CYCLOPS: 
What do you say?  You proffer a new name. 700

ULYSSES: 
My father named me so; and I have taken
A full revenge for your unnatural feast;
I should have done ill to have burned down Troy
And not revenged the murder of my comrades.

CYCLOPS: 
Ai! ai! the ancient oracle is accomplished; 705
It said that I should have my eyesight blinded
By your coming from Troy, yet it foretold
That you should pay the penalty for this
By wandering long over the homeless sea.

ULYSSES: 
I bid thee weep—­consider what I say; 710
I go towards the shore to drive my ship
To mine own land, o’er the Sicilian wave.

CYCLOPS: 
Not so, if, whelming you with this huge stone,
I can crush you and all your men together;
I will descend upon the shore, though blind, 715
Groping my way adown the steep ravine.

CHORUS: 
And we, the shipmates of Ulysses now,
Will serve our Bacchus all our happy lives.

***

EPIGRAMS.

[These four Epigrams were published—­numbers 2 and 4 without title—­by Mrs. Shelley, “Poetical Works”, 1839, 1st edition.]

1.—­TO STELLA.

FROM THE GREEK OF PLATO.

Thou wert the morning star among the living,
Ere thy fair light had fled;—­
Now, having died, thou art as Hesperus, giving
New splendour to the dead.

2.—­KISSING HELENA.

FROM THE GREEK OF PLATO.

Kissing Helena, together
With my kiss, my soul beside it
Came to my lips, and there I kept it,—­
For the poor thing had wandered thither,
To follow where the kiss should guide it, 5
Oh, cruel I, to intercept it!

3.—­SPIRIT OF PLATO.

FROM THE GREEK.

Eagle! why soarest thou above that tomb? 
To what sublime and star-ypaven home
Floatest thou?—­
I am the image of swift Plato’s spirit,
Ascending heaven; Athens doth inherit 5
His corpse below.

NOTE: 
5 doth Boscombe manuscript; does edition 1839.

4.—­CIRCUMSTANCE.

FROM THE GREEK.

A man who was about to hang himself,
Finding a purse, then threw away his rope;
The owner, coming to reclaim his pelf,
The halter found; and used it.  So is Hope
Changed for Despair—­one laid upon the shelf, 5
We take the other.  Under Heaven’s high cope
Fortune is God—­all you endure and do
Depends on circumstance as much as you.

***

FRAGMENT OF THE ELEGY ON THE DEATH OF ADONIS.

PROM THE GREEK OF BION.

[Published by Forman, “Poetical Works of P. B. S.”, 1876.]