The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Part 157

CHORUS: Go! But what needs this serious haste, O father? _75

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! _80 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 _90 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 _95 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. _100

SILENUS: How, touched you not at your paternal sh.o.r.e?

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. _105

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? _110

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. _115

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? _120

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. _125

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. _130

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 G.o.d, gave it me.

SILENUS: Whom I have nursed a baby in my arms. _135

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.