Let the wide air with our complaint resound!

  A DRYAD.

  ’Tis surely Orpheus, who hath reached the hill,
      With harp in hand, glad-eyed and light of heart! 
      He thinks that his dear love is living still. 
  My news will stab him with a sudden smart: 
      An unforeseen and unexpected blow
      Wounds worst and stings the bosom’s tenderest part. 
  Death hath disjoined the truest love, I know,
      That nature yet to this low world revealed,
      And quenched the flame in its most charming glow. 
  Go, sisters, hasten ye to yonder field,
      Where on the sward lies slain Eurydice;
      Strew her with flowers and grasses!  I must yield
  This man the measure of his misery.

  [Exeunt DRYADS. Enter ORPHEUS, singing.

  ORPHEUS.

  Musa, triumphales titulos et gesta canamus
      Herculis, et forti monstra subacta manu;
  Ut timidae malri pressos ostenderit angues,
      Intrepidusque fero riserit ore puer.

  A DRYAD.

  Orpheus, I bring thee bitter news.  Alas! 
      Thy nymph who was so beautiful, is slain!
      flying from Aristaeus o’er the grass,
      What time she reached yon stream that threads the plain,

    A snake which lurked mid flowers where she did pass,
    Pierced her fair foot with his envenomed bane: 
    So fierce, so potent was the sting, that she
    Died in mid course.  Ah, woe that this should be!

  [ORPHEUS turns to go in silence.

  MNESILLUS, the satyr.

  Mark ye how sunk in woe
    The poor wretch forth doth pass,
    And may not answer, for his grief, one word? 
    On some lone shore, unheard,
    Far, far away, he’ll go,
    And pour his heart forth to the winds, alas! 
    I’ll follow and observe if he
    Moves with his moan the hills to sympathy.

  [Follows ORPHEUS.

  ORPHEUS.

  Let us lament, O lyre disconsolate! 
    Our wonted music is in tune no more. 
    Lament we while the heavens revolve, and let
    The nightingale be conquered on Love’s shore! 
    O heaven, O earth, O sea, O cruel fate! 
    How shall I bear a pang so passing sore? 
    Eurydice, my love!  O life of mine! 
    On earth I will no more without thee pine! 
  I will go down unto the doors of Hell,
    And see if mercy may be found below: 
    Perchance we shall reverse fate’s spoken spell
    With tearful songs and words of honeyed woe: 
    Perchance will Death be pitiful; for well
    With singing have we turned the streams that flow;
    Moved stones, together hind and tiger drawn,
    And made trees dance upon the forest lawn.

  [Passes from sight on his way to Hades.

  MNESILLUS.