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prince! O friend! lo! here thy Medon ftands;
Ah! ftop the hero's un refited hands,
Incens'd too juftly by that impious brood
Whofe guilty glorics now are fet in blood.
To whom lydes with a pleaf ng eye:
Be bold, on friendship and my fon rely;
Live an example for the world to read,
How much more safe the good than evil deed :
Thou, with the Heaven-taught Bard, in peace
refort

From blood and carnage to you open court:
Me other work requires-With timorous awe
From the dire feene th' exempted two withdraw,
Scarce fure of life, look round, and trembling move
To the bright al'ars of Protector jove. 430
Mean while Ulyffes fearch'd the dome, to find
If yet there live of all th' offending kind.
Not one! complete the bloody tale he found,
All steep'd in blood, all gasping on the ground,
So when, by hollow flores, the £fher train 435
Sweep with their arching rets the hoary main,
And fearce the meshy toils the copious draught
contain,

All naked of their element, and bare,
The fires pa t and gap in thinner air;
Wire o'er the fands are spread the stiffening prey,
Till the warm fun exhales their foul away.

And now the king commands his fon to call
Old Euryclea to the d-athul hall:

The fon bfervant mot a moment stays:

The aged governefs with speed obeys:

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The founding portals infiant they difplay;
The matron moves, the prince directs the way.
On heaps of death the ftern Ulyles flood,
All black with duft, and cover'd thick with blood.
So the grim lion from the flaughter comes,
Dreadful he glares, and terribly he foams,
His breast with marks of carnage painted o'er,
His jaws all dropping with the bull's black gore.
Soon as her eyes the welcome object met,
The guilty fall, the mighty deed complete ;
A fcream of joy her feeble voice e ay'd:
The hero check'd her, and compos'dly faid-
Woman, experienc'd as thou art, control
Indece tiny, and feat thy fecret foul.
T infult the dead, is cruel and unjust;
Fate and their crime have funk them to the duft.
Nor heeded thefe the ceufore of nankind.
The good and bad were equal in their mind.
Juftly the price of worthleffhefs they paid,
A deach now wails an unlamented fhade.
But thou, incere, O Eurycla! fay
What maids dionour us, and what obey?

Then the: In thefe thy kingly walls remain (My fon) full fiity of the handmaid train, Taught by my care to cull the Seece, or weave, And fervitude with plea ng tafks deceive; Of thefe, twice fx purfue their wicked way, Nor ne, nor chafte Penelope obey; Nor fits it that Telemachus command

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Hence to the upper chambers let me fly,
Where fumbers foft new clofe the royal eye;
There wake her with the news the matron
cry'd.

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Not fo, (Ulyffes more fedate reply'd)
Bring first the crew who wrought thefe guilty
deeds:
In hafte the matron parts; the king proceeds:
Now to difpofe the dead, the care remains
To you, my foa, and yon, my faithful fwains;
Th'offending females to that taik we doom,
To wash, to fcent, and purify the room.
Thefe (every table cleans'd, and every throne,
And all the melancholy labour done)
Drive to yon court, without the palace wall,
There the revenging fword fall fmite them all;
So with the fuitors let them mix in duft, 496
Stretch'd in a long oblivion of their luft.

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He faid: the lamentable train appear, Each vents a groan, and drops a tender tear; Each heav'd her mournful burthen, and beneathr The porch, depos'd the ghaftly heaps of death. The chief fevere, compelling each to move, Urg'd the dire task imperious from above, With thirty sponge they rub the tables o'er, (The fwains unite their toil) the walls, the floor, [gore. Wal'd with th' effufive wave, are purg'd of, Once more the palace fet in fair array,

To the bafe court the females take their way; There compafs'd clofe between the dome and wall, (Their life's laft fcene) they trembling wait their fall.

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Then thus the prince: To thefe shall we afford A fate fo pure as by the martial fword! To thefe, the nightly proftitutes to frame, And bafe revilers of our houfe and rame?

Thus fpeaking, on the circling wall he ftrung
A fip's tough cable, from a columa hung;
Near the high top he ftrain'd it ftrongly round,
Whence no contending foot could reach the ground
Their heads above connected in a row,

They beat the air with quivering feet below: 515
Thus, on fome tree hung ftruggling in the fnare,
The doves or thrufhes flap their wings in air.
Soon fled the foul impure, a d left behind
The empty cor e to waver with the wind.

Then forth they led Melanthius, and began
Their bloody work; they lopp'd away the man,
Moriel for dogs! then trimm'd with brazen fheers
The wretch, and forten'd of his nofe and ears;
His hands and feet laft felt the cruel fteel:
He roar'd, and torments gave his foul to hell-
They wafh, and to Ulyles take their way; 226
So erds the bloody bufnefs of the day.

To Euryclea then addref'd the king:
Bring hither fire, and hither fulphur bring,
To purge the palace: then, the queen attend,
And let her with her matron-train defcend;
The matron-train, with all the virgin-band,
A Temble here to learn their lord's command.
Then Euryclea: Joy ull obey,
But caft thofe mean dif oneft rags away:
Permit me first the royal robes to bring:

(Young as he is) his mother's female band. 475 Illuits this garb the shoulders of a king.

535

"Bring fulphur firait, and fire," (the monarch | They hear, rush forth, and inftant round him crics)

She hears and at the word obedient flies,
With fire and fulphur, cure of noxious fumes,
He purged the walls, and blood-polluted rooms.
Again the matron fprings with eager pace,
And spreads her lord's return from place to place.

ftand

A gazing throng, a torch in every hand.
They faw, they knew him, and with fond embrace
Each humbly kifs'd his knee, or hand, or face;
He knows them all; in all fuch truth appears,
Ev'n he indulges the fweet joy of tears.

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Euriclea awakens Penelope with the news of Ulyffes's return, and the death of the fuitors. Penelope fourcely credits her, but fuppofes fome God has punished them, and defcends from her apartment in doubt. At the first inter view of Ulyffes and Penelope, he is quite unsatisfied. Minerva rejtores him to the beauty of his youth; but the queen continues incredulous, till by fome circumftarces fhe is convin ed, and falls into all the trarfports of passion and tenderness. They recount to each other all that has pa, during their long feparation. The next morning Ulyffes, arming himself and his friends, goes from the city to visit his father.

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The tranfports of her faithful heart fupply
A fudden youth, and give her wings to fly.
And fleeps my child? the reverend matron cries:
Ulyffes lives! arife my child, arife!
At length appears the long-expected hour!
Ulyffes comes! the fuitors are no more!
No more they view the golden light of day!
Arise, and bless thee with the glad furvey!
Touch'd at her words, the mournful queen re-
join'd

ΤΟ

15

Ah! whither wanders thy diftemper'd mind?
The righteous Powers, who tread the ftarry skies,
The weak enlighten, and confound the wife,
And human thought with unrefisted sway,
Deprefs or raife, enlarge or take away:
Truth, by their high decree, thy voice forfakes,
And folly, with the tongue of Wisdom, speaks:
Unkind, the fond illufon to impofe !
Was it to flatter or deride my woes?
Never did I a fleep fo fweet enjoy,
Since my dear lord left Ithaca for Troy,
Why must I wake to grieve; and curfe thy frore,
O Troy may never tongue pronounce thee
more!

Be gore: another might have felt our rage,
But age is facred, and we fpare thy age.

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To whom with warmth: My foul a lie difdains; Ulyffes lives, thy own Ulyffes reigns: That ftranger, patient o' the fuitors' wrongs, And the rude licence of ungovern'd tongues, 30 He, he is thine. Thy fon his latent gueft Long knew, but lock'd the fecret in his breaft; With well-concreted art to end his woes, And burft at once in vengeance on the foes. While yet he spoke, the queen in tranfport fprung

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Swift from the couch, and round the matron hung;
Faft from her eye defcends the rolling tear,
Say, once more fay, is my Ulyffes here?

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How could that numerous and outrageous band
By one be flain, though by an hero's hand?
I faw it not, fhe cries, but heard alone,
When death was bufy, a loud dying groan;
The damfel-train turn'd pale at every wound,
Immur'd we fate, and catch'd each paffing found;
When death had feiz'd her prey thy fon attends,
And at his nod the damfel-train defcends;
There terrible in arms Ulyffes flood,
And the dead fuitors almoft fwam in blood;
Thy heart had leap'd, the hero to furvey,
Stern as the furly lion o'er his prey,
Glorious in gore now with fulphureous fires
The dome he purges, now the flame afpires:
Heap'd lie the dead without the palace walls,
Hafte, daughter, hafte, thy own Ulyffes calls!
Thy every wish the bounteous Gods beftow, 55
Enjoy the prefent good, and former woe;
Ulyffes lives, his vanquifh'd foes to fee;
He lives to thy Telamachus and thee!

50

Ah! no; with fighs Penelope rejoin'd, Excefs of joy difturbs thy wandering mind; 60 How blefs'd this happy hour, fould he appear, Dear to us all, to me fupremely dear!

Ah! no; fome God the fuitors' deaths decreed, Some God defcends, and by his hand they bleed; Blind! to contemn the ftranger's righteous cause, And violate all hofpitable laws!

66

The good they hated, and the Powers defy'd;
But Heaven is juft, and by a God they dy'd,
For never muft Ulyffes view this thore
Never! the lov'd Ulyffes is no more:
What words (the matron cries) have reach'd my
ears?

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At length Telemachus-Ch! who can find
A woman like Penelope unkind?
Why thus in flerce! why with winning charms
Thus flow, to fly with rapture to his arms?
Stubborn the breast that with no tranfport glows,
When twice ten years are pass'd of mighty woes;
To foftnefs lo, to fpoufal love unknown,
The Gods have form'd that rigid heart of ftone!
O my Telemachus! the queen rejoin'd,
Diftracting fears confound my labouring mind;
Powerlefs to ipcal, I fearce uplift my eyes,
Nor dare to queftion; doubts on doubts arise.
Oh! deign he, if Ulyffes, to remove
Thefe boding thoughts, and what he is, to prove!
Pleas'd with her virtuous fears, the king replies,
Indulge, my fon, the cautions of the wife; 115
Time fall the truth to fure remembrance bring:
This garb of poverty belies the ing:

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No more. This day our deepest care requires,
Cautious to act what thought mature infpires.
If one man's blood, though mean, diftain our hands,
The homicide retreats to foreign lands;
By us, in heaps th' illuftrious peerage fall,
Th' Important deed our whole attention calls.
Be that thy care, Telemachus replies,
The world confpires to fpeak Ulyffes wife;
For wildlom all is thine! lo, I obey,
And dauntlefs follow where you lead the way;
Nor halt thou in the day of danger find
Thy coward fon degen rate lag behind,

125

Then infant to the bath (the mona.ch cries) Bid the gay youth and sprightly virgins rife, 131 Thence all defcend in pomp and proud array, And bid the dome re found the mirthful lay; While the fwift lyrift airs of rapture fings, And forms the dance refponfive to the ftrings. 135 That hence th' eluded pallengers may fay, Lo! the queen weds! we hear the spousal lay! The fuitors' death unknown, till we remove Far from the court, and aft infpired by Jove. Thus spoke the king: the obfervant train obey, At once they bathe, and drefs in proud array: 141 The lyrift frikes the firing: gay youths advance, And fair-zou'd damfels form the fprightly dance.

155

The voice attun'd to inftrumental founds,
Afcends the roof; the vaulted roof rebounds; 145
Not unobferv'd; the Greeks eluded fay
Lo!, the queen weds! we hear the spousal lay!
Inconftant! to admit the bridal hour.
Thus they-but nobly chafte fhe weds no more.
Mean while the weary'd king the bath afcends;
With faithful cares Eurynomè attends,
O'er every limb a fhower of fragrance sheds :
Then, drefs'd in pomp, magnificent he treads.
The Warrior-Goddefs gives his frame to fhine
With majefty enlarg'd, and grace divine.
Back from his brows in wavy ringlets fly
His thick large locks of hyacinthine dye.
As by fome artift, to whom Vulcan gives
His heavenly kill, a breathing image lives;
By Pallas taught, he frames the wondrous mould,
And they ale filver glows with fufle gold:
161
So Pallas his heroic form improves
With bloom divine, and like a God he moves;
More high he treads, and iffuing forth in ftate,
Radiant before his gazing confort fate.
165
And, O my queen he cries, what power above
Has feel'd that heart averfe to fpoufal love!
Canft thou, Penelope, when heaven reftores
Thy loft Ulyffes to his native fhores,
Canft thou, oh cruel! unconcern'd furvey
Thy loft Ulyffes, on this fignal day?
Hafte, Euriclea, and dispatchful fpread
For me, and me alone, th' imperial bed:
My weary nature craves the balm of reft:
But Heaven with adamant has arm'd her breaft,
Ah! no; fhe cries, a tender heart I bear, 176
A foe to pride; no adamant is there;
And now, ev'n now it melts! for fure I fee
Once more Ulyffes, my belov'd in thee!
Fix'd in my foul as when he fail'd'to Troy, 180
His image dwells: then hafte the bed of joy!
Hafte, from the bridal bower the bed tranflate,
Fram'd by his hand, and be it drefs'd in state!

170

Thus fpeaks the queen, ftill dubious, with dif

guife;

Touch'd at her words, the king with warmth replies :
Alas, for this! what mortal ftrength can move 185
The enormous burthen, who but Heaven above?
It mocks the weak attempts of human hands;
But the whole earth muft move, if Heaven com-
mands.

Then hear fure evidence, while we difplay 190
Words feal'd with facred truth, and truth obey:
This hand the wonder-fram'd; an olive spread
Full in the court its ever verdant head.
Vatt as fome mighty column's bulk, on high
The huge trunk rofe, and heav'd into the sky; 195
Around the tree I rais'd a nuptial bower,
And roof'd defenfive of the ftorm and fhower;
The fpacious valve, with art inwrought, conjoins;
And the fair dome with polifh'd marble fhines.
I lopp'd the branchy head; aloft in twain
Sever'd the bole, and imooth'd the shining grain;
Then pofts, capacious of the frame, I raife,
And bore it, regular, from space to space :
Athwart the frame, at equal diftance, lie
Thongs of tough hides, that boaft a purple dye;
Then, polifting the whole, the finifh'd mould
With filver fhone, with elephant, and gold,

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But if o'erturn'd by rude ungovern'd hands,
Or ftill inviolate the olive ftands,

'Tis thine, O queen, to say: and now impart, 210 If fears remain, or doubts distract thy heart?

While yet he speaks, her powers of life decay, She fickens, trembles, falls, and faints away: At length recovering, to his arms the flew, And ftrain'd him clofe, as to his brept he grew: The tears pour'd down amain: and, Oh! the cries, Let not against thy fpoufe thine anger rife! Oh! vers'd in every turn of human art, Forgive the weaknefs of a woman's heart! The righteous Powers, that mortal lots difpofe, 220 Decree us to fuftain a length of woes, And from the flower of life, the bliss deny To bloom together, fade away, and die. Oh! let me, let me not thine anger move, That I forbore, thus, thus to fpeak my love, 225 Thus in fond kiffes, while the tranfport warms, Pour out my foul, and die within thy arms! I dreaded fraud! Men, faithlefs men, betray Our eafy faith, and make the fex their prey: Against the fondness of my heart I strove, 'Twas caution, O my lord! not want of love: Like me had Helen fear'd, with wanton charms Ere the fair mifchief fet two worlds in arms; Ere Greece rofe dreadful in th' avenging day; Thus had the fear'd, the had not gone attray. 235 But Heaven, averfe to Greece, in wrath decreed That the fhould wander, and that Greece fhould bleed :

Blind to the ills that from injuftice flow,

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She colour'd all our wretched lives with woe.
But why thefe forrows when my lord arrives?
I yield! I yield! my own Ulyffes lives!
The fecrets of the bridal bed are known
To thee, to me, to Actoris alone,

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(My father's prefent in the spousal hour, The fole attendant on our genial bower). Since what no eye has feen thy tongue reveal'd, Hard and diftruftful as I am, I yield, Touch'd to the foul, the king with rapture hears.

255

[tears. Hangs round her neck, and fpeaks his joy in As to the shipwreck'd mariner, the shores 250 Delightful rife, when angry Nepture roars; Then, when the furge in thunder mounts the fky; And gulf'd in crowds at once the failors die; If one more happy, while the tempeft raves, Out-lives the tumult of conflicting waves, All pale, with ooze deform'd he views the ftrand, And plunging forth with transport grafps the land: The ravish'd queen with equal rapture glows, Clafps her lov'd lord, and to his bofom grows, Nor had they ended till the morning ray: But Pallas backward held the ring day, The wheels of night retarding, to detain The gray Aurora in the wavy main! Whose flaming steeds emerging through the night, Beam o'er the caftern hills with ftreaming light. At length Ulyses with a igh replies : Yet Fate, yet cruel Fate, repofe denies; A labour long, and hard, remains behind; By Heaven above, by Hell beneath enjoin'd: For, to Tire has through th' eternal gates Of hell I trode, to learn my future tates,

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But end we here-the night demands repofe,
Be deck'dthe couch! and peace awhile, my woes

!

To whom the queen: Thy word we shall obey, And deck the couch; far hence be woes away; Since the juft Gals, who tread the ftarry plains, Reftore thee fafe, ince my Ulyffes reigns. But what thofe perils Heaven decrees, impart; Knowledge may grieve, but fear diftracts the heart,

To this the king: Ah! why muft I disclose 280
A dreadful ftory of approaching woes?
Why in this hour of tranfport wound thy cars,
When thou must learn what I muft fpeak with
tears?

Heaven, by the Theban ghoft, thy fpoufe decrees,
Torn from thy arms, to fail a length of feas;
From realm to realm a nation to explore 286
Who ne'er knew falt, or heard the billows roar,
Nor faw gay veffel item the furgy plain,
A painted wonder, fiying on the main;
An oar my hand must bear; a fhepherd eyes 290
The unknown inftrument with strange furprife,
And calls a corn-van: this upon the plain
I fix, and hail the monarch of the main ;
Then bathe his altars with the mingled gore
Of victims vow'd, a ram, a bull, a boar:
Thence fwift re-failing to my native fhores,
Due victims flay to all the ethereal Powers.
Then Heaven decrees in peace to end my days.
And steal myself from life by flow decays;
Unknown to pain, in age refign my breath, 305
When late ftern Neptune points the fraft of death;
To the dark grave retiring as to reft;

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My people bleffing, by my people bless'd. [play Such future scenes th' all righteous Powers difBy their dread feer, and fuch my future day.

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To whom thus firm of foul: If ripe for death, And full of days, thou gently yield thy breath: While Heaven a kind release from ills forefhows; Triumph, thou happy vitor of thy woes! But Euryclea with difpatchful care, And fage Eurynome, the couch prepare: Infant they bid the blazing torch difplay Around the dome an artificial day; Then to repofe her steps the matron bends, And to the queen Eurynonè defcends; A torch the bears, to light with guiding fires The royal pair; fhe guides them, and retires. Then inftant his fair ipoufe Ulyffes led To the chate love-rites of the nuptial bed.

320

And now the blooming youths and fprightly fair Ceafe the gay dance, and to their reft repair; 326 But in difcourfe the king and confort lay, While the foft hours ftole vaperceiv'd away: Intent he hears Penelope difclofe

A mournful flory of domeftic woes,

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350

How to the land of Lote unblefs'd he fails :
And images the rills, and flowery yales!
How, dafh'd like dogs, his friends the Cyclops tore,
(Not unreveng'd) and quaff'd the fpouting gore;
How, the loud ftorms in prison bound, he fails
From friendly #olus with profperous gales;
Yet Fate withitands! a fudden tempeft roars,
And whirls him groaning from his native fhores:
How, on the barbarous Læftrigonian coaft,
By favage hands his fleet and friends he loft;
How fearce himself furviv'd: he paints the bower,
The fpells of Circe, and her magic power,
His dreadful journey to the realms beneath,
To feck Tirefas in the vales of death;
How, in the doleful manfions he furvey'd
His royal mother, pale Anticlea's fhade;
And friends in battle flain, heroic ghofts!
Then how, unarm'd he paft the Syren-coafts,
The juftling rocks where fierce Charybdis raves,
And howling Scylla whirls her thunderous waves,
The cave of death! How his companions flay
The oxen facred to the God of Day,
Till Jove in wrath the rattling tempeft guides,
And whelms the offenders in the roaring tides,
How, ftruggling through the furge, he reach'd

the fhores

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Of fair Ogygia, and Calypfo's bowers;
Where the gay blooming nymph conftrain'd his
stay,

With fweet reluctant amorous delay;
And promis'd, vainly promis'd, to bestow. / 370
Immortal life, exempt from age and woe:
How fav'd from ftorms, Phæacia's coafts he trod,
By great Alcinous honour'd as a God,

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We drank the cup of forrow mix'd with tears, 385,
Thou, for thy lord: while me th' immortal Powers
Detain'd reluctant from my native shores.
Now, bleft again by Heaven, the queen display,
And rule our palace with an equal sway :
Be it my care, by loans, or martial toils,
To throng my empty folds with gifts or fpcils.
But now I hate to blefs Laertes' eyes
With fight of his Ulyffes ere he dies;
The good old man, to wafting woes a prey,
Weeps a fad life in folitude away.

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[fold

But hear, though wife! This morning fall un-
The deathful fcene; on heroes, heroes roll'a.
Thou with thy maids within the palace stay,
From all the scene of tumult far away!

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The fuls of the fuitors are conducted by Mercury to the infernal fades. Ulyes in the country goes to the retireme i of his father Laertes; he finds him bufied in his garden all alere: the manner of his discovery to him is beautifully deferibel. They return together to his lodge, and the king is acknowledged by Delius and the fervants. The Ithacenfans, led by Eutithes, the father of Antinous rife against Ïly Jer, who gives them battle, in whic' Eupithes is kille! by Laertes: and the Goddess Pullas makes a laging peace between Ulyffes and his fubjects, which concludes the Odyffey.

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YILENIUS now to Pluto's dreary reign
Conveys the dead, a lamentable train!
The golden wand, that caufes fleep to fly,
Or in foft flumber feals the wakeful eye,
That drives the ghosts to realms of night or day; 5
Points out the long uncomfortable way.
Trembling the fpe&tres glide, and plaintive vent
Thin, hollow fcreams, along the deep defcent.
As in the cavern of fome rifted den,

Where flock noturnal bats, and birds obfcene; 10
Clutter'd they hang, till at fome fudden shock,
They move, and murmurs run through all the rock;
So cowering fed the fable heaps of ghosts,
And fuch a fecream fill'd all the difmal coafts.
And now they reach'd the earth's remoteft ends.
And now the gates where evening Sol defcends,

And Ledcas' rock, and Ocean's utmost streams,
And now pervade the dusky land of Dreains,
And reft at laft, where fouls unbodied dwell
In ever-flowering meads of afphodel.
The empty forins of men inhabit there,
Impaffive femblance, images of air!
Nought elfe are all that fhin'd on earth before;
Ajax and great Achilles are no more!
Yet, ftill a mafter ghoft, the rest he aw'd,
The reft ador'd him, towering as he trod;
Still at his fide in Neftor's fon furvey'd,
And lov'd Patroclus ftill attends his fade.

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New as they were to that infernal shore,
The fuitors ftopp'd, and gaz'd the hero o'er, 30
When, moving flow, the regal form they view'd
Of great Atrides; him in pomp pursued

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