Thus the fam’d hero, perfected in wiles,
With fair similitude of truth beguiles
The queen’s attentive ear:  dissolved in woe,
From her bright eyes the tears unbounded flow,
As snows collected on the mountain freeze;
When milder regions breathe a vernal breeze,
The fleecy pile obeys the whispering gales,
Ends in a stream, and murmurs through the vales: 
So, melting with the pleasing tale he told,
Down her fair cheek the copious torrent roll’d: 
She to her present lord laments him lost,
And views that object which she wants the most,
Withering at heart to see the weeping fair,
His eyes look stern, and cast a gloomy stare;
Of horn the stiff relentless balls appear,
Or globes of iron fix’d in either sphere;
Firm wisdom interdicts the softening tear. 
A speechless interval of grief ensues,
Till thus the queen the tender theme renews.

“Stranger! that e’er thy hospitable roof
Ulysses graced, confirm by faithful proof;
Delineate to my view my warlike lord,
His form, his habit, and his train record.”

“’Tis hard (he cries,) to bring to sudden sight
Ideas that have wing’d their distant flight;
Rare on the mind those images are traced,
Whose footsteps twenty winters have defaced: 
But what I can, receive.—­In ample mode,
A robe of military purple flow’d
O’er all his frame:  illustrious on his breast,
The double-clasping gold the king confess’d. 
In the rich woof a hound, mosaic drawn,
Bore on full stretch, and seized a dappled fawn;
Deep in the neck his fangs indent their hold;
They pant and struggle in the moving gold. 
Fine as a filmy web beneath it shone
A vest, that dazzled like a cloudless sun: 
The female train who round him throng’d to gaze,
In silent wonder sigh’d unwilling praise. 
A sabre, when the warrior press’d to part,
I gave, enamell’d with Vulcanian art: 
A mantle purple-tinged, and radiant vest,
Dimension’d equal to his size, express’d
Affection grateful to my honour’d guest. 
A favourite herald in his train I knew,
His visage solemn, sad of sable hue: 
Short woolly curls o’erfleeced his bending head,
O’er which a promontory shoulder spread;
Eurybates; in whose large soul alone
Ulysses view’d an image of his own.”

His speech the tempest of her grief restored;
In all he told she recognized her lord: 
But when the storm was spent in plenteous showers,
A pause inspiriting her languish’d powers,
“O thou, (she cried,) whom first inclement Fate
Made welcome to my hospitable gate;
With all thy wants the name of poor shall end: 
Henceforth live honour’d, my domestic friend! 
The vest much envied on your native coast,
And regal robe with figured gold emboss’d,
In happier hours my artful hand employ’d,
When my loved lord this blissful bower enjoy’d: 
The fall of Troy erroneous and forlorn
Doom’d to survive, and never to return!”