Beginning from the rural Gods, his hand
Was liberal to the powers of high command:
Each Deity in every kind was blefs'd,
Till at Diana's fane th' invidious honour ceas'd.
Wrath touches ev'n the Gods; the queen of night,
Fir'd with difdain, and jealous of her right,
Unhonour'd though I am, at least, said she,
Not unreveng'd that impious act shall be.
Swift as the word, the fped the boar away,
With charge on those devoted fields to prey.
No larger bulls th' Ægyptian paftures feed,
And none fo large Sicilian meadows breed:
His eye-balls glare with fire, faffus'd with blood;
His neck fhoots up a thickset thorny wood;
His bristled back a trench impal'd appears,
And ftands erected, like a field of spears.
Froth fills his chaps, he fends a grunting found,
And part he churns, and part befoams the ground.
For tusks with Indian elephants he strove,
And Jove's own thunder from his mouth he drove.
He burns the leaves; the fcorching blast invades
The tender corn, and fhrivels-up the blades:
Or, fuffering not their yellow beards to rear,
He tramples down the spikes, and intercepts the year.
In vain the barns expect their promis'd load,
Nor barns at home, nor reeks are heap'd abroad :
In vain the hinds the threshing-floor prepare,
And exercife their flails in empty air.
With olives ever green the ground is strow'd,
And grapes ungather'd fhed their generous blood.
Amid the fold he rages, nor the sheep
Their fhepherds, nor the grooms their bulls can keep.
From fields to walls the frighted rabble run,
Nor think themselves fecure within the town:
Till Meleagrus, and his chofen crew,
Contemn the danger, and the praise pursue.
Fair Leda's twins, (in time to ftars decreed)
One fought on foot, one curb'd the fiery steed;
Then iffued forth fam'd Jafon after thefe,
Who mann'd the foremost ship that fail'd the feas;
Then Thefeus join'd with bold Pirithous came :
A fingle concord in a double name:
The Theftian fons, Idas who swiftly ran,
And Ceneus, once a woman, now a man.
Lynceus, with eagle's eyes and lion's heart;
Leucippus, with his never-erring dart;
Acaftus, Phileus, Phænix, Telamon,
Echion, Lelex, and Eurytion,
Achilles' father, and great Phocus' fon;
Dryas the fierce, and Hippafus the strong;
With twice old Iolas, and Neftor then but young.
Laertes active, and Ancæus bold;
Mopfus the fage, who future things foretold;
And t'other feer yet by his wife unfold.
A thousand others of immortal fame ;
Among the reft fair Atalanta came,
Grace of the woods; a diamond buckle bound
Her veft behind, that elfe had flow'd upon the ground, And shew'd her bufkin'd legs; her head was bare,
But for her native ornament of hair;
Which in a fimple knot was ty'd above,
Sweet negligence, unheeded bait of love!
Her founding quiver on her fhoulder ty'd,
One hand a dart, and one a bow supply'd.
Such was her face, as in a nymph display'd
A fair fierce boy, or in a boy betray'd
The blushing beauties of a modest maid.
The Caledonian chief at once the dame
Beheld, at once his heart receiv'd the flame,
With heavens averfe. O happy youth, he cry'd;
For whom thy fates referve fo fair a bride!
He figh'd, and had no leisure more to say :
His honour call'd his eyes another way,
And forc'd him to pursue the now neglected prey.
There food a forest on the mountain's brow,
Which over-look'd the shaded plains below,
No founding ax prefum'd those trees to bite ;
Coeval with the world, a venerable fight.
The heroes there arriv'd, some spread around
The toils, fome fearch the footsteps on the ground,
Some from the chains the faithful dogs unbound.
Of action eager, and intent on thought,
The chiefs their honourable danger fought:
A valley food below; the common drain
Of waters from above, and falling rain :
The bottom was a moift and marshy ground,
Whofe edges were with bending ofiers crown'd;
The knotty bulrush next in order stood,
And all within of reeds a trembling wood.
From hence the boar was rous'd, and sprung amain,
ike lightning sudden on the warrior-train ;
Beats down the trees before him, shakes the ground,
The foreft echoes to the crackling found:
hout the fierce youth, and clamours ring around.
All stood with their protended spears prepar'd,
With broad steel heads the brandifh'd weapons glar'd.
The beaft impetuous with his tuiks afide
Deals glancing wounds; the fearful dogs divide :
All spend their mouth aloft, but none abide.
Echion threw the first, but mifs'd his mark,
And ftuck his boar-fpear on a maple's bark,
Then Jafon; and his javelin feem'd to take,
3ut fail'd with over-force, and whizz'd above his back.
Mopfus was next; but ere he threw, address'd
To Phoebus thus: O patron, help thy priest.
If I adore, and ever have ador'd
Thy power divine, thy prefent aid afford;
That I may reach the beast. The God allow'd
His prayer, and, fmiling, gave him what he could:
He reach'd the savage, but no blood he drew,
Dian unarm'd the javelin as it flew.
This chaf'd the boar, his noftrils flames expire,
And his red eye-balls roll with living fire.
Whirl'd from a fling, or from an engine thrown,
Amidst the foes, fo flies a mighty stone,
As flew the beaft; the left wing put to flight,
The chiefs o'erborn, he rushes on the right.
Empalamos and Pelagon he laid
In duft, and next to death, but for their fellows aid.
Onefimus far'd worfe, prepar'd to fly ;
The fatal fang drove deep within his thigh,
And cut the nerves; the nerves no more fuftain
The bulk; the bulk unprop'd falls headlong on the plain.
Neftor had fail'd the fall of Troy to fee,
But, leaning on his lance, he vaulted on a tree;
Then, gathering up his feet, look'd down with fear,
And thought his monstrous foe was still too near.
Against a ftump his tufk the monster grinds,
And in the fharpen'd edge new vigour finds ;
Then, trufting to his arms, young Othrys found,
And ranch'd his hips with one continued wound.
New Leda's twins, the future ftars, appear:
White were their habits, white their horfes were;
Confpicuous both, and both in act to throw,
Their trembling lances brandifh'd at the foe:
Nor had they miss'd; but he to thickets fled,
Conceal'd from aiming fpears, not pervious to the steed.
But Telamon rufh'd in, and happ'd to meet
A rifing root, that held his faften'd feet;
So down he fell, whom, fprawling on the ground,
His brother from the wooden gyves unbound.
Mean time the virgin-huntress was not flow
T' expel the fhaft from her contracted bow :
Beneath his ear the faften'd arrow ftood,
And from the wound appear'd the trickling blood.
She blush'd for joy: But Meleagrus rais'd
His voice with loud applause, and the fair archer prais'd.
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