Who gazes on him, and with wond'ring eyes
Beholds the new majestic figure rise,
His glowing features, and celestial light,
And all the god discover'd to her sight.
WHEN now Agenor had his daughter lost,
He sent his son to search on every coast;
And sternly bid him to his arms restore
The darling maid, or see his face no more,
But live an exile in a foreign clime :
Thus was the father pious to a crime.
The restless youth search'd all the world around;
But how can Jove in his amours be found?
When tir'd at length with unsuccessful toil,
To shun his angry sire and native soil,
He goes a suppliant to the Delphic dome;
There asks the god what new appointed home
Should end his wand'rings, and his toils relieve.
The Delphic oracles this answer give :
"Behold among the fields a lonely cow, Unworn with yokes, unbroken to the plough; Mark well the place where first she lays her down, There measure out thy walls, and build thy town, And from thy guide Boeotia call the land,
In which the destin'd walls and town shall stand.”
No sooner had he left the dark abode,
Big with the promise of the Delphic god,
When in the fields the fatal cow he view'd,
Nor gall'd with yokes, nor worn with servitude:
Her gently at a distance he pursu'd;
And, as he walk'd aloof, in silence pray'd
To the great pow'r whose counsels he obey'd.
Her way through flow'ry Panope she took,
And now, Cephisus, cross'd thy silver brook;
When to the heav'ns her spacious front she rais'd,
And bellow'd thrice, then backward turning gaz'd
On those behind, till on the destin❜d place
She stoop'd, and couch'd amid the rising grass.
Cadmus salutes the soil, and gladly hails
The new-found mountains, and the nameless vales,
And thanks the gods, and turns about his eye
To see his new dominions round him lie;
Then sends his servants to a neighb'ring grove
For living streams, a sacrifice to Jove.
O'er the wide plain there rose a shady wood
Of aged trees; in its dark bosom stood
A bushy thicket, pathless and unworn,
O'errun with brambles, and perplex'd with thorn :
Amidst the brake a hollow den was found,
With rocks and shelving arches vaulted round.
Deep in the dreary den, conceal'd from day,
Sacred to Mars, a mighty dragon lay,
Bloated with poison to a monstrous size;
Fire broke in flashes when he glanc'd his eyes:
His tow'ring crest was glorious to behold,
His shoulders and his sides were scal'd with gold;
Three tongues he brandish'd when he charg'd his foes;
His teeth stood jaggy in three dreadful rows.
The Tyrians in the den for water sought,
And with their urns explor'd the hollow vault :
From side to side their empty urns rebound,
And rouse the sleepy serpent with the sound.
Straight he bestirs him, and is seen to rise '
And now with dreadful hissings fills the skies,
And darts his forky tongues, and rolls his glaring eyes.
The Tyrians drop their vessels in the fright,
All pale and trembling at the hideous sight.
Spire above spire uprear'd in air he stood,
And gazing round him, overlook'd the wood:
Then floating on the ground, in circles roll'd;
Then leap'd upon them in a mighty fold.
Of such a bulk and such a monstrous size,
The serpent in the polar circle lies,
That stretches over half the northern skies.
In vain the Tyrians on their arms rely,
In vain attempt to fight, in vain to fly :
All their endeavours and their hopes are vain;
Some die entangled in the winding train;
Some are devour'd; or feel a loathsome death,
Swoln up with blasts of pestilential breath.
And now the scorching sun was mounted high, In all its lustre, to the noon-day sky;
When, anxious for his friends, and fill'd with cares,
To search the woods th' impatient chief prepares.
A lion's hide around his loins he wore,
The well pois'd jav'lin to the field he bore,
Inur'd to blood, the far destroying dart,
And, the best weapon, an undaunted heart.
Soon as the youth approach'd the fatal place,
He saw his servants breathless on the grass;
The scaly foe amid their corps he view'd,
Basking at ease, and feasting in their blood.
"Such friends," he cries, "deserv'd a longer date;
But Cadmus will revenge, or share their fate."
Then heav'd a stone, and rising to the throw,
He sent it in a whirlwind at the foe :
A tower, assaulted by so rude a stroke,
With all its lofty battlements had shook;
But nothing here th' unwieldy rock avails,
Rebounding harmless from the plaited scales,
That, firmly join'd, preserv'd him from a wound,
With native armour crusted all around.
With more success the dart unerring flew,
Which at his back the raging warrior threw;
Amid the plaited scales it took its course,
And in the spinal marrow spent its force.
The monster hiss'd aloud, and rag'd in vain,
And writh'd his body to and fro with pain;
And bit the spear, and wrench'd the wood away;
The point still buried in the marrow lay.
And now his rage, increasing with his pain,
Reddens his eyes, and beats in every vein;
Churn'd in his teeth the foamy venom rose,
Whilst from his mouth a blast of vapours flows,
Such as th' infernal Stygian waters cast;
The plants around him wither in the blast.
Now in a maze of rings he lies enroll'd,
Now all unravell'd, and without a fold;
Now, like a torrent, with a mighty force
Bears down the forest in his boist'rous course.
Cadmus gave back, and on the lion's spoil
Sustain'd the shock, then forc'd him to recoil;
The pointed jav'lin warded off his rage:
Mad with his pains, and furious to engage,
The serpent champs the steel, and bites the spear,
Till blood and venom all the point besmear.
But still the hurt he yet receiv'd was slight;
For, whilst the champion with redoubled might
Strikes home the jav'lin, his retiring foe
Shrinks from the wound, and disappoints the blow.
The dauntless hero still pursues his stroke,
And presses forward, till a knotty oak
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