Ibis (Mozley)

Up to this time, when I have already completed fifty years, all the song of my Muse has been harmless ; and not a letter of Naso, who wrote so many thousands, exists to be read that is stained with blood ; nor have my writings hurt anyone save me, when his own Art proved the artist’s bane. One man (and this is itself a mighty wrong) suffers not my title to innocence to endure. Whoever he is (for so far as I can I shall yet be silent of his name), he compels my unaccustomed hands to take up arms. He suffers me not, though banished to the North wind’s icy birthplace, to lie hidden in my exile; cruelly he vexes the wounds that crave repose, and shouts my name in all the Forum, nor allows her who is joined to me in the perpetual union of the marriage-bed to weep for her husband’s living corpse. And while I embrace the shattered fragments of my bark, he fights to possess my shipwrecked planks ; and he who ought to have extinguished the sudden flames seeks plunder like a robber from the midst of the fire. He strives that my exiled old age may lack sustenance : ah . how much worthier is he himself of my distress ! May the gods forbid ! of whom the greatest far is he, who would not have my voyage destitute. To him, therefore, will I render merited thanks, always wherever I may, for his so kindly heart. Let Pontus hear these words : perchance too that same power will cause a nearer land to be called by me to witness. But thou, thou man of blood, who didst spurn me fallen, where er I may, thou wretch, I shall be thy devoted foe. Sooner shall moisture cease to be opposed to fire, and the sun’s light be joined to the moon; the same part of heaven shall send forth western winds and eastern, and the warm south blow from the cold sky ; a strange concord shall unite the brothers’ smoke, which ancient anger separates on the kindled pyre ; sooner shall spring mingle with autumn, or summer with midwinter, and the same region be both evening and sunrise, than the arms that we took up be laid aside, and between thee and me, shameless wretch, there be that friendship which thy crime sundered. That peace shall we enjoy, while life remains to me, which wolves are wont to keep with the defenceless flock. First will I join battle in the measure I have begun, although wars are not wont to be waged in this strain ; and as the spear of the soldier who is not yet fired to battle first attacks the yellow, sandy soil, so will I not yet shoot at thee with sharpened steel, nor shall my javelin seek forthwith thy hateful life; and no name nor deeds shall I mention in this work, and I will suffer thee easily to dissemble who thou art. Afterwards, if thou dost continue, my satire unrestrained shall hurl at thee missiles tinged by Lycambean blood. Now, in such wise as Battiades calls curses down on his enemy Ibis, so do I call curses down on thee and thine. Like him I will enshroud my song in doubtful story, although I am not wont to pursue this style. His riddlings shall I be said to have imitated, forgetful of my judgment and my custom. And because I reveal not yet to those who ask me, who thou art, bear thou also meanwhile the name of Ibis ; and just as my lines have something of the dark, so let thy own life’s series all be black. Be this what he offers thee upon thy birthday and upon Janus’ Kalends, whosoever reads with lips that shall not lie.

Gods of land and sea, and ye who hold with Jove a better realm than these between the sundered poles, hither, I pray, turn hither all of you your minds, and allow weight to my desires : and thou thyself, O Earth, and thyself, O Sea with thy waves, and thyself, O supreme Air, hear my petition ; ye constellations, too, and the sun’s ray-encircled image, and thou Moon that never shinest with the orb thou hadst before, and Night, awful in the beauty of thy shadows; and ye who with triple thumb spin your appointed task, and thou river of unperjured water, that with roar terrific flowest through the infernal vales, and ye who, as they tell, your tresses bound by twisted serpents, sit before the dim prison gates, ye too, the host of gods above. Fauns, Satyrs, Lars, streams and nymphs, and the race of demigods: gods lastly old and new from ancient chaos down to our own time, be present all, while dreadful spells are chanted against that faithless head and grief and anger play their parts. Give assent all in turn to my desires, and let no part of my supplication fall ! And what I pray, may that be done : so that he deem them not my sayings, but the words of the lover of Pasiphae’s daughter. And whatever penalties I pass by, may he suffer those as well ; let him be richer in misery than my wit can conceive ! Nor may vows that doom a feigned name to perdition be less strong to harm, or move less powerful gods : that Ibis do I execrate whom the mind understands, who knows that his deeds have merited these curses. I am in no mood to tarry : as priest I will fulfil the appointed prayers. Whosoever thou art that attendest at my rite, suit thy speech thereto ; whosoever thou art that attendest at the rite, utter Words of woe, and draw near to Ibis with tear-moistened cheeks ; meet him with evil omens and with left feet foremost, and let black raiment hide your bodies ! Thou too, Why dost thou hesitate to assume the garb of Woe ? Already thy funeral altar is set up, as thou dost see thyself. The procession is ready for thee ; let not my prayers be delayed ; offer thy throat, O fearful victim, to my knife.

May the earth refuse thee her fruits and the river his waters, may Wind and breeze deny their breath. May the sun not be Warm for thee, nor Phoebe bright, may the clear stars fail thy vision. May neither Vulcan nor the air lend thee their aid, nor earth nor sea afford thee any path. Mayst thou wander an exile and destitute, and haunt the doors of others, and beg a little food with trembling mouth. May neither thy body nor thy sick mind be free from querulous pain, may night be to thee more grievous than day, and day than night. Mayst thou ever be piteous, but have none to pity thee ; may men and women rejoice at thy adversity. May hatred crown thy tears, and mayst thou be thought worthy, having borne many ills, to bear yet more. And (what is rare) may the aspect of thy fortune, though its wonted favour be lost, bring thee but ill-will. Mayst thou have cause enough for death, but no means of dying; may thy life be compelled to shun the death it prays for. May thy spirit struggle long ere it leave thy tortured limbs, and rack thee first with long delaying.

These things shall be. Phoebus himself of late gave me signs of the future, and a bird of sorrow flew from the left. Surely, may I think that my prayers will move the gods, and ever, treacherous one, will I feed on the hope of thy death. And sooner will that late-arriving day deprive me of the life too oft assailed by thee, than age ever cause this resentment of mine to fail, or length of time appease my hate. While Thracians fight with the bow and Iazygians with the spear, while Ganges is warm and Danube cold, while oaks are on the mountains and lush pasture on the plains, while Tuscan Tiber holds running waters, I shall wage war with thee ; nor shall death end my wrath, but give fierce weapons to my innocuous ghost. Then also when I shall be scattered into tenuous air my lifeless shade shall detest thy ways ; then too shall I come, a shade that forgets not thy deeds, and in bony shape shall I assail thy face. Whether I am consumed (as I fain would not be) by length of years, or undone by a self-sought death ; whether I am tossed in shipwreck o’er unmeasured waters, and the outlandish fish devours my flesh ; whether foreign fowl prey upon my limbs, or wolves stain their jaws with my blood ; whether someone deign to put my lifeless corpse beneath the earth, or to set it upon a common pyre : whatever I shall be, I shall strive to burst forth from the Stygian realm, and shall stretch forth icy hands in vengeance against thy face. Waking thou shalt behold me, in the silent shadows of the night I shall appear before thee and drive away thy slumbers. Finally, whatever thou dost I shall hover before thine eyes and countenance, and make complaint, and in no place shalt thou have repose. Twisted thongs shall crack and twined serpents hiss, and torches smoke before thy guilty face. By these furies shalt thou be driven while living and by these when dead, and thy punishment shall outlast thy life. Nor shall any funeral fall to thy lot, nor lamentation of thy kin ; thou shalt be cast forth, a life unmourned. The hand of the executioner shall drag thee, amid the plaudits of the mob, and his hook shall be fixed in thy bones. The very flames, which consume all things, shall shun thee ; the righteous ground shall spurn thy hated corpse. With beak and talons the cruel vulture shall pluck at thy loins, and ravening dogs tear thy perfidious heart, and o’er thy body (of such fame mayst thou boast) shall rage the strife of insatiable wolves. To places far removed from Elysian fields shalt thou be summoned, and where the guilty have their dwelling shalt thou abide. Sisyphus is there, rolling his stone and seeking it again, and he who is whirled, fast bound, by the circle of the flying wheel, and the daughters of Belus who bear on their shoulders the water that runs away, the daughters-in-law of exiled Aegyptus, a bloodstained company. Pelops’ sire grasps at the fruit before him, and ever lacks yet ever abounds in running waters ; and he whose extremities nine acres sunder, who yields his forfeited entrails to the assiduous bird. Here shall one of the Furies tear thy side with a scourge, that thou mayst confess the full measure of thy wickedness ; another shall cut up thy limbs for the snakes of Tartarus ; a third shall roast thy smoking face with fire. In a thousand ways shall thy noxious shade be mangled, and Aeacus shall use all his art to find thee punishments. To thee shall he transfer the torments of sinners of old ; to all the ancients shalt thou bring peace. Sisyphus, thou shalt have one to whom thou mayst give thy revolving weight ; the swift wheels now shall turn new limbs ; this man shall it be who will grasp in vain at boughs and waves ; this man will feed the birds with liver unconsumed. Nor shall another death bring this death’s torments to an end, no hour shall be the last for misery so great. Thereof will I sing but little, as though one gathered leaves from Ida, or water from the surface of the Libyan sea. For neither can I say how many flowers bloom in Sicilian Hybla, nor how many crocuses the Cilician earth doth bear nor, when the fierce storm quivers upon the wings of the North wind, with how many hailstones Athos is made white ; nor can all thy sins be recounted by my speech, though thou give me voices manifold. So many (woe upon thee!) and such destructions shall come on thee, that I ween I too could be compelled to weep. Those tears will make me happy without end ; that weeping will be sweeter to me than laughter.

Thou wert born unfortunate (so willed the gods), no star was favourable or kindly at thy birth. Venus shone not, nor Jupiter in that hour, neither moon nor sun were fitly placed, nor did he whom shining Maia bore to mighty Jove set his fires in position to bring thee aught of profit. The savage star of Mars that promises naught peaceful bore thee down, and the star of the aged wielder of the scythe. Thy natal day too, that thou mightest see naught save gloom, was foul and black with pall of cloud. This is the day to which in our Annals deadly Allia gives her name, and the day which brought Ibis to birth, brought destruction to our people. So soon as, fallen from an impure mother’s womb, his unclean body lay on the Cinyphian soil, a nocturnal owl sat over against him in a tree-top, and uttered dismal sounds with death-foretelling mouth. Forthwith the Furies washed him in the waters of the mere, where flowed a channel from the Stygian stream, and anointed his breast with poison of a snake of Erebus, and thrice smote their blood-stained hands together.

His infant throat had they moistened with bitches’ milk : this was the first food to enter the child’s mouth : thence drank the fosterling the madness of his nurse and o’er the whole city his snarling voice is heard. They swathed his limbs in bands of dusky hue, snatched from a pyre abandoned as accursed ; and lest it lie unpropped on the naked earth they set a flint-stone beneath his baby head. And now, about to withdraw, they placed before his eyes, close by his face, a green-wood torch. The babe was weeping, smarting from the pungent smoke, when one sister of the three thus spake : “ Unto endless ages have we called forth those tears of thine, which, their cause failing not, shall ever fall.” She had done ; but Clotho bade her promise have power, and with hostile hand spun dark-hued threads; and that her own mouth might not utter the long presage, “ There shall be a bard,” said she, to sing thy fate.” That bard am I ; from me shalt thou learn thy wounds, so do the gods but lend their strength to my Words ; and the weight of circumstance shall aid my songs, Whose fulfilment thou shalt experience to thy sorrow. And lest the examples of a former age be lacking to thy torments, let not thine ills be lighter than those of Troy, and such wounds as the son of Poeas, heir of club-wielding Hercules, endured in his envenomed leg, mayst thou bear in thine. Nor mayst thou suffer less grievously than he who drank of the hind’s udders, whom the armed man wounded and the unarmed succoured ; or than he who from his horse fell headlong to the Aleian fields, whose face was well-nigh his destruction. Mayst thou see what Amyntor’s son beheld and reft of light grope thy timorous path by the service of a stick. Nor mayst thou see more than he whom his daughter guided, whose wickedness both his parents knew ; but be as was the old man, famous for Apollo’s craft, when he was taken to judge the jesting quarrel; as he, too, by whose precept the dove was made forerunner and guide of the Palladian ship ; and also as he who lost those eyes by which to his loss he looked upon the gold, and which the bereft mother gave as death-offering to her son ; or as Aetna’s shepherd, to whom Telephus, son of Eurynius, foretold what should befall him ; as the two sons of Phineus, from whom he reft the light who gave it ; as the head of Thamyris or of Demodocus. So may one hack thy limbs, as Saturn cut off those parts that wrought his birth. Nor may Neptune be kinder to thee among the swelling waves than to him whose brother and wife became on a sudden birds ; or to the man of guile, whom Semele’s sister pitied as he clung to the fragments of his shattered raft. Either (lest one alone know this fashion of punishment) may thy flesh be torn and carried by horses diverse ways ; or mayst thou bear what he bore at the Punic chieftain’s hands, who held it base for a Roman to be ransomed. Nor may a present deity bring thee aid, as to him whom the household shrine of Jove availed naught. And as Thessalus leapt down from Ossa’s height, so mayst thou too be hurled from a rocky ridge. Or like Eurylochus, who took the sceptre from him, may thy limbs be food for greedy snakes. Or like Minos’ fate, let the boiling heat of water poured upon thy head hasten thy death. And like Prometheus, whose deeds were kindly, yet not unpunished, mayst thou be fettered and feed the birds of air. Or like Erechthides, thrice defeated by mighty Hercules, mayst thou be slain and hurled into the immeasurable deep. Or like Amyntus’ son, may the boy thou dost love detest thy shameful wooing, and Wound thee with his angry blade. Nor may cups more trustworthy be mixed for thee than for him who was born of horned Jove. Or hanging like the captive Achaeus mayst thou die, who hung miserably by the stream that bears the gold. Or like Achilles’ scion, whose kindred name brings him renown, may a tile flung by an enemy's hand destroy thee. Nor may thy bones rest more blissful than those of Pyrrhus, which lay scattered through Ambracian ways. And like the daughter of Aeacides mayst thou die by the blows of javelins ; this rite Ceres may not dissemble. And like the grandson of the monarch named in my song but now, mayst thou drink at thy parent’s hand the juice of the Spanish fly. Or may an adulteress be called righteous for slaying thee, as she was called righteous by whose vengeance Leucon fell. And mayst thou send with thee to the pyre the bodies most dear to thee, an end of life that befell Sardanapalus. And like them who prepared to violate the shrine of Libyan Jove, ay the sand driven by the South wind o’erwhelm thy face. And like those slain by the fraud of the second Darius, even so may the sinking ashes devour thy countenance. Or like him who once set forth from olive-bearing Sicyon, may cold and hunger be the cause of thy death. Or like the Atarnean, mayst thou, sewed in a bullock’s hide, be basely carried as booty to thy lord. And mayst thou be murdered in thy chamber like him of Pherae, who was slain by the sword of his own spouse, and like Aleuas of Larissa mayst thou by thine own wound find faithless those whom thou thinkest faithful. And like Milo, under whose tyranny Pisa groaned, mayst thou be hurled alive into hidden waters A And may the missiles sped by Jove against him who held the Phylacian realm of the Aphidantians seek thee also. Or like Lenaeus faring once from Amastris’ shores mayst thou be left destitute on Achillean soil. And as either Eurydamas was thrice dragged round Thrasyllus’ tomb by Larissean wheels, or he who with his own body purified the walls, so soon to fall, which he had often saved, or as the adulterer was dragged, they say, o’er Attic soil, while the daughter of Hippomenes suffered a new kind of doom, so, when the hated life has left thy limbs, may avenging steeds pull thy dishonoured corpse.' In such wise may some rock pierce thy flesh, as the Greeks were pierced in the Euboean bay ; and as the bold ravisher perished by thunderbolt and by sea, so may fire aid the waters that will drown thee. Mayst thou in mind too be as distraught and frenzy-driven as he who in his whole body has but one wound ; or as the son of Dryas who held the realm of Rhodope and wore unlike gear on his two feet ; or the Oetean of old, or the son-in-law of serpents, or Tisamenus’ sire, or Callirhoe’s husband. Nor may thy mother be more chaste than she for whom as his daughter-in-law Tydeus might have blushed : or as the Locrian who joined in love with her husband’s brother, when she had been disguised in the person of her slaughtered handmaid. And so. Heaven grant, mayst thou find joy in the faithfulness of thy spouse, as did Talaus’ or Tyndareus’ son-in-law : or as did their husbands in the daughters of Belus, who dared to plan death for their own cousins, and whose necks are bowed with constant carrying of water. May thy sister burn, as with a torch, with the fire of Byblis and of Canace, nor prove her love save by a crime. If thou hast a daughter, may she be what Pelopea was to Thyestes, Myrrha to her father and Nyctimene to hers. Nor may she be more dutiful and more considerate to her father’s head than was his daughter to Pherelas, or thine to thee, O Nisus : or than she who made the place infamous with the mention of her sin, and crushed her sire’s limbs beneath driven wheels. As those youths mayst thou perish, whose feet and faces and arms the gates of Pisa held aloft : - as he who with his own blood more profitably stained the ground that the blood of wretched suitors oft had drenched : as perished the traitorous charioteer of the fierce tyrant, giving a new name to the Myrtoan sea : as they who wooed the fleet-footed girl in vain, until three apples made her slower ; as they who entered the chambers that hid the monster of strange shape, the blind dwelling whence there was no return : as those whose bodies, six with another six again, Aeacides in fury sent to the lofty pyre : as those whom, overcome by her mouth’s dark riddling, the Sphinx, we read, sent to unspeakable death ; as those who fell in the shrine of Bistonian Minerva, wherefore even now the face of the goddess is veiled : as those who once made the stalls of the 'Thracian monarch gory with the feast of their own flesh : as they who felt the lions of Therodamas, or knew the Tauric rites of the goddess of Thoas as they whom greedy Scylla or Charybdis facing Scylla snatched trembling from the Dulichian craft as they whom Polyphemus sent down into his vast paunch, or who suffered Laestrygonian violence : as they whom the Punic chieftain sank in the waters of the well and throwing dust upon them made the water white ; as perished the twice six handmaidens of Icarius’ daughter and her suitors, and he who gave arms to the suitors against his master’s life : as lies the wrestler whom the Aonian stranger threw, whose falling, wondrous to tell, brought him victory ; as those whom the strong arms of Antaeus crushed, and those whom the Lemnian crowd sent to a savage death : as he who taught a cruel rite, and after long time, a victim slain, brought rainy showers ; as Antaeus’ brother stained the altars with the blood it was right to shed, and fell by the example of his own deed: as he who impiously fed the terrible steeds with human flesh in place of the grass that holds the grain : as the two slain by different wounds of the same avenger’s hand, Nessus and Dexamenus’ son-in-law : as thy great-grandson, Saturn, whom from his own city the son of Coronis saw expire : as Sinis and Sciron and Polypemon With his son, and he who was part man, part bullock ; and as he who let fly into the air the boughs bent down to the earth, and beheld the waters of this sea and of that : and as the body of Cercyon that Ceres with joyful face saw perishing by Theseus’ hand.

Such ills befall thee whom my anger execrates with merited curses, ills no less than these ! Such a lot as was that of Achaemenides, abandoned on Sicilian Etna, when he saw the Trojan sails approach : and that of Irus the double-named, and of them who haunt the bridge, shall be greater than thou canst hope for. May the son of Ceres be ever loved by thee in vain, and ever for all thy seeking fail thy fortune ; and as when the wave by alternate ebbings glides away the soft sand is withdrawn from the foot’s pressure, so in some subtle wise may thy fortune ever melt, and glide and flow away ever through thy hands. And like the sire of her who was wont to change from shape to shape though full mayst thou be wasted by inextinguishable hunger ; nor mayst thou shrink from human flesh ; but where thou art strongest thou shalt be the Tydeus of these days ; mayst thou do such a deed as shall make the horses of the Sun in terror dash from evening to the East again ; thou shalt repeat the foul banquet of the Lycaonian board, and try to deceive Jove with counterfeited food ; and I pray that someone may serve thee up and provoke the god to wrath, that thou mayst be Tantalus’ son and the Thracian child, And may thy limbs be so scattered o’er the broad fields as those which stayed a father’s march. Mayst thou imitate real bullocks with the bronze of Perillus, whilst thy cries match the shape of the bull. And like fierce Phalaris, thy tongue first severed with the sword, mayst thou bellow like an ox imprisoned in Paphian bronze. And while thou wishest to return to years of lustier life, mayst thou be deceived like the aged father-in-law of Admetus.’ Or on horseback mayst thou be sunk in the midst of a morass of mud, so long as thy fate hath no renown. And wouldst that thou mightest perish like those sprung from the teeth that a Sidonian hand scattered on Grecian fields. And may the ill-starred curses that the son of Panthus uttered concerning Medusa’s brother befall thy head : i and those too wherewith in a brief volume that bird is execrated which cleanses its body by throwing water on it. And as many wounds mayst thou suffer as he is said to have suffered, from whose rites the knife is wont to be absent. And like those whom the Cybelean mother excites mayst thou in frenzy sever thy slighted parts to Phrygian strains ; and from a man mayst thou become nor man nor woman, like Attis, and with soft hand shake the loud timbrels. And mayst thou be suddenly turned into a beast of the Mighty Mother, as he who won and she who lost the race were turned. And lest Limone alone endure that punishment, may thy flesh too be torn by the horse’s savage tooth. Or like him of Cassandrea, no gentler than that monarch, mayst thou be wounded and buried beneath high-piled earth. Or like Abantiades or the Cycnean hero mayst thou be hurled, imprisoned, into the sea’s waters. Or mayst thou be slain a victim at the altar of sacrifice, as Theodotus suffered death from his ruthless foe. Or may Abdera call curses upon thee on certain days, and stones more numerous than hail seek the object of their cursing.' Or mayst thou be struck by the triple dart of angry Jove, like the son of Hipponous and the sire of Dexione, like the sister of Autonoe and the nephew of Maia, like him who badly guided the rashly prayed-for steeds ; like the bold son of Aeolus, like him who was born of that same blood wherefrom was begotten Arctos who knows not liquid waters, like as Macelo with her spouse was struck by devouring flames, so, I pray, mayst thou foil by a heavenly avenger’s fire. And mayst thou be a prey to them who, since they slew Trasus ere his time, may not approach Latonian Delos : to them too who tore in pieces him Who spied on chaste Diana’s bath, and Linus, grandson of Crotopus. Nor mayst thou be more lightly stung by poisoned snake than the daughter-in-law of old Oeager and Calliope ; or than Hypsipyle’s babe, or he who first with sharp point of spear transfixed the hollow wood of the suspected horse. Nor mayst thou climb the lofty steps more cautiously than Elpenor, but bear, as he bore it, the potency of wine.’ So mayst thou fall vanquished, as fell whoe’er of the Dryopians succoured the churlish Thiodamas when he called to arms as fierce Cacus himself did perish, slaughtered in his own cave, and betrayed by the voice of the imprisoned cow : or he who took the gifts steeped in the poison of Nessus, and stained the Euboean waters with his blood. Or mayst thou go down to Tartarus from a rock’s sheer height, like him who read the Socratic work on death, like him who saw the deceiving sails of Theseus’ bark, like the boy flung from Ilium’s citadel, like the nurse and aunt of infant Bacchus, like him whose death came from the saw that he invented, or as the jealous maiden threw herself from the high cliffs, who had said angry words to the invincible god. May a lioness of thy land, lately delivered, meet thee in thy native fields, and bring thee the death Phalaecus suffered. And may the boar that slew Lycurgus’ son, and him that was born of a tree, and courageous Idmon, tear thee too asunder. And even dying may he wound thee, as him upon whom fell the head of the boar he had transfixed. Or mayst thou be at once that Phrygian whom a pine tree slew with a like fate, and the huntsman son of Berecyntia. If thy ship shall have touched Minoan sands, let the Cretan crowd deem thee a Corcyrean. And mayst thou enter a house doomed to fall, like the seed of Aleuas, when the star was propitious to Leoprepes’ famous son. Or like Evenus, drowned in a river torrent, or Tiberinus, mayst thou give thy name to the rapid stream. And like Astacides may thy head be cut from thy truncated corpse, and, though deserving of beasts, be food for a man. And that which they say Brotea did in longing for death, mayst thou give thy limbs to be burnt upon the kindled pyre. And while imprisoned mayst thou suffer a violent death, as he who wrote the history that would profit him naught. And as it hurt the inventor of the quarrelsome iambus, so may a wayward tongue be for thy destruction. And like him who harmed Athens with his halting song mayst thou perish, hated, by failure of food. And as the poet of the austere lyre is said to have perished, may an injured hand be the cause of thy death. And as the serpent wounded Orestes, Agamemnon’s son, so mayst thou too fall by a poisoned bite. May the first night of wedlock be the last of thy life : in this fashion perished Eupolis and his new bride. And as they relate that buskined Lycophron fell, so in thy flesh may the barb stick last. Or rent asunder mayst thou be strewn in the woods by thine own kin, as at Thebes he was strewn who was born of the serpent’s son. And over wild mountains mayst thou be dragged by a tearing bull, as was dragged the imperious spouse of Lycus. And, what the unwilling rival of her own sister suffered, may thy tongue cut out fall before thy feet. And like the author of tardy Myrrha, whose surname wrought him harm, mayst thou be found in countless places of the world. And may the craftsman bee, as he did to the Achaean seer, bury in thine eyes his noxious dart.' And chained on the hard rocks mayst thou have thine entrails torn, as he whose brother’s daughter Pyrrha was. Like the young son of Harpagus mayst thou recall the example of Thyestes, and carved in pieces enter thy father’s bowels. Mayst thou have limbs maimed and parts mutilated by the savage sword, as they say were those of Mamertas. And as with the Syracusan bard whose throat was strangled, so may a noose stop the way of thy breath.’ Or may thy flesh be exposed by stripping off the skin, like him whose name a Phrygian river bears. Mayst thou in evil hour see the face of Medusa that turns to stone, who alone gave many of the Cephenians to death. Like Glaucus mayst thou suffer the bites of Potnian mares, and like another Glaucus leap into the waters of the sea. And like him who hath the same name as the two aforesaid may Gnosian honey choke thy breath. And with harassed countenance mayst thou drink what once the learned prisoner of Anytus drank with countenance unperturbed. Nor if thou lovest at all may it turn out more happily for thee than for Haemon, and as Macareus possessed his mistress so mayst thou thine. Or mayst thou see what Hector’s son saw from his native citadel, when already the flames were mastering all.' Mayst thou atone thy shame with blood, as he whose grandsire was the father that begot him, by whose crime his own parent was made his sister. And in thy bones may that kind of weapon stick fast, whereby Icarius’ son-in-law is said to have fallen. And as the chattering throat was crushed in the maple horse, so may a thumb close the passage of thy voice. Or like Anaxarchus mayst thou be crushed small in a deep mortar, and thy pounded bones sound like the wonted grain. And like Psamathe’s sire may Phoebus bury thee in lowest Tartarus, as he had done to his own daughter. And on thy kindred may that pestilence fall, which the might of Coroebus overcame and brought succour to the poor Argive women. And as Aethra’s grandson, doomed to die by Venus’ wrath, mayst thou be hurled, an exile, from terror-stricken steeds. As the host slew his Ward for his great wealth, so for thy little Wealth may thy host slay thee.' And as they say his six brethren perished With Damasichthon, so may all thy race perish With thee.’ As the harper completed With his Own his Wretched children’s deaths, so mayst thou With reason grow weary of thy life. Or like Pelops’ sister mayst thou harden With a growth of stone, or like Battus harmed by his own tongue.’ If thou Wilt launch the disk and hurl it at the liquid air, mayst thou fall struck by the circle that slew the young Oebalides. If with alternate arm thou Wilt beat the wave, may every strait be more dangerous to thee than that of Abydos. As the comic writer perished in mid-water as he swam, thy mouth too may the Stygian wave thus stifle. Or when shipwrecked thou hast o’ercome the windy sea, mayst thou die like Palinurus after gaining land. And as Diana’s guardians tore the tragic bard, so may a crowd of watchful hounds tear thee in pieces. Or like the Trinacrian mayst thou leap into the giant’s mouth, where in full might Sicanian Aetna vomits flames. And may Strymonian mothers rend thy limbs with frenzied nails, deeming them those of Orpheus. As absent flames consumed Althaea’s son, so may a firebrand kindle thy funeral pile. As the new bride took fire from the Phasian garland, and the sire of the bride, and with her sire the house ; as the gore ran diffused through the limbs of Hercules, so may pestilent poison devour thy frame. As his own offspring was revenged upon Lycurgus, so may the stroke of a strange weapon await thee also. And like Milo mayst thou strive to draw apart the split oak tree, nor be able to draw back thence thy captured arms. And mayst thou be hurt by thine own gifts, as Icarus against whom the drunken crowd brought armed violence. And as did the loving daughter in grief at her father’s death, make thy throat to enter the rope’s noose. And mayst thou suffer starvation from the blocking of the door of thy house, as he whose own mother decreed his punishment. Mayst thou violate Minerva’s image after his example who turned aside the rash journey from Aulis’ haven. Or like the son of Nauplius mayst thou pay by death the penalty of a false charge, nor find pleasure in thy innocence. As the Isindian host deprived Aethalus of life, whom the unforgetting Ionian debars e’en now from the sacred rites ; and as his own mother by the aid of light revealed him that lurked in darkness after the slaying of Melantheus, so may hurled weapons pierce thy breast, so, I pray, may thine own helpers hinder thee. As passed the night for the timorous Phrygian who bargained the steeds that valiant Achilles drove, so may the night pass for thee. Nor mayst thou repose with better slumber than Rhesus, or than they who bore Rhesus company, first on the road, then in death ; or than those whom bold Hyrtacides and the comrade of Hyrtacides slew with Rutulian Ramnes. Or like the son of Clinias, surrounded by venomous flames mayst thou take thy charred limbs to Stygian death. And as with Remus who dared to o’erleap the rising wall, may rustic weapons be hurtful to thy head. Finally, I pray that among Sarmatian and Getic arrows, that in these regions thou mayst live and die.

Receive this message meanwhile that my hasty volume brings, lest thou complain I have forgot thee. Brief is it, I confess ; but may the gods give more than they are asked, and by their favour send my prayer manifold increase. Thou shalt read more anon, bearing thine own true name, and writ in a measure wherein bitter wars rightly should be waged.