Enrag'd Caïcus and Lycormas roar,

And Xanthus, fated to be burnt once more:
The fam❜d Meander, that unwearied strays
Through mazy windings, smokes in every maze.
From his lov'd Babylon Euphrates flies;
The big-swoln Ganges and the Danube rise
In thickening fumes, and darken half the skies:
In flames Ismenos and the Phasis roll'd,
And Tagus floating in his melted gold:
The swans, that on Caïster often tried

Their tuneful songs, now sung their last, and died:
The frighted Nile ran off, and under ground
Conceal'd his head, nor can it yet be found;
His seven divided currents all are dry,

And where they roll'd seven gaping trenches lie:
No more the Rhine or Rhone their course maintain,
Nor Tiber of his promis'd empire vain.

The ground, deep cleft, admits the dazzling ray, And startles Pluto with the flash of day: The seas shrink in, and to the sight disclose Wide naked plains, where once their billows rose : Their rocks are all discover'd, and increase The number of the scatter'd Cyclades: The fish in shoals about the bottom creep, Nor longer dares the crooked dolphin leap : Gasping for breath the' unshapen Phocæ dic, And on the boiling wave extended lie : Nereus and Doris, with her virgin train, Seek out the last recesses of the main; Beneath unfathomable depths they faint, And secret in their gloomy caverns pant : Stern Neptune thrice above the waves upheld His face, and thrice was by the flames repell'd.

The Earth at length, on every side embrac'd With scalding seas, that floated round her waist, When now she felt the springs and rivers come, And crowd within the hollow of her womb, Uplifted to the heavens her blasted head, And clapt her hand upon her brows, and said; (But first, impatient of the sultry heat, Sunk deeper down, and sought a cooler seat) 'If you, great king of gods! my death approve, And I deserve it, let me die by Jove;

If I must perish by the force of fire,

Let me transfix'd with thunderbolts expire.
See, whilst I speak, my breath the vapours choke,
(For now her face lay wrapt in clouds of smoke)
See my sing'd hair, behold my faded eye

And wither'd face, where heaps of cinders lie!
And does the plough for this my body tear?
This the reward for all the fruits I bear,

Tortur'd with rakes, and harass'd all the year? S

That herbs for cattle daily I renew,

And food for man, and frankincense for you?
But grant me guilty; what has Neptune done?
Why are his waters boiling in the sun?

The wavy empire, which by lot was given,

Why does it waste, aud further shrink from heav'n?
If I, nor he, your pity can provoke,

See your own heavens; the heavens begin to smoke!
Should once the sparkles catch those bright abodes,
Destruction seizes on the heavens and gods;
Atlas becomes unequal to his freight,

And almost faints beneath the glowing weight.
If heaven, and earth, and sea, together burn,
All must again into their chaos turn.

Apply some speedy cure, prevent our fate,
And succour Nature ere it be too late.'

She ceas'd; for choak'd with vapours round her spread,

Down to the deepest shades she sunk her head.
Jove call'd to witness every power above,
And ev❜n the god whose son the chariot drove,
That what he acts he is compell'd to do,
Or universal ruin must ensue.

Straight he ascends the high ethereal throne,

From whence he us'd to dart his thunder down,
From whence his show'rs and storms he us❜d to pour,
But now could meet with neither storm nor show'r,
Then aiming at the youth with lifted hand,
Full at his head he hurl'd the forky brand,

In dreadful thunderings. Thus the' almighty Sire
Suppress'd the raging of the fires with fire.

At once from life and from the chariot driven, The' ambitious boy fell thunder struck from heav'n : The horses started with a sudden bound,

And flung the reins and chariot to the ground: The studded harness from their necks they broke; Here fell a wheel, and here a silver spoke;

Here were the beam and axle torn away,

And scatter'd o'er the earth the shining fragments lay:

The breathless Phaeton, with flaming hair

Shot from the chariot like a falling star,
That in a summer's evening from the top

Of heaven drops down, or seems at least to drop,
Till on the Po his blasted corpse was hurl'd,

Far from his country, in the western world.

PHAËTON'S SISTERS

TRANSFORMED INTO TREES.

THE Latian nymphs came round him, and amaz'd
On the dead youth, transfix'd with thunder, gaz'd,
And, whilst yet smoking from the bolt he lay,
His shatter'd body to a tomb convey,

And o'er the tomb an epitaph devise ;
'Here he who drove the sun's bright chariot lies;
His father's fiery steeds he could not guide,
But in the glorious enterprise he died.'

Apollo hid his face, and pin'd for grief;
And if the story may deserve belief,
The space of one whole day is said to run,
From morn to wonted even, without a sun :
The burning ruins, with a fainter ray,
Supply the sun, and counterfeit a day,
A day that still did Nature's face disclose;
This comfort from the mighty mischief rose.

But Clymenè, enrag'd, with grief, laments,
And as her grief inspires her passion vents:
Wild for her son, and frantic in her woes,
With hair dishevell'd, round the world she goes,
To seek where'er his body might be cast,
Till, on the borders of the Po, at last

The name inscrib'd on the new tomb appears: The dear dear name she bathes in flowing tears, Hangs o'er the tomb, unable to depart,

And hugs the marble to her throbbing heart.

Her daughters, too, lament, and sigh, and mourn,
(A fruitless tribute to their brother's urn)
And beat their naked bosoms, and complain,
And call aloud for Phaëton in vain ;

All the long night their mournful watch they keep,
And all the day stand round the tomb, and weep.
Four times, revolving, the full moon return'd,
So long the mother and the daughters mourn'd;
When now the eldest, Phaëthusa strove
To rest her weary limbs, but could not move;
Lampetia would have help'd her, but she found
Herself withheld, and rooted to the ground:
A third in wild affliction, as she grieves,

Would rend her hair, but fills her hand with leaves:
One sees her thighs transform'd, another views
Her arms shot out, and branching into boughs,
And now their legs, and breasts, and bodies stood
Crusted with bark, and hardening into wood;
But still above were female heads display'd,
And mouths, that call'd the mother to their aid.
What could, alas! the weeping mother do?
From this to that with eager haste she flew,
And kiss'd her sprouting daughters as they grew
She tears the bark that to each body cleaves,
And from their verdant finger strips the leaves:
The blood came trickling where she tore away
The leaves and bark; the maids were heard to say,
'Forbear, mistaken parent, oh! forbear:
A wounded daughter in each tree you tear :
Farewell for ever.' Here the bark increas'd,
Clos'd on their faces, and their words suppress'd.
The new-made trees in tears of amber run,
Which, harden'd into value by the sun,