Yet Aphrodite cast a cloud so deep
About their chariot none might see them there.
And strangely did they hear the trumpets blare,
And noise of racing wheels; yet saw they nought:
Then died the sounds upon the distant air,
And safe they won the haven that they sought.
XVII.
Beneath a grassy cliff, beneath the down,
Where swift Eurotas mingles with the sea,
There climb’d the grey walls of a little town,
The sleepy waters wash’d it languidly,
For tempests in that haven might not be.
The isle across the inlet guarded all,
And the shrill winds that roam the ocean free
Broke and were broken on the rocky wall.
XVIII.
Then Paris did a point of hunting blow,
Nor yet the sound had died upon the hill
When round the isle they spied a scarlet prow,
And oars that flash’d into that haven still,
The oarsmen bending forward with a will,
And swift their black ship to the haven-side
They brought, and steer’d her in with goodly skill,
And bare on board the strange Achaean bride.
XIX.
Now while the swift ship through the waters clave,
All happy things that in the waters dwell,
Arose and gamboll’d on the glassy wave,
And Nereus led them with his sounding shell:
Yea, the sea-nymphs, their dances weaving well,
In the green water gave them greeting free.
Ah, long light linger’d, late the darkness fell,
That night, upon the isle of Cranae!
XX.
And Hymen shook his fragrant torch on high,
Till all its waves of smoke and tongues of flame,
Like clouds of rosy gold fulfill’d the sky;
And all the Nereids from the waters came,
Each maiden with a musical sweet name;
Doris, and Doto, and Amphithoe;
And their shrill bridal song of love and shame
Made music in the silence of the sea.
XXI.
For this was like that night of summer weather,
When mortal men and maidens without fear,
And forest-nymphs, and forest-gods together,
Do worship Pan in the long twilight clear.
And Artemis this one night spares the deer,
And every cave and dell, and every grove
Is glad with singing soft and happy cheer,
With laughter, and with dalliance, and with love.
* * *
*
XXII.
Now when the golden-throned Dawn arose
To waken gods and mortals out of sleep,
Queen Aphrodite sent the wind that blows
From fairy gardens of the Western deep.
The sails are spread, the oars of Paris leap
Past many a headland, many a haunted fane:
And, merrily all from isle to isle they sweep
O’er the wet ways across the barren plain.
XXIII.
By many an island fort, and many a haven
They sped, and many a crowded arsenal:
They saw the loves of Gods and men engraven
On friezes of Astarte’s temple wall.
They heard that ancient shepherd Proteus call
His flock from forth the green and tumbling lea,
And saw white Thetis with her maidens all
Sweep up to high Olympus from the sea.
XXIV.
They saw the vain and weary toil of men,
The ships that win the rich man all he craves;
They pass’d the red-prow’d barks Egyptian,
And heard afar the moaning of the slaves
Pent in the dark hot hold beneath the waves;
And scatheless the Sardanian fleets among
They sail’d; by men that sow the sea with graves,
Bearing black fate to folk of alien tongue.
XXV.
Then all day long a rolling cloud of smoke
Would hang on the sea-limits, faint and far,
But through the night the beacon-flame upbroke
From some rich island-town begirt with war;
And all these things could neither make nor mar
The joy of lovers wandering, but they
Sped happily, and heedless of the star
That hung o’er their glad haven, far away.
XXVI.
The fisher-sentinel upon the height
Watch’d them with vacant eyes, and little knew
They bore the fate of Troy; to him the bright
Plashed waters, with the silver shining through
When tunny shoals came cruising in the blue,
Was more than Love that doth the world unmake;
And listless gazed he as the gulls that flew
And shriek’d and chatter’d in the vessel’s wake.
XXVII.
So the wind drave them, and the waters bare
Across the great green plain unharvested,
Till through an after-glow they knew the fair
Faint rose of snow on distant Ida’s head.
And swifter then the joyous oarsmen sped;
But night was ended, and the waves were fire
Beneath the fleet feet of a dawning red
Or ere they won the land of their desire.
XXVIII.
Now when the folk about the haven knew
The scarlet prow of Paris, swift they ran
And the good ship within the haven drew,
And merrily their welcoming began.
But none the face of Helen dared to scan;
Their bold eyes fell before they had their fill,
For all men deem’d her that Idalian
Who loved Anchises on the lonely hill.
XXIX.
But when her sweet smile and her gentleness
And her kind speech had won them from dismay,
They changed their minds, and ‘gan the Gods to bless
Who brought to Ilios that happy day.
And all the folk fair Helen must convey,
Crown’d like a bride, and clad with flame-hued pall,
Through the rich plain, along the water-way
Right to the great gates of the Ilian wall.
XXX.
And through the vines they pass’d, where old and young
Had no more heed of the glad vintaging,
But all unpluck’d the purple clusters hung,
Nor more of Linus did the minstrel sing,
For he and all the folk were following,
Wine-stain’d and garlanded, in merry bands,
Like men when Dionysus came as king,
And led his revel from the sun-burnt lands,
XXXI.
So from afar the music and the shout
Roll’d up to Ilios and the Scaean gate,
And at the sound the city folk came out
And bore sweet Helen–such a fairy weight
As none might deem the burden of Troy’s fate –
Across the threshold of the town, and all
Flock’d with her, where King Priam sat in state,
Girt by his elders, on the Ilian wall.
XXXII.
No man but knew him by his crown of gold,
And golden-studded sceptre, and his throne;
Ay, strong he seem’d as those great kings of old,
Whose image is eternal on the stone
Won from the dust that once was Babylon;
But kind of mood was he withal, and mild,
And when his eyes on Argive Helen shone,
He loved her as a father doth a child.
XXXIII.
Round him were set his peers, as Panthous,
Antenor, and Agenor, hardly grey,
Scarce touch’d as yet with age, nor garrulous
As are cicalas on a sunny day:
Such might they be when years had slipp’d away,
And made them over-weak for war or joy,
Content to watch the Leaguer as it lay
Beside the ships, beneath the walls of Troy.
XXXIV.
Then Paris had an easy tale to tell,
Which then might win upon men’s wond’ring ears,
Who deem’d that Gods with mortals deign to dwell,
And that the water of the West enspheres
The happy Isles that know not Death nor tears;
Yea, and though monsters do these islands guard,
Yet men within their coasts had dwelt for years
Uncounted, with a strange love for reward.
XXXV.
And there had Paris ventured: so said he, –
Had known the Sirens’ song, and Circe’s wile;
And in a cove of that Hesperian sea
Had found a maiden on a lonely isle;
A sacrifice, if so men might beguile
The wrath of some beast-god they worshipp’d there,
But Paris, ‘twixt the sea and strait defile,
Had slain the beast, and won the woman fair.
XXXVI.
Then while the happy people cried “Well done,”
And Priam’s heart was melted by the tale –
For Paris was his best-beloved son –
Came a wild woman, with wet eyes, and pale
Sad face, men look’d on when she cast her veil,
Not gladly; and none mark’d the thing she said,
Yet must they hear her long and boding wail
That follow’d still, however fleet they fled.
XXXVII.
She was the priestess of Apollo’s fane,
Cassandra, and the God of prophecy
Spurr’d her to speak and rent her! but in vain
She toss’d her wasted arms against the sky,
And brake her golden circlet angrily,
And shriek’d that they had brought within the gate
Helen, a serpent at their hearts to lie!
Helen, a hell of people, king, and state!
XXXVIII.
But ere the God had left her; ere she fell
And foam’d among her maidens on the ground,
The air was ringing with a merry swell
Of flute, and pipe, and every sweetest sound,
In Aphrodite’s fane, and all around
Were roses toss’d beneath the glimmering green
Of that high roof, and Helen there was crown’d
The Goddess of the Trojans, and their Queen.
Book IV.
The Death Of Corythus
How Helen was made an outcast by the Trojan women, and how none, the old love of Paris, sent her son Corythus to him as her messenger, and how Paris slew him unwittingly; and of the curses of none, and the coming of the Argive host against Troy.