Ecce ingens fragmen scopuli, quod vertice summo
Desuper impendet, nullo fundamine nixum,
Decidit in fluctus:  maria undique et undique saxa
Horrisono stridore tenant, et ad aethera murmur
Erigitur; trepidatque suis Neptunus in undis. 
Nam, longa venti rabie, atque aspergine crebra
Aequorei laticis, specus ima rupe cavatur: 
Jam fultura ruit, jam summa cacumina nutant;
Jam cadit in praeceps moles, et verberat undas. 
Attonitus credas, hinc dejecisse Tonantem
Montibus impositos montes, et Pelion altum
In capita anguipedum coelo jaculasse gigantum. 
  Saepe etiam spelunca immani aperitur hiatu
Exesa e scopulis, et utrinque foramina pandit,
Hinc atque hinc a ponto ad pontum pervia Phoebo
Cautibus enorme junctis laquearia tecti
Formantur; moles olim ruitura superne. 
Fornice sublimi nidos posuere palumbes,
Inque imo stagni posuere cubilia phocae. 
  Sed, cum saevit hyems, et venti, carcere rupto,
Immensos volvunt fluctus ad culmina montis;
Non obsessae arces, non fulmina vindice dextra
Missa Jovis, quoties inimicus saevit in urbes,
Exaequant sonitum undarum, veniente procella: 
Littora littoribus reboant; vicinia late,
Gens assueta mari, et pedibus percurrere rupes,
Terretur tamen, et longe fugit, arva relinquens. 
  Gramina dum carpunt pendentes rupe capellae,
Vi salientis aquae de summo praecipitantur,
Et dulces animas imo sub gurgite linquunt. 
  Piscator terra non audet vellere funem;
Sed latet in portu tremebundus, et aera sudum
Haud sperans, Nereum precibus votisque fatigat.

CARBERY ROCKS

TRANSLATED BY DR. DUNKIN

Lo! from the top of yonder cliff, that shrouds
Its airy head amid the azure clouds,
Hangs a huge fragment; destitute of props,
Prone on the wave the rocky ruin drops;
With hoarse rebuff the swelling seas rebound,
From shore to shore the rocks return the sound: 
The dreadful murmur Heaven’s high convex cleaves,
And Neptune shrinks beneath his subject waves: 
For, long the whirling winds and beating tides
Had scoop’d a vault into its nether sides. 
Now yields the base, the summits nod, now urge
Their headlong course, and lash the sounding surge. 
Not louder noise could shake the guilty world,
When Jove heap’d mountains upon mountains hurl’d;
Retorting Pelion from his dread abode,
To crush Earth’s rebel sons beneath the load. 
  Oft too with hideous yawn the cavern wide
Presents an orifice on either side. 
A dismal orifice, from sea to sea
Extended, pervious to the God of Day: 
Uncouthly join’d, the rocks stupendous form
An arch, the ruin of a future storm: 
High on the cliff their nests the woodquests make,
And sea-calves stable in the oozy lake. 
  But when bleak Winter with his sullen train
Awakes the winds to vex the watery plain;