The horses' names he knew not in the fright,
Nor would he loose the reins, nor could he hold

'em right.

Now all the horrors of the heavens he spies, And monstrous shadows of prodigious size, That, deck'd with stars,lie scatter'd o'er the skies. There is a place above, where Scorpio bent In tail and arms surrounds a vast extent; In a wide circuit of the heavens he shines, And fills the space of two celestial signs. Soon as the youth beheld him, vex`d with heat, Brandish his sting, and in his poison sweat, Half-dead with sudden fear he drop'd the reins; The horses felt 'em loose upon their manes, And, flying out through all the plains above, Ran uncontroll'd where'er their fury drove; Rush'd on the stars, and through a pathless way Of unknown regions hurried on the day: And now above, and now below they flew, And near the earth the burning chariot drew.

The clouds disperse in fumes; the wandering moon
Beholds her brother's steeds beneath her own;
The highlands smoke, cleft by the piercing rays,
Or clad with woods, in their own fuel blaze.
Next o'er the plains, where ripen'd harvests grow,
The running conflagration spreads below.
But these are trivial ills: whole cities burn,
And peopled kingdoms into ashes turn.

The mountains kindle as the car draws near,
Athos and Tmolus red with fires appear;
Eagrian Hamus, (then a single name)
And virgin Helicon increase the flame;
Taurus and Etè glare amid the sky,
And Ida, spite of all her fountains, dry:

Eryx, and Othrys, and Cithæron, glow,
And Rhodope, no longer cloth'd in snow ;
High Pindus, Mimas, and Parnassus sweat,
And Ætna rages with redoubled heat.
Ev'n Scythia, through her hoary regions warm'd,
In vain with all her native frost was arm'd.
Cover'd with flames the towering Apennine,
And Caucasus, and proud Olympus, shine;
And, where the long-extended Alps aspire,
Now stands a huge continued range of fire.
The' astonish'd youth, where'er his eyes could
turn,

Beheld the universe around him burn:

The world was in a blaze; nor could he bear
The sultry vapours and the scorching air,
Which from below, as from a furnace, flow'd;
And now the axle-tree beneath him glow'd:
Lost in the whirling clouds that round him broke,
And white with ashes, hovering in the smoke,
He flew where'er the horses drove; nor knew
Whither the horses drove, or where he flew.
'Twas then, they say, the swarthy Moor begun
To change his hue, and blacken in the sun.
Then Libya first, of all her moisture drain'd,
Became a barren waste, a wild of sand.
The water-nymphs lament their empty urns,
Boeotia, robb'd of silver Dirce, mourns,
Corinth Pyrene's wasted spring bewails,
And Argos grieves whilst Amymonè fails.
The floods are drain'd from every distant coa
Ev'n Tanais, though fix'd in ice, was lost.
Enrag'd Caïcus and Lycormas roar,

And Xanthus, fated to be burn'd once more.

The fam'd Meander, that unwearied strays
Through mazy windings, smokes in every maze.
From his lov'd Babylon Euphrates flies;
The big-swoln Ganges and the Danube rise
In thickening fumes, and larken half the skies.
In flames Ismenos and the Phasis roll'd,
And Tagus, floating in his melted gold.
The swans, that on Cäyster often tried

Their tuneful songs, now sung their last and died.
The frighted Nile ran off, and under ground
Conceal'd his head, nor can it yet be found:
His seven divided currents all are dry,

And where they row'd, seven gaping trenches lie:
No more the Rhine or Rhone their course maintain,
Nor Tiber, of his promis'd empire vain.

The ground, deep-cleft, admits the dazzling ray, And startles Pluto with the flash of day. The seas shrink in, and to the sight disclose Wide naked plains, where once their billows rose; Their rocks are all discover'd, and increase The number of the scatter'd Cyclades. The fish in shoals about the bottom creep, Nor longer dares the crooked dolphin leap : Gasping for breath, the' unshapen Phocæ die, And on the boiling wave extended lie. Nereus and Doris, with her .irgin train, Seek out the last recesses of the main; Beneath unfathomable depths they faint, And secret in their gloomy caverns pant. Stern Neptune thrice above the waves upheld His face, and thrice was by the flames repell'd. The Earth at length, on every side embrac'd With scalding seas that floated round her waist,

When now she felt the springs and rivers come, And crowd within the hollow of her womb, Up-lifted to the heavens her blasted head, And clap'd her hand upon her brows, and said; (But first, impatient of the sultry heat, Sunk deeper down, and sought a cooler seat :) 'If you, great king of gods, my death approve, And I deserve it, let me die by Jove;

If I must perish by the force of fire,

Let me transfix'd with thunderbolts expire.

See, whilst I speak, my breath the vapours choke;'
(For now her face lay wrapt in clouds of smoke.)
'See my sing'd hair, behold my faded eye,
And wither'd face, where heaps of cinders lie!
And does the plough for this my body tear?
This the reward for all the fruits I bear,
Tortur'd with rakes, and harass'd all the year?
That herbs for cattle daily I renew,

And food for man, and frankincense for you?
But grant me guilty; what has Neptune done?
Why are his waters boiling in the sun?
The wavy empire, which by lot was giv'n,
Why does it waste, and further shrink from heav'n?
If I, nor he, your pity can provoke,

See your own heavens; the heavens begin to smoke!
Should once the sparkles catch those bright abodes,
Destruction seizes on the heavens and gods;
Atlas becomes unequal to his freight,

And almost faints beneath the glowing weight.
If heaven, and earth, and sea, together burn,
All must again into their chaos turn.
Apply some speedy cure, prevent our fate,
And succour nature, ere it be too late.'

She ceas'd; for, chok'd with vapours round her

spread,

Down to the deepest shades she sunk her head.
Jove call'd to witness every power above,
And ev❜n the god whose son the chariot drove,
That what he acts he is compell'd to do,
Or universal ruin must ensue.

Straight he ascends the high ethereal throne,
From whence he us'd to dart his thunder down,
From whence his showers and storms he us'd to pour,
But now could meet with neither storm nor show'r;
Then, aiming at the youth, with lifted hand,
Full at his head he hurl'd the forky brand,
In dreadful thunderings. Thus, the' almighty sire
Suppress'd the raging of the fires with fire.

At once from life and from the chariot driv'n,
The' ambitious boy fell thunderstruck from heav'n.
The horses started with a sudden bound,
And flung the reins and chariot to the ground:
The studded harness from their necks they broke,
Here fell a wheel, and here a silver spoke;
Here were the beam and axle torn away;

[lay.

And scatter'd o'er the earth the shining fragments
The breathless Phaëton, with flaming hair,
Shot from the chariot like a falling star,
That in a summer's evening from the top
Of heaven drops down, or seems at least to drop;
Till on the Po his blasted corpse was hurl'd,
Far from his country, in the western world.

PHAETON'S SISTERS TRANSFORMED INTO TREES.
The Latian nymphs came round him, and, amaz'd,
On the dead youth transfix'd with thunder gaz'd,