Then in a moment from their quartered homes
The winds came muttering,-West and blighting East,
And South; while Boreas prison-doomed and mad
Flew to the North, and shivering branch and trunk
Lifted the billows till their curling heads
Struck the pale stars.-At last the wet South hung
Brooding alone, down-weighed by cloud and shower,
And bound in black, mourning the coming doom,
And with his raven wings and misty breath
Allured the storms. Wide-stretching clouds around
(A dark confederacy) in silence met,
Hiding all Heaven. Towards the glooming shore
The tempest sailed direct, and on the top
Of Pelion burst and swept away its pines
By thousands:-Where it burst a way was made
Like that torn by the avalanche, when it falls
Louder than crashing thunder, amidst smoke
And ruin, bounding from the topmost Alps
O'er chasm and hill, and strips the forests bare.
Oh! woe, deep woe to fruitful Thessaly ! That tempest-shock sounded all o'er the land,
And men left their low dwellings, and came forth
And saw the sheeted cataracts gush from Heaven,
Like rivers that had burst their bonds, and fall
Darkening the day, until those ceaseless floods
Drowned and destroyed the herbs and bended corn,
Flowers and fruits, the wealth of all the year.-
For a time the earth drank in the mighty rains;
For a time, but sated soon, morasses shone
Where plains had stretched, and ripling rivers left
Their channels old and wandered far away.
Upon a hilly slope lay Pyrrha's home
Still safe from the rising waters; yet she feared.
"Deucalion!"-(on their mossy bed they lay,
And heard without the hissing rain descend.)
"Deucalion! Ah! I fear, Deucalion,
The gods are angered; not with thee, dear friend,
For, tho' the Titan's son, thy vows have been
Constant, thine actions holy. Unto Jove
And Themis have we bowed and prayed-in vain For lo! the storms are out, and Heaven is dark Perpetually. Apollo now no more
Rises at morning nor at evening fades;
And Dian, who when the year was wasting looked
But pale amidst the fighting elements,
Hath vanish'd quite the stars are gone; the day
Hath died—the earth itself passeth away."
Thus spoke that gentle woman and lay still,
Weeping and full of fears: Deucalion took
Her nearer to his heart :- “Themis is just,"
Sighing he said, " and kind, and tho' a frown
Hath hung upon the forehead of great Jove
Awhile, yet clearer light will come at last,
And he will smile and we rejoice again.
Believe it, love and know, a dream-a thought
How thou may'st yet be saved hath come to me,
And I will labour long and shape a raft
Wherein upon the rough wave thou shalt pass
To happier shores, sweet Pyrrha."-Still she sighed,
While he, still soothing, from her forehead pale
Parted the dark brown hair, and pressed thereon
His lips in silence. Thus, heart-folded close
She wept away her fears, and slumber fell
Like snow-down on her :-Quietly she slept
Without a dream until the morning came.
Morn came but that broad light which hung so
In heaven forsook the showering firmament.-
The clouds went floating on their fatal way.
Rivers had grown to seas: the great sea swol'n
Too mighty for his bound broke on the land,
Roaring and rushing, and each flat and plain
Devoured.-Upon the mountains now were seen
Gaunt men, and women hungering with their babes,
Eying each other, or with marble looks
Measuring the space beneath swift-lessening.
At times a swimmer from some distant rock
Less high, came struggling with the waves, but sank
Back from the slippery soil. Pale mothers then
Wept without hope, and aged heads struck cold
By agues trembled like red autumn leaves;
And infants moaned and young boys shrieked with fear.
Stout men grew white with famine. Beautiful girls
Whom once the day languished to look on, lay
On the wet earth and wrung their drenched hair;
And fathers saw them there, dying, and stole
Their scanty fare, and while they perished thrived.
Then Terror died, and Grief, and proud Despair,
Rage and Remorse, infinite Agony,
Love in its thousand shapes, weak and sublime,
Birth-strangled ; and strong Passion perished."
young, the old, weak, wise, the bad, the good Fell on their faces, struck,-whilst over them Washed the wild waters in their clamorous march.
Still fell the flooding rains. Great Ossa stood
Lone, like a peering Alp, when vapours shroud
Its sides, unshaken in the restless waves;
But from the weltering deeps Pelion arose
And shook his piny forehead at the clouds,
Moaning, and crown'd Olympus all his snows
Lost from his hundred heads, and shrank aghast.
Day, Eve, Night, Morning came and passed away.
No Sun was known to rise and none to set:
'Stead of its glorious beams a sickly light
Paled the broad East what time the day is born :
At others a thick mass vaporous and black,
And firm like solid marble, roofed the sky;
Yet gave no shelter.
|