The Athenaid

The Persians vanquish'd, Greece from bondage sav'd, The death of great Leonidas aveng'd By Attic virtue—celebrate, O Muse!

A burning ray the summer solstice cast, Th' Olympiad was proclaim'd; when Xerxes pour'd His millions through Thermopylae, new-stain'd With blood. From Athens Aeschylus divine In genius, arts, and valour, musing deep On his endanger'd country's future doom, Repairs, invited by an evening still, To clear Ilissus, Attic stream renown'd. Beneath an oak, in solitary state Apart, itself a wood, the hero's limbs On tufted moss repose. He grasps the lyre; Unfolded scrolls voluminous he spreads Along the ground: high lays repeating thence, Leonidas the Spartan he extols, And sweeps th' accordant strings. To closing day He bade farewel, and hail'd th' ascending stars In music long continued; till the stream With drowsy murmur won his eye to sleep, But left his fancy waking. In a dream The god of day, with full meridian blaze, Seem'd to assume his function o'er the skies; When, lo! the earth divided: through the cleft A gush of radiance dimm'd the noon-tide sun. In structure all of diamond, self pois'd, Amid redundant light a chariot hung Triumphal. Twelve transparent horses breath'd Beams from their nostrils, dancing beams of day Shook from their manes. In lineaments of man, Chang'd to immortal, there the mighty soul Of Sparta's king apparent shone. His wounds Shot forth a splendour like the clust'ring stars, Which on Orion's chest and limbs proclaim Him first of constellations. Round in cars Of triumph too arrang'd, the stately forms Of those whom virtue led to share his doom, And consecrate Thermopylae to fame. Pines tipp'd with lightning seem'd their spears; their shields Broad like Minerva's aegis: from their helms An empyreal brightness stream'd abroad: Ineffable felicity their eyes, Their fronts the majesty of gods display'd.

Erect the glorious shape began to speak In accents louder than a bursting cloud— Pentelicus, Hymettus seem'd to shake Through all their quarries, and Ilissus beat His shudd'ring banks in tumult—Thou, whose muse Commands th' immortalizing trump of fame, Go to the sage Hellanodics, the just Elēan judges of Olympian palms; There in thy own celestial strains rehearse, Before that concourse wide, our deeds and fate. Let our example general Greece inspire To face her danger; let the Spartan shield Protect th' Athenians, else I died in vain.

The brilliant vision, now dispersing, leaves The wond'ring bard. He, starting, in his ken Discerns no other than the real scene Of shadows brown from close embow'ring wood, Than distant mountains, and the spangled face Of heav'n, reflected from the silver stream. But pensive, brooding o'er his country's fate, His step he turns. Themistocles, who rul'd Athenian councils, instant he accosts With large recital of his awful dream.

Obey the mandate, cries the chief: alarm Th' Olympian concourse: from the Delphian port Of Cirrha sail for Elis: on thy way Consult Apollo in the state's behalf, Which to that function nominates thy worth: Of Xerxes' march intelligence obtain.

This said, they parted. Aeschylus by dawn Commenc'd his progress, join'd by numbers arm'd, Like him to Pisa's barrier destin'd all, Electing him their chief. Five times the sun Renew'd his orbit, five successive nights The moon enlarg'd her crescent, ere they reach'd Phoebean Delphi, seated on a rock Abrupt, sublime. Yet thence the curious eye Must upward look to meet the summits blue Of double-topp'd Parnassus, where the god Oracular is worshipp'd. Here they trac'd Barbarian violence profane. Consum'd Were hamlets, temples levell'd to the dust, The statues broken, each religious bow'r A burning mass of embers. Wrapt in smoke, With cinders strewn, so glows the region round Portentous Aetna, or Vesuvius dire, Death's flaming cauldrons; when their stony ribs And min'ral bowels, liquefied by fire, O'erwhelm the fields, by nature left unbless'd, Alone unbless'd of all Sicania's bound, Or lovely-fac'd Hesperia. Dubious here Th' Athenians halt, while fierce the sultry noon Inflames the sky. From Delphi's open gates, To Attic eyes no stranger, Timon comes, Sage priest of Phoebus, magistrate unsoil'd, The public host of Athens, to the plain Descending swift with followers who bear His buckler, spear, and armour. On his head Were ashes sprinkled: rent, his garb presag'd Some black disaster. What malignant dart Of fortune wounds thee? Aeschylus aloud, While by the hand Cecropia's host he press'd.

To him the Delphian: From deserted roofs, Depopulated streets, I come to hail Thee, bound by hospitable ties my friend, Thee, dear to Phoebus, by Minerva grac'd, Thy country's goddess. Me thou often saw'st A parent bless'd in Amarantha's bloom, Yet ripe in virtue. Her, presenting pray'r With votive flow'rs before Minerva's shrine, This very hour Barbarians have enthrall'd, Borne in my sight precipitate away. O wife lamented, gather'd in thy prime By ruthless Pluto! in Elysian groves How shall I meet thee, and the tidings bear Of thy lost child, to servitude a prey, To violation doom'd? Yet more: the rage Of these invaders, who have spoil'd our fields, Defac'd our temples, driv'n to shelt'ring caves, To pathless cliffs, our populace dismay'd, Is now ascending to insult the fane, With sacrilegious violence to seize Th' accumulated off'rings by the great And good from age to age devoted there.

He scarce had finish'd, when the earth beneath Rock'd from her center in convulsive throes; From pole to pole th' ethereal concave groan'd: Night from her cavern with gigantic steps Bestrode the region, lifting high as heav'n Her broad, infernal palm, whose umbrage hides The throne of light; while, glancing through the rifts Of her black mande, overlaid with clouds, Blue vapours trail'd their fires. The double head Of tall Parnassus reeling, from the crag Unloos'd two fragments; mountainous in bulk, They roll to Delphi with a crashing sound, Like thunder nigh whose burst of ruin strikes The shatter'd ear with horror. Thus the bard Unmov'd, while round him ev'ry face is pale:

Not on our heads these menaces are thrown By ireful nature, and portentous heav'n; Th' unrighteous now, th' oppressor of mankind, The sacrilegious, in this awful hour Alone should feel dismay. My Delphian host, Who knows but thund'ring Jove's prophetic son Now vindicates his altar; in his name Now calls the turbid elements to war? What shrieks of terror fill thy native streets! The hills with barb'rous dissonance of cries, The caverns howl. Athenians, be prepar'd, Best so when arm'd: then, Timon, case thy limbs; The season teems with prodigy. Secure In conscious virtue, let us calmly watch The mighty birth. By heav'n! through yonder gate The foes are driven; confusion, wild despair, With panic dread pursue them: friends, embrace Th' auspicious moment; lift your pious blades, Ye chosen men, auxiliars to a god!

He spake, advancing with his holy friend To battle. Shiv'ring at their own misdeed, At heav'n-inflicted punishment, the foes Unnerv'd, distracted, unresisting, deem'd The warriors two celestials from above, Cas'd in Vulcanian panoply, to wage The war of gods. The whole Athenian train In equal fervour with Barbarian blood Distain their weapons. So from forests drear, When barren winter binds the foodful earth, Enrag'd by famine, trooping wolves invade A helpless village; unwithstood, they range With greedy fangs, and dye with human gore The snow-envelop'd ways. The Delphian race, By fear so lately to the neighb'ring hills And caves restrain'd, forsake their shelt'ring holds; In clusters rushing on the foes dismay'd, Accomplish their defeat. Th' Athenian chief Triumphant, red with massacre, admits A Persian youth to mercy, who his shield And sword surrenders. Persian, dost thou hope Thy flow'ring bloom shall ripen to enjoy A length of days? (severe his victor spake) Then to my questions utter words sincere. Reveal thy name, thy father's. Where encamps The host of Xerxes? Whither doth he point His inroad next? To violate this fane By his appointment was thy youth compell'd? Last, if thou know'st, what impious savage tore The Delphian maiden from Minerva's shrine?

The Persian answers with a crimson'd cheek, With eyes in tears—Ah! little now avails Th' illustrious current of Argestes' blood To me a captive, less the name I bear Of Artamanes. By the king's decree That we were sent, that I unwilling came, Is truth sincere. Our leader slain, the heaps Of these disfigur'd carcases have made Their last atonement to th' insulted god. The king in rich Orchomenus I left; Who through Boeotia meditates to march Against th' Athenians. He, alas! who seiz'd The beauteous virgin at Minerva's shrine, He is my brother, eldest of the race, Far hence secure; while captive here I mourn His heinous outrage, and my own disgrace.

Addressing Timon, here Cecropia's bard: Preserve this youth a hostage for thy child: He seems deserving; thee I know humane. Now to Apollo's temple be my guide. Still dost thou droop?—O Aeschylus, exclaims Desponding Timon, from the woes begun This day in Delphi, I to Athens trace A series black with evil. Lo! the wise, The righteous Aristides from your walls Through jealousy of merit is expell'd; Themistocles the cause. Himself, though great, Yet envious, and ambitious that his light May blaze unrivall'd, of th' Athenian state Extinguishes the brightest. Sparta shews, At this dread crisis, how the hearts of men By selfish eares and falsehood are deprav'd. She to the land of Pelops still confines Her efforts, on the neighb'ring isthmus rears A partial bulwark, leaving half the Greeks, Your noble seat, this oracle, expos'd To devastation: little she regards Our god profan'd, our progeny enslav'd; Her chief Pausanias, arrogant and stern, O'erlooks my suff'rings. Feeling what I fear For thee and others, I must droop, my friend.

To him the bard, in these sententious strains: Not endless sunshine is the lot of man, Nor ever blooming seasons. Night succeeds The day, as day the night: rude winter frowns, Fair summer smiles. Thus variable the mind, Not less than human fortune, feels the strife Of truth and error, which alternate reign The arbiters of nature. Dark the deed, A deed of gloomy night, when envy forc'd The best Athenian from his natal roof: But light will soon return. Though Sparta break Her promise pledg'd; though false Boeotia prop A foreign throne; still Athens will sustain Herself and Greece, will retribution pay To Aristides, and her morn dispel The mist of error with a glorious blaze. No more—my duty calls me to the fane.

They move, and passing by Minerva's grove, Two monuments of terror see. There stopp'd The massy fragments, from Parnassus rent: An act of nature, by some latent cause Disturb'd. Tremendous o'er Barbarian ranks The ruins down the sacred way had roll'd, Leaving its surface horrible to sight; Such as might startle war's remorseless god, And shake his heart of adamant. Not long This blood-congealing spectacle detains The troop, which swiftly to the Pythian dome Press their ascending steps. The martial bard First, as enjoin'd by holy form, to scenes Far diff'rent, sweet Castalia's fount and grove, Resorts, with pure ablution to redeem From dust and slaughter his polluted limbs, To holy eyes obscene. Beside the fane, Within a flow'ring bosom of the hill, Through veins of rock beneath embow'ring shade, The rills divine replenish, as they flow, A cavity of marble. O'er the brim, In slender sheets of liquid crystal, down They fall harmonious. Plistus takes below To his smooth bed their tribute. Plunging there In deep obscurity of wood, whose roof With ridgy verdure meets the low-bent eye From that stupendous cliff, his current winds Through shade awhile; thence issuing large in view, Refreshes grateful meads, by mountains edg'd, Which terminate on Cirrha, Delphian port. Beyond her walls blue Neptune spreads his face Far as Achaia's wide expanse of coast, With tow'rs and cities crown'd. The marble fount On either side is skirted thick by groves Of ancient laurel with luxuriant arms, In glossy green attir'd. There Phoebus, pride Of Parian quarries, stands a form divine, In act to draw an arrow from the case Loose hanging o'er his shoulder; and in look Serene, but stern: his worshippers to guard, As if the Pythian serpent were in sight, He meditates the combat. Here disarm'd, His limbs from all th' impurities of Mars Th' Athenian purges. Menial care supplies A garment silver-white: an olive branch His suppliant hand sustains. He seeks the fane; He mounts the steps magnificent: the gates On sounding hinges turn their brazen valves. Across an area vast, with solemn shade Of massy columns border'd, slow he moves His manly frame. Procumbent at the mouth Of that abyss oracular, whose fume Breathes wild sensation through the Pythian maid, With hands outstretch'd, he offers up this pray'r:

O vanquisher of Python! Seed of Jove, Whose eleutherian might the tyrant dreads! Bright pow'r of day, dispenser of that fire Which kindles genius in the human breast! God of that light diffusing through the soul The rays of truth and knowledge! Friend to man, His monitor prophetic! O admit Athenians, anxious for their country's weal, In this her day of peril to consult Thy wisdom, thy protection to implore!

Her tripod high the prophetess ascends: Enthusiastic motion strains her form, In flashes rolls her eyeballs, and bespreads Her agitated front with floating hair. Her weight a laurel, planted nigh, upholds, Which she embraces; her convulsive grasp Shakes to the root the groaning trunk, the boughs, The clatt'ring foliage. Forth she bursts in foam.

Fly, wretched men, to earth's extremest bound! I see, I see th' Acropolis in flames, Your temples crumble, and your turrets nod: I see the blood run sable through your streets.

All unabash'd, the hero firm replies: Yet further speak. Though citadel and fanes Be doom'd to ashes, must the nation fall? If so, instruct thy suppliants how their fall May prove most glorious in the sight of gods And men.—The Pythian answers with a look Of pity, soft'ning her tempestuous rage:

Ah! still my tongue like adamant is hard. Minerva's tow'rs must perish: Jove severe So wills; yet granting, at his daughter's suit, Her people refuge under walls of wood. But shun the myriads of terrific horse, Which on your fields an eastern Mars will range.

She ceas'd; Th' Athenian notes her answer down: To one, the most entrusted of his train, He gives the tablet. Back to Athens fly, He said; the son of Neocles alone, By his unbounded faculties, can pierce The hidden sense of these mysterious strains; All which of Xerxes thou hast heard, report: I must depart to Elis.—Must thou go? Dejected Timon then: what safety here For me remains? Barbarians will return; My countrymen, dishearten'd as before, Resort to caverns. Though the god hath sav'd His shrine, the rest of Phocis lies a prey, Boeotia, Locris, Doris, to the foe. Yet what have I, O Aeschylus! to dread? I have no other child for savage force To violate: In Amarantha lost, My joy, my hope are vanish'd; and the hand, Which lays me breathless, will befriend me best.

Th' Athenian here: Unmanly is despair, A noxious weed, whose growth, my Delphian host, Let courage wither. Phoebus hath denounc'd The waste of Athens. Hopeful I forebode, That prouder walls and battlements will lift Their heads for ages; and that eye of Greece With inextinguishable ray surpass Its former lustre. Quit this dang'rous place, With us embarking: borrow help from time, Safe counsellor to wisdom. You, the race Of holy Delphi, should the foe return, Again dispersing to your caves, rely On your protecting god. Not vers'd alone In holy rites, in arms and council tried, A chief like Timon fame forbids to hide His dignity in caverns.—Timon here:

Thou shalt conduct me, thou my friendly star! Meantime selected messengers I send The needful barks at Cirrha to prepare.

Now from the temple under Timon's roof Admitted, vig'rous with refection due Of rest and food, to Cirrha they proceed With Artamanes. Ready are the barks, The gale propitious, calm the wat'ry plain: When, like the feather'd sojourners, who leave Their late abode on winter's bleak approach, To wing their flight for climates more benign, These with extended canvas quit the port, And, doubling round Achaia, cut the main To sacred Pisa. On their way the harp Of Aeschylus, preluding to the strain Which on his banks Alpheus was to hear, Relieves the sailor toiling at his oar, Enchants the wind retentive of the sounds Which harmonize his breath. If round the keel Of sweet Arion dolphins ever play'd, Or blithsome Nereids to the pleasing mood Of Orpheus danc'd, while Argo plough'd the deep; They now had felt controulment as in bonds, Not on their pliant, azure-glossy fins Disporting light, but rigid with amaze At this majestic muse. Yet sounding verse, In solemn cadence to the deep-ton'd lyre, Which could the boist'rous mariner subdue, The ear of Timon, languid by despair, Rejects, attentive to his grief alone, Which sighs within. Society is pain, Ev'n with his friend. A solitary couch He seeks; recumbent, not reposing, there Consumes the hours in pertinacious woe, Which sheds no tear. If wearied nature sinks, His sleep is troubled; visions of the night Appal his spirit; starting, he forsakes A thorny pillow; rushes on the deck With lamentations to the midnight moon. Alarm'd, th' Athenian chief approaching seiz'd On Timon's hand; with earnest looks enquir'd Why thus complaining he disturbs the calm, From his own pillow chacing due repose?

Ah! I have seen my daughter, he replies, Have seen her twice!—Where seen her? all distress'd Th' Athenian questions.—On a rock she stood, A naked rock, the parent wild exclaims; Unloos'd her zone, dishevell'd was her hair; The ravisher was nigh. On sight of me, Who no assistance from the shore could reach, O father, father! I am sham'd, deflower'd, But here will end my sorrows and disgrace; She said, and plung'd precipitate. I saw Her body swallow'd by the greedy surge, Unwept, depriv'd of sepulture, to float.

Illusion all! the bard consoling spake; The phantom offspring of distemper'd sleep.

A second time, the frantic fire pursues, Did Amarantha meet my aking sight; Then, like an eastern concubine attir'd, Her head was blazon'd with Barbaric gems; With golden gloss her wanton garment wav'd: With her despoiler hand in hand she walk'd, Disclaim'd her father, and her father's gods. Oh then I wish'd her on the waves again, To parch in winds, or sate some vulture's beak!

The youthful captive Artamanes, rous'd, Stands nigh in gen'rous tears. To him the bard:

Ingenuous Persian, check thy tears, and lend Thy hand benign: committed to his couch Him watch and fuccour.—Hourly was perform'd The pious office; noblest Delphians round Assist in tears; while now the moonlight twice Danc'd on the billows. On the second morn They land in Elis. Fame had gone before, Promulgating the valour which aveng'd The Delphian god, prophetic light to man, Ev'n more than Jove in Ammon's Libyan shrine Or Dodonaean groves. A shining car Waits on the shore; a herald there salutes The warrior bard. Divine Athenian, hail! Hail, righteous captain of a righteous band! These olive crowns to thee and them I bear; So have the sage Hellanodics ordain'd, Who to their just tribunal through my voice Invite thy presence. Aeschylus receives The victor's chaplet, and ascends the car. Along Alphēus to th' Olympian lists He passes through spectators all array'd In garlands too, and num'rous like the flow'rs Embellishing the river's fragrant sides, Or like the pebbles in his murm'ring bed.

Th' approach of Aeschylus is known. Between Two rows of victors in their olive crowns He o'er the sanded area greets the thrones, Where, grac'd with scepters magisterial, sat Th' Elēan judges. Standing on the car, To them, uprising from their seats, he spake:

If to have fought for Delphi and her god Deserve this chaplet, what superior praise To him is due, who voluntary died For Lacedaemon? But he claims no more Than emulation from the sons of Greece, Like him to save their countries and their laws. He hath his honours in the bless'd abodes; From him I come deputed; hear in me Leonidas. A vision, as of gods, To me, late slumb'ring on Ilissus, rose; In semblance rose Leonidas, begirt With all the virtuous partners in his fate. Before me earth divided; through the cleft A gushing radiance dimm'd the eye of noon. In structure all of diamond, self-pois'd, Amid redundant light, a chariot hung Triumphal. Twelve transparent horses breath'd Beams from their nostrils, dancing beams of day Shook from their manes. In lineaments of man, Chang'd to immortal, with a shape enlarg'd, A stature lengthen'd, there the mighty soul Of Sparta's king apparent shone. His wounds Shot forth a starlike splendour. Round in cars Triumphal too arrang'd, the stately forms Of those whom virtue led to share his doom, And consecrate Thermopylae to fame. To me these words the glorious shape address'd:

Go to the sage Hellanodics, the just Elēan judges of Olympian palms: In that wide concourse celebrate my death. Let my example gen'ral Greece inspire To face her danger; let the Spartan shield Protect th' Athenians, else I died in vain.

Attention mute th' Hellanodics command: The thick'ning crowd is hush'd. The bard proceeds, While inspiration swells his copious breast, Flames in his eye, and thunders from his voice.

Parnassian Phoebus he invok'd, the pow'r Of prophecy and song. His aid is due In celebration of the man who heard The oracle from Delphi, and obey'd. "A king deriv'd from Hercules must die "For Lacedaemon." Who obedient heard? Leonidas: he left his household gods, His wife belov'd, his offspring; at the gate Of Greece, Thermopylae, he fought, he fell: With him what heroes? Alpheus, Maron bled, There Agis, there Dioneces, the seer, Megistias, bold Diomedon, the youth Of Dithyrambus, Thespia's hoary chief, Demophilus; for you they all expir'd: Rise, Greeks, revenge their fall! in that revenge Your laws, your manners, and religion save. You who aspire to these Olympic wreaths, The brightest guerdon to a Grecian brow, Yet will you linger, till Barbaric arms Annihilate th' Olympiad? Not to die Leonidas invites; no, Greeks, to live! Surmounting foes enervate by the dread His death impress'd, to fill your cup of life With virtuous glory, to enjoy your hopes In peace, in years and merit then mature Be his companions in eternal bliss.

Such was the substance; but in swelling phrase At large, full tide of poesy and zeal, Flow'd his high-ton'd, enthusiastic song.