Which not the best-built ship that ever was
Will pass exulting, when such winds, as Jove
Can thunder up, their trims and tacklings prove.
But could I build one, I would ne’er aboard,
Thy will oppos’d, nor, won, without thy word,
Giv’n in the great oath of the Gods to me,
Not to beguile me in the least degree.”
The Goddess smil’d, held hard his hand, and said:
“O y’ are a shrewd one, and so habited
In taking heed thou know’st not what it is
To be unwary, nor use words amiss.
How hast thou charm’d me, were I ne’er so sly!
Let earth know then, and heav’n, so broad, so high,
And th’ under-sunk waves of th’ infernal stream,
(Which is an oath, as terribly supreme,
As any God swears) that I had no thought
But stood with what I spake, nor would have wrought,
Nor counsell’d, any act against thy good;
But ever diligently weigh’d, and stood
On those points in persuading thee, that I
Would use myself in such extremity.
For my mind simple is, and innocent,
Not giv’n by cruel sleights to circumvent,
Nor bear I in my breast a heart of steel,
But with the suff’rer willing suff’rance feel.”
This said, the Grace of Goddesses led home,
He trac’d her steps; and, to the cavern come,
In that rich throne, whence Mercury arose,
He sat. The Nymph herself did then appose,
For food and bev’rage, to him all best meat
And drink, that mortals use to taste and eat.
Then sat she opposite, and for her feast
Was nectar and ambrosia addrest
By handmaids to her. Both, what was prepar’d,
Did freely fall to. Having fitly far’d,
The Nymph Calypso this discourse began:
“Jove-bred Ulysses! Many-witted man!
Still is thy home so wish’d? So soon, away?
Be still of cheer, for all the worst I say.
But, if thy soul knew what a sum of woes,
For thee to cast up, thy stern Fates impose,
Ere to thy country earth thy hopes attain,
Undoubtedly thy choice would here remain,
Keep house with me, and be a liver ever.
Which, methinks, should thy house and thee dissever,
Though for thy wife there thou art set on fire,
And all thy days are spent in her desire;
And though it be no boast in me to say
In form and mind I match her ev’ry way.
Nor can it fit a mortal dame’s compare,
T’ affect those terms with us that deathless are.”
The great-in-counsels made her this reply:
“Renown’d, and to be rev’renc’d, Deity!
Let it not move thee, that so much I vow
My comforts to my wife; though well I know
All cause myself why wise Penelope
In wit is far inferior to thee,
In feature, stature, all the parts of show,
She being a mortal, an immortal thou,
Old ever growing, and yet never old.
Yet her desire shall all my days see told,
Adding the sight of my returning day,
And natural home. If any God shall lay
His hand upon me as I pass the seas,
I’ll bear the worst of what his hand shall please,
As having giv’n me such a mind as shall
The more still rise the more his hand lets fall.
In wars and waves my suff’rings were not small.
I now have suffer’d much, as much before,
Hereafter let as much result, and more.”
This said, the sun set, and earth shadows gave;
When these two (in an in-room of the cave,
Left to themselves) left love no rites undone.
The early Morn up, up he rose, put on
His in and out weed. She herself enchaces
Amidst a white robe, full of all the Graces,
Ample, and pleated thick like fishy scales;
A golden girdle then her waist impales;
Her head a veil decks; and abroad they come.
And now began Ulysses to go home.
A great axe first she gave, that two ways cut,
In which a fair well-polish’d helm was put,
That from an olive bough receiv’d his frame.
A plainer then. Then led she, till they came
To lofty woods that did the isle confine.
The fir-tree, poplar, and heav’n-scaling pine,
Had there their offspring. Of which, those that were
Of driest matter, and grew longest there,
He choos’d for lighter sail. This place thus shown,
The Nymph turn’d home. He fell to felling down,
And twenty trees he stoop’d in little space,
Plain’d, used his plumb, did all with artful grace.
In mean time did Calypso wimbles bring.
He bor’d, clos’d, nail’d, and order’d ev’ry thing,
And look how much a ship-wright will allow
A ship of burden (one that best doth know
What fits his art) so large a keel he cast,
Wrought up her decks, and hatches, side-boards, mast,
With willow watlings arm’d her to resist
The billows’ outrage, added all she miss’d,
Sail-yards, and stern for guide. The Nymph then brought
Linen for sails, which with dispatch he wrought,
Gables, and halsters, tacklings. All the frame
In four days’ space to full perfection came. 3
The fifth day, they dismiss’d him from the shore,
Weeds neat, and odorous, gave him, victuals store,
Wine, strong waters, and a prosp’rous wind,
To which, Ulysses, fit-to-be-divin’d,
His sails expos’d, and hoiséd. Off he gat;
And cheerful was he. At the stern he sat,
And steer’d right artfully. Nor sleep could seize
His eye-lids. He beheld the Pleiades;
The Bear, surnam’d the Wain, that round doth move
About Orion, and keeps still above
The billowy ocean; the slow-setting star
Bootes call’d, by some the Waggoner.
Calypso warn’d him he his course should steer
Still to his left hand. Seventeen days did clear
The cloudy night’s command in his moist way,
And by the eighteenth light he might display
The shady hills of the Phæacian shore,
For which, as to his next abode, he bore.
The country did a pretty figure yield,
And look’d from off the dark seas like a shield.
Imperious Neptune, making his retreat
From th’ Æthiopian earth, and taking seat
Upon the mountains of the Solymi,
From thence, far off discov’ring, did descry
Ulysses his fields ploughing. All on fire
The sight straight set his heart, and made desire
Of wreak run over, it did boil so high.
When, his head nodding; “O impiety,”
He cried out, “now the Gods’ inconstancy
�
� Is most apparent, alt’ring their designs
Since I the Æthiops saw, and here confines
To this Ulysses’ fate his misery.
The great mark, on which all his hopes rely,
Lies in Phæacia. But I hope he shall
Feel woe at height, ere that dead calm befall.”
This said; he, begging, gather’d clouds from land, 4
Frighted the seas up, snatch’d into his hand
His horrid trident, and aloft did toss,
Of all the winds, all storms he could engross,
All earth took into sea with clouds, grim Night
Fell tumbling headlong from the cope of light,
The East and South winds justled in the air,
The violent Zephyr, and North making-fair,
Roll’d up the waves before them. And then bent
Ulysses’ knees, then all his spirit was spent.
In which despair, he thus spake: “Woe is me!
What was I born to, man of misery!
Fear tells me now, that, all the Goddess said,
Truth’s self will author, that Fate would be paid
Grief’s whole sum due from me, at sea, before
I reach’d the dear touch of my country’s shore.
With what clouds Jove heav’n’s heighten’d forehead binds!
How tyrannize the wraths of all the winds!
How all the tops he bottoms with the deeps,
And in the bottoms all the tops he steeps!
Thus dreadful is the presence of our death.
Thrice four times blest were they that sunk beneath
Their fates at Troy, and did to nought contend
But to renown Atrides with their end!
I would to God, my hour of death and fate
That day had held the’ pow’r to terminate,
When show’rs of darts my life bore undepress’d
About divine Æacides deceas’d!
Then had I been allotted to have died,
By all the Greeks with fun’rals glorified,
(Whence death, encouraging good life, had grown)
Where now I die, by no man mourn’d nor known.”
This spoke, a huge wave took him by the head,
And hurl’d him o’er board; ship and all it laid
Inverted quite amidst the waves, but he
Far off from her sprawl’d, strow’d about the sea,
His stern still holding broken off, his mast
Burst in the midst, so horrible a blast
Of mix’d winds struck it. Sails and sail-yards fell
Amongst the billows; and himself did dwell
A long time under water, nor could get
In haste his head out, wave with wave so met
In his depression; and his garments too,
Giv’n by Calypso, gave him much to do,
Hind’ring his swimming; yet he left not so
His drenchéd vessel, for the overthrow
Of her nor him, but gat at length again,
Wrastling with Neptune, hold of her; and then
Sat in her bulk, insulting over death,
Which, with the salt stream prest to stop his breath,
He ‘scap’d, and gave the sea again to give
To other men. His ship so striv’d to live,
Floating at random, cuff’d from wave to wave.
As you have seen the North wind when he drave
In autumn heaps of thorn-fed grasshoppers
Hither and thither, one heap this way bears,
Another that, and makes them often meet
in his confus’d gales; so Ulysses’ fleet
The winds hurl’d up and down; now Boreas
Toss’d it to Notus, Notus gave it pass
To Eurus, Eurus Zephyr made pursue
The horrid tennis. This sport call’d the view
Of Cadmus’ daughter, with the narrow heel,
Ino Leucothea, that first did feel
A mortal dame’s desires, and had a tongue,
But now had th’ honour to be nam’d among
The marine Godheads. She with pity saw
Ulysses justled thus from flaw to flaw,
And, like a cormorant in form and flight,
Rose from a whirl-pool, on the ship did light,
And thus bespake him: “Why is Neptune thus
In thy pursuit extremely furious,
Oppressing thee with such a world of ill,
Ev’n to thy death? He must not serve his will,
Though ’tis his study. Let me then advise
As my thoughts serve; thou shalt not be unwise
To leave thy weeds and ship to the commands
Of these rude winds, and work out with thy hands
Pass to Phæacia, where thy austere Fate
Is to pursue thee with no more such hate.
Take here this tablet, with this riband strung,
And see it still about thy bosom hung;
By whose eternal virtue never fear
To suffer thus again, nor perish here.
But when thou touchest with thy hand the shore,
Then take it from thy neck, nor wear it more,
But cast it far off from the continent,
And then thy person far ashore present.
Thus gave she him the tablet; and again,
Turn’d to a cormorant, div’d, past sight, the main.
Patient Ulysses sigh’d at this, and stuck
In the conceit of such fair-spoken luck,
And said: “Alas! I must suspect ev’n this,
Lest any other of the Deities
Add sleight to Neptune’s force, to counsel me
To leave my vessel, and so far off see
The shore I aim at. Not with thoughts too clear
Will I obey her, but to me appear
These counsels best: As long as I perceive
My ship not quite dissolv’d, I will not leave
The help she may afford me, but abide,
And suffer all woes till the worst be tried.
When she is split, I’ll swim. No miracle can,
Past near and clear means, move a knowing man.”
While this discourse employ’d him, Neptune rais’d
A huge, a high, and horrid sea, that seiz’d
Him and his ship, and toss’d them through the lake.
As when the violent winds together take
Heaps of dry chaff, and hurl them ev’ry way;
So his long wood-stack Neptune strook astray
Then did Ulysses mount on rib, perforce,
Like to a rider of a running horse,
To stay himself a time, while he might shift
His drenched weeds, that were Calypso’s gift.
When putting straight Leucothea’s amulet
About his neck, he all his forces set
To swim, and cast him prostrate to the seas.
When pow’rful Neptune saw the ruthless prease
Of perils siege him thus, he mov’d his head,
And this betwixt him and his heart he said:
“So, now feel ills enow, and struggle so,
Till to your Jove-lov’d islanders you row.
But my mind says, you will not so avoid
This last task too, but be with suff’rance cloy’d.”
This said, his rich-man’d horse he mov’d, and reach’d
His house at Ægas. But Minerva fetch’d
The winds from sea, and all their ways but one
B
arr’d to their passage; the bleak North alone
She set to blow, the rest she charg’d to keep
Their rages in, and bind themselves in sleep.
But Boreas still flew high to break the seas,
Till Jove-bred Ithacus the more with ease
The navigation-skill’d Phæacian states
Might make his refuge, Death and angry Fates
At length escaping. Two nights, yet, and days
He spent in wrastling with the sable seas;
In which space, often did his heart propose
Death to his eyes. But when Aurora rose,
And threw the third light from her orient hair,
The winds grew calm, and clear was all the air,
Not one breath stirring. Then he might descry,
Rais’d by the high seas, clear, and land was nigh.
And then, look how to good sons that esteem
Their father’s life dear, (after pains extreme,
Felt in some sickness, that hath held him long
Down to his bed, and with affections strong
Wasted his body, made his life his load,
As being inflicted by some angry God)
When on their pray’rs they see descend at length
Health from the heav’ns, clad all in spirit and strength,
The sight is precious; so, since here should end
Ulysses’ toils, which therein should extend
Health to his country, held to him his sire
And on which long for him disease did tire,
And then, besides, for his own sake to see
The shores, the woods so near, such joy had he,
As those good sons for their recover’d sire.
Then labour’d feet and all parts to aspire
To that wish’d continent; which when as near
He came, as Clamour might inform an ear,
He heard a sound beat from the sea-bred rocks,
Against which gave a huge sea horrid shocks,
That belch’d upon the firm land weeds and foam,
With which were all things hid there, where no room
Of fit capacity was for any port,
Nor from the sea for any man’s resort,
The shores, the rocks, the cliff’s, so prominent were.
“O,” said Ulysses then, “now Jupiter
Hath giv’n me sight of an unhop’d for shore,
Though I have wrought these seas so long, so sore.
Of rest yet no place shows the slend’rest prints,
The rugged shore so bristled is with flints,
Against which ev’ry way the waves so flock,
And all the shore shows as one eminent rock,
The Complete Poetical Works of George Chapman Page 119
