon begun?

Inured to sorrow from my tender years, My parents' ashes drank my early tears: My brother next, neglecting wealth and fame, Ignobly burn'd in a destructive flame: An infant daughter late my griefs increased, And all a mother's cares distract my breast, Alas! what more could Fate itself impose, But thee, the last, and greatest of my woes? 80 No more my robes in waving purple flow, Nor on my hand the sparkling diamonds glow; No more my locks in ringlets curl'd diffuse The costly sweetness of Arabian dews, Nor braids of gold the varied tresses bind, That fly disorder'd with the wanton wind: For whom should Sappho use such arts as these?

He's gone, whom only she desired to please!

Cupid's light darts my tender bosom move; Still is there cause for Sappho still to love: 90 So from my birth the Sisters fix'd my doom, And gave to Venus all my life to come; Or, while my Muse in melting notes complains, My yielding heart keeps measure to my strains.

By charms like thine, which all my soul have won, Who might not--ah! who would not be undone?

For those Aurora Cephalus might scorn, And with fresh blushes paint the conscious morn.

For those might Cynthia lengthen Phaon's sleep; And bid Endymion nightly tend his sheep; 100 Venus for those had rapt thee to the skies; But Mars on thee might look with Venus' eyes.

Oh scarce a youth, yet scarce a tender boy!

Oh useful time for lovers to employ!

Pride of thy age, and glory of thy race, Come to these arms, and melt in this embrace!

The vows you never will return, receive; And take, at least, the love you will not give.

See, while I write, my words are lost in tears!

The less my sense, the more my love appears. 110 Sure 'twas not much to bid one kind adieu, (At least to feign was never hard to you) 'Farewell, my Lesbian love,' you might have said; Or coldly thus, 'Farewell, O Lesbian maid!'

No tear did you, no parting kiss receive, Nor knew I then how much I was to grieve.

No lover's gift your Sappho could confer, And wrongs and woes were all you left with her.

No charge I gave you, and no charge could give, But this, 'Be mindful of our loves, and live.' 120 Now by the Nine, those powers adored by me, And Love, the god that ever waits on thee, When first I heard (from whom I hardly knew) That you were fled, and all my joys with you, Like some sad statue, speechless, pale, I stood, Grief chill'd my breast, and stopp'd my freezing blood; No sigh to rise, no tear had power to flow, Fix'd in a stupid lethargy of woe: But when its way the impetuous passion found, I rend my tresses, and my breast I wound: 130 I rave, then weep; I curse, and then complain; Now swell to rage, now melt in tears again.

Not fiercer pangs distract the mournful dame, Whose first-born infant feeds the funeral flame.

My scornful brother with a smile appears, Insults my woes, and triumphs in my tears; His hated image ever haunts my eyes; 'And why this grief? thy daughter lives!' he cries.

Stung with my love, and furious with despair, All torn my garments, and my bosom bare, 140 My woes, thy crimes, I to the world proclaim; Such inconsistent things are love and shame!

'Tis thou art all my care and my delight, My daily longing, and my dream by night; Oh night more pleasing than the brightest day, When fancy gives what absence takes away, And, dress'd in all its visionary charms, Restores my fair deserter to my arms!

Then round your neck in wanton wreaths I twine, Then you, methinks, as fondly circle mine: 150 A thousand tender words I hear and speak; A thousand melting kisses give and take: Then fiercer joys, I blush to mention these, Yet, while I blush, confess how much they please.

But when, with day, the sweet delusions fly, And all things wake to life and joy but I, As if once more forsaken, I complain, And close my eyes to dream of you again: Then frantic rise, and like some Fury rove Through lonely plains, and through the silent grove; 160 As if the silent grove, and lonely plains, That knew my pleasures, could relieve my pains.

I view the grotto, once the scene of love, The rocks around, the hanging roofs above, That charm'd me more, with native moss o'ergrown, Than Phrygian marble, or the Parian stone; I find the shades that veil'd our joys before; But, Phaon gone, those shades delight no more.

Here the press'd herbs with bending tops betray Where oft entwined in amorous folds we lay; 170 I kiss that earth which once was press'd by you, And all with tears the withering herbs bedew.

For thee the fading trees appear to mourn, And birds defer their songs till thy return: Night shades the groves, and all in silence lie, All but the mournful Philomel and I: With mournful Philomel I join my strain, Of Tereus she, of Phaon I complain.

A spring there is, whose silver waters show, Clear as a glass, the shining sands below: 180 A flowery lotus spreads its arms above, Shades all the banks, and seems itself a grove; Eternal greens the mossy margin grace, Watch'd by the sylvan genius of the place.

Here as I lay, and swell'd with tears the flood, Before my sight a watery virgin stood: She stood and cried, 'O you that love in vain!

Fly hence, and seek the fair Leucadian main; There stands a rock, from whose impending steep Apollo's fane surveys the rolling deep; 190 There injured lovers, leaping from above, Their flames extinguish, and forget to love.

Deucalion once with hopeless fury burn'd, In vain he loved, relentless Pyrrha scorn'd: But when from hence he plunged into the main, Deucalion scorn'd, and Pyrrha loved in vain.

Haste, Sappho, haste, from high Leucadia throw Thy wretched weight, nor dread the deeps below!'

She spoke, and vanish'd with the voice--I rise, And silent tears fall trickling from my eyes. 200 I go, ye nymphs! those rocks and seas to prove; How much I fear, but ah, how much I love!

I go, ye nymphs! where furious love inspires: Let female fears submit to female fires.

To rocks and seas I fly from Phaon's hate, And hope from seas and rocks a milder fate.

Ye gentle gales, beneath my body blow, And softly lay me on the waves below!

And thou, kind Love, my sinking limbs sustain, Spread thy soft wings, and waft me o'er the main, 210 Nor let a lover's death the guiltless flood profane!

On Phoebus' shrine my harp I'll then bestow, And this inscription shall be placed below: 'Here she who sung, to him that did inspire, Sappho to Phoebus consecrates her lyre; What suits with Sappho, Phoebus, suits with thee: The gift, the giver, and the god agree.'

But why, alas! relentless youth, ah, why To distant seas must tender Sappho fly?

Thy charms than those may far more powerful be, 220 And Phoebus' self is less a god to me.

Ah! canst thou doom me to the rocks and sea, Oh far more faithless and more hard than they?

Ah! canst thou rather see this tender breast Dash'd on these rocks than to thy bosom press'd?

This breast which once, in vain, you liked so well; Where the Loves play'd, and where the Muses dwell.

Alas! the Muses now no more inspire; Untuned my lute, and silent is my lyre.

My languid numbers have forgot to flow, 230 And fancy sinks beneath a weight of woe.

Ye Lesbian virgins, and ye Lesbian dames, Themes of my verse, and objects of my flames, No more your groves with my glad songs shall ring, No more these hands shall touch the trembling string: My Phaon's fled, and I those arts resign; (Wretch that I am, to call that Phaon mine!) Return, fair youth! return, and bring along Joy to my soul, and vigour to my song: Absent from thee, the poet's flame expires; 240 But ah! how fiercely burn the lover's fires?

Gods! can no prayers, no sighs, no numbers move One savage heart, or teach it how to love?

The winds my prayers, my sighs, my numbers bear, The flying winds have lost them all in air!

Oh when, alas! shall more auspicious gales To these fond eyes restore thy welcome sails?

If you return--ah, why these long delays?

Poor Sappho dies while careless Phaon stays.

Oh launch thy bark, nor fear the watery plain; 250 Venus for thee shall smooth her native main.

Oh launch thy bark, secure of prosperous gales; Cupid for thee shall spread the swelling sails.

If you will fly--(yet ah! what cause can be, Too cruel youth, that you should fly from me?) If not from Phaon I must hope for ease, Ah, let me seek it from the raging seas: To raging seas unpitied I'll remove, And either cease to live, or cease to love!

THE FABLE OF DRYOPE.[56]

FROM THE NINTH BOOK OF OVID'S METAMORPHOSES.

She said, and for her lost Galanthis sighs; When the fair consort of her son replies: 'Since you a servant's ravish'd form bemoan, And kindly sigh for sorrows not your own, Let me (if tears and grief permit) relate A nearer woe, a sister's stranger fate.

No nymph of all Oechalia could compare For beauteous form with Dryope the fair, Her tender mother's only hope and pride, (Myself the offspring of a second bride). 10 This nymph, compress'd by him who rules the day, Whom Delphi and the Delian isle obey, Andraemon loved; and, bless'd in all those charms That pleased a god, succeeded to her arms.

'A lake there was with shelving banks around, Whose verdant summit fragrant myrtles crown'd.

These shades, unknowing of the fates, she sought, And to the Naiads flowery garlands brought: Her smiling babe (a pleasing charge) she press'd Within her arms, and nourish'd at her breast. 20 Not distant far, a watery lotus grows; The spring was new, and all the verdant boughs, Adorn'd with blossoms, promised fruits that vie In glowing colours with the Tyrian dye: Of these she cropp'd, to please her infant son, And I myself the same rash act had done: But, lo! I saw (as near her side I stood) The violated blossoms drop with blood; Upon the tree I cast a frightful look; The trembling tree with sudden horror shook. 30 Lotis the nymph (if rural tales be true) As from Priapus' lawless lust she flew, Forsook her form, and, fixing here, became A flowery plant, which still preserves her name.

'This change unknown, astonish'd at the sight, My trembling sister strove to urge her flight; And first the pardon of the nymphs implored, And those offended sylvan powers adored: But when she backward would have fled, she found Her stiffening feet were rooted in the ground: 40 In vain to free her fasten'd feet she strove, And as she struggles only moves above; She feels th' encroaching bark around her grow By quick degrees, and cover all below: Surprised at this, her trembling hand she heaves To rend her hair; her hand is fill'd with leaves: Where late was hair, the shooting leaves are seen To rise, and shade her with a sudden green.

The child Amphissus, to her bosom press'd, Perceived a colder and a harder breast, 50 And found the springs, that ne'er till then denied Their milky moisture, on a sudden dried.

I saw, unhappy! what I now relate, And stood the helpless witness of thy fate; Embraced thy boughs, thy rising bark delay'd, There wish'd to grow, and mingle shade with shade.

'Behold Andraemon and th' unhappy sire Appear, and for their Dryope inquire: A springing tree for Dryope they find, And print warm kisses on the panting rind, 60 Prostrate, with tears their kindred plant bedew, And close embrace as to the roots they grew.

The face was all that now remain'd of thee, No more a woman, nor yet quite a tree; Thy branches hung with humid pearls appear, From every leaf distils a trickling tear; And straight a voice, while yet a voice remains, Thus through the trembling boughs in sighs complains:

'"If to the wretched any faith be given, I swear by all th' unpitying powers of Heaven, 70 No wilful crime this heavy vengeance bred; In mutual innocence our lives we led: If this be false, let these new greens decay, Let sounding axes lop my limbs away, And crackling flames on all my honours prey.

But from my branching arms this infant bear, Let some kind nurse supply a mother's care: And to his mother let him oft be led, Sport in her shades, and in her shades be fed: Teach him, when first his infant voice shall frame 80 Imperfect words, and lisp his mother's name, To hail this tree, and say, with weeping eyes, 'Within this plant my hapless parent lies:'

And when in youth he seeks the shady woods, Oh! let him fly the crystal lakes and floods, Nor touch the fatal flowers; but, warn'd by me, Believe a goddess shrined in every tree.

My sire, my sister, and my spouse, farewell!

If in your breasts or love or pity dwell, Protect your plant, nor let my branches feel 90 The browsing cattle or the piercing steel.

Farewell! and since I cannot bend to join My lips to yours, advance at least to mine.

My son, thy mother's parting kiss receive, While yet thy mother has a kiss to give.

I can no more; the creeping rind invades My closing lips, and hides my head in shades: Remove your hands, the bark shall soon suffice Without their aid to seal these dying eyes."

'She ceased at once to speak and ceased to be, 100 And all the nymph was lost within the tree; Yet latent life through her new branches reign'd, And long the plant a human heat retain'd.'

VERTUMNUS AND POMONA,

FROM THE FOURTEENTH BOOK OF OVID'S METAMORPHOSES.

The fair Pomona flourish'd in his reign; Of all the virgins of the sylvan train None taught the trees a nobler race to bear, Or more improved the vegetable care.

To her the shady grove, the flowery field, The streams and fountains no delights could yield: 'Twas all her joy the ripening fruits to tend, And see the boughs with happy burdens bend.

The hook she bore instead of Cynthia's spear, To lop the growth of the luxuriant year, 10 To decent forms the lawless shoots to bring, And teach th' obedient branches where to spring.

Now the cleft rind inserted grafts receives, And yields an offspring more than nature gives; Now sliding streams the thirsty plants renew, And feed their fibres with reviving dew.

These cares alone her virgin breast employ, Averse from Venus and the nuptial joy.

Her private orchards, wall'd on every side, To lawless sylvans all access denied. 20 How oft the satyrs and the wanton fauns, Who haunt the forests or frequent the lawns, The god whose ensign scares the birds of prey, And old Silenus, youthful in decay, Employ'd their wiles and unavailing care To pass the fences, and surprise the fair!

Like these, Vertumnus own'd his faithful flame, Like these, rejected by the scornful dame.