SILENUS:
O Bacchus, what a world of toil, both now
And ere these limbs were overworn with age,
Have I endured for thee! First, when thou fled-st
The mountain-nymphs who nursed thee, driven afar
By the strange madness Juno sent upon thee;
Then in the battle of the Sons of Earth,
When I stood foot by foot close to thy side,
No unpropitious fellow-combatant,
And, driving through his shield my winged spear,
Slew vast Enceladus. Consider now,
Is it a dream of which I speak to thee?
By Jove it is not, for you have the trophies!
And now I suffer more than all before.
For when I heard that Juno had devised
A tedious voyage for you, I put to sea
With all my children quaint in search of you,
And I myself stood on the beaked prow
And fixed the naked mast; and all my boys
Leaning upon their oars, with splash and strain
Made white with foam the green and purple sea,--
And so we sought you, king. We were sailing
Near Malea, when an eastern wind arose,
And drove us to this waste Aetnean rock;
The one-eyed children of the Ocean God,
The man-destroying Cyclopses, inhabit,
On this wild shore, their solitary caves,
And one of these, named Polypheme. has caught us
To be his slaves; and so, for all delight
Of Bacchic sports, sweet dance and melody,
We keep this lawless giant-s wandering flocks.
My sons indeed on far declivities,
Young things themselves, tend on the youngling sheep,
But I remain to fill the water-casks,
Or sweeping the hard floor, or ministering
Some impious and abominable meal
To the fell Cyclops. I am wearied of it!
And now I must scrape up the littered floor
With this great iron rake, so to receive
My absent master and his evening sheep
In a cave neat and clean. Even now I see
My children tending the flocks hitherward.
Ha! what is this? are your Sicinnian measures
Even now the same, as when with dance and song
You brought young Bacchus to Althaea-s halls?

CHORUS OF SATYRS:

STROPHE:
Where has he of race divine
Wandered in the winding rocks?
Here the air is calm and fine
For the father of the flocks;--
Here the grass is soft and sweet,
And the river-eddies meet
In the trough beside the cave,
Bright as in their fountain wave.--
Neither here, nor on the dew
Of the lawny uplands feeding?
Oh, you come!-a stone at you
Will I throw to mend your breeding;--
Get along, you horned thing,
Wild, seditious, rambling!

EPODE:
An Iacchic melody
To the golden Aphrodite
Will I lift, as erst did I
Seeking her and her delight
With the Maenads, whose white feet
To the music glance and fleet.
Bacchus, O beloved, where,
Shaking wide thy yellow hair,
Wanderest thou alone, afar?
To the one-eyed Cyclops, we,
Who by right thy servants are,
Minister in misery,
In these wretched goat-skins clad,
Far from thy delights and thee.

SILENUS:
Be silent, sons; command the slaves to drive
The gathered flocks into the rock-roofed cave.

CHORUS:
Go! But what needs this serious haste, O father?

SILENUS:
I see a Grecian vessel on the coast,
And thence the rowers with some general
Approaching to this cave.-About their necks
Hang empty vessels, as they wanted food,
And water-flasks.-Oh, miserable strangers!
Whence come they, that they know not what and who
My master is, approaching in ill hour
The inhospitable roof of Polypheme,
And the Cyclopian jaw-bone, man-destroying?
Be silent, Satyrs, while I ask and hear 85
Whence coming, they arrive the Aetnean hill.

ULYSSES:
Friends, can you show me some clear water-spring,
The remedy of our thirst? Will any one
Furnish with food seamen in want of it?
Ha! what is this? We seem to be arrived
At the blithe court of Bacchus. I observe
This sportive band of Satyrs near the caves.
First let me greet the elder.--Hail!

SILENUS:
Hail thou,
O Stranger! tell thy country and thy race.

ULYSSES:
The Ithacan Ulysses and the king
Of Cephalonia.

SILENUS:
Oh! I know the man,
Wordy and shrewd, the son of Sisyphus.

ULYSSES:
I am the same, but do not rail upon me.--

SILENUS:
Whence sailing do you come to Sicily?

ULYSSES:
From Ilion, and from the Trojan toils.

SILENUS:
How, touched you not at your paternal shore?

ULYSSES:
The strength of tempests bore me here by force.

SILENUS:
The self-same accident occurred to me.

ULYSSES:
Were you then driven here by stress of weather?

SILENUS:
Following the Pirates who had kidnapped Bacchus.

ULYSSES:
What land is this, and who inhabit it?--

SILENUS:
Aetna, the loftiest peak in Sicily.

ULYSSES:
And are there walls, and tower-surrounded towns?

SILENUS:
There are not.--These lone rocks are bare of men.

ULYSSES:
And who possess the land? the race of beasts?

SILENUS:
Cyclops, who live in caverns, not in houses.

ULYSSES:
Obeying whom? Or is the state popular?

SILENUS:
Shepherds: no one obeys any in aught.

ULYSSES:
How live they? do they sow the corn of Ceres?

SILENUS:
On milk and cheese, and on the flesh of sheep.

ULYSSES:
Have they the Bromian drink from the vine-s stream?

SILENUS:
Ah! no; they live in an ungracious land.

ULYSSES:
And are they just to strangers?-hospitable?

SILENUS:
They think the sweetest thing a stranger brings
Is his own flesh.

ULYSSES:
What! do they eat man-s flesh?

SILENUS:
No one comes here who is not eaten up.

ULYSSES:
The Cyclops now--where is he? Not at home?

SILENUS:
Absent on Aetna, hunting with his dogs.

ULYSSES:
Know-st thou what thou must do to aid us hence?

SILENUS:
I know not: we will help you all we can.

ULYSSES:
Provide us food, of which we are in want.

SILENUS:
Here is not anything, as I said, but meat.

ULYSSES:
But meat is a sweet remedy for hunger.

SILENUS:
Cow-s milk there is, and store of curdled cheese.

ULYSSES:
Bring out:--I would see all before I bargain.

SILENUS:
But how much gold will you engage to give?

ULYSSES:
I bring no gold, but Bacchic juice.

SILENUS:
Oh, joy!
Tis long since these dry lips were wet with wine.

ULYSSES:
Maron, the son of the God, gave it me.

SILENUS:
Whom I have nursed a baby in my arms.

ULYSSES:
The son of Bacchus, for your clearer knowledge.

SILENUS:
Have you it now?-or is it in the ship?

ULYSSES:
Old man, this skin contains it, which you see.

SILENUS:
Why, this would hardly be a mouthful for me.

ULYSSES:
Nay, twice as much as you can draw from thence.

SILENUS:
You speak of a fair fountain, sweet to me.

ULYSSES:
Would you first taste of the unmingled wine?

SILENUS:
-Tis just-tasting invites the purchaser.

ULYSSES:
Here is the cup, together with the skin.

SILENUS:
Pour: that the draught may fillip my remembrance.

ULYSSES:
See!

SILENUS:
Papaiapax! what a sweet smell it has!

ULYSSES:
You see it then?--

SILENUS:
By Jove, no! but I smell it.

ULYSSES:
Taste, that you may not praise it in words only.

SILENUS:
Babai! Great Bacchus calls me forth to dance!
Joy! joy!

ULYSSES:
Did it flow sweetly down your throat?

SILENUS:
So that it tingled to my very nails.

ULYSSES:
And in addition I will give you gold.

SILENUS:
Let gold alone! only unlock the cask.

ULYSSES:
Bring out some cheeses now, or a young goat.

SILENUS:
That will I do, despising any master.
Yes, let me drink one cup, and I will give
All that the Cyclops feed upon their mountains.
...

CHORUS:
Ye have taken Troy and laid your hands on Helen?

ULYSSES:
And utterly destroyed the race of Priam.
...

SILENUS:
The wanton wretch! she was bewitched to see
The many-coloured anklets and the chain
Of woven gold which girt the neck of Paris,
And so she left that good man Menelaus.
There should be no more women in the world
But such as are reserved for me alone.--
See, here are sheep, and here are goats, Ulysses,
Here are unsparing cheeses of pressed milk;
Take them; depart with what good speed ye may;