He fees, and weeps at his approaching fate,
And begs for mercy, and repents too late.

"Help, help my aunt Autonöe, he cry'd;
!
"Remember how your own Acteon dy'd."
Deaf to his cries, the frantic matron crops
One stretch'd-out arm, the other Ino lops.
In vain does Pentheus to his mother fue,
And the raw bleeding stumps presents to view:
His mother howl'd; and, heedlefs of his prayer,
Her trembling hand she twisted in his hair,
"And this, she cry'd, shall be Agave's share.”
When from the neck his struggling head she tore,
And in her hands the ghaftly visage bore,
With pleasure all the hideous trunk survey;
Then pull'd and tore the mangled limbs away,
As starting in the pangs of death it lay.
Soon as the wood its leafy honours casts,
Blown off and scatter'd by autumnal blasts,
With fuch a fudden death lay Pentheus flain,
And in a thousand pieces ftrow'd the plain.
By fo diftinguishing a judgment aw'd,
The Thebans tremble, and confess the god.

}

THE

THE STORY OF SALMACIS AND HERMAPHRODITUS.

FROM THE FOURTH BOOK OF OVID'S

METAMORPHOSES.

HOW Salmacis, with weak enfeebling streams,

Softens the body, and unnerves the limbs,

And what the fecret caufe, fhall here be fhown;
The caufe is fecret, but th' effect is known.
The Naïads nurst an infant heretofore,
That Cytherea once to Hermes bore :

From both th' illuftrious authors of his race
The child was nam'd; nor was it hard to trace
Both the bright parents through the infant's face.
When fifteen years, in Ida's cool retreat,
The boy had told, he left his native feat,
And fought fresh fountains in a foreign foil :
The pleasure leffen'd the attending toil.
With eager steps the Lycian fields he croft,
And fields that border on the Lycian coast;
A river here he view'd fo lovely bright,
It fhew'd the bottom in a fairer light,
Nor kept a fand conceal'd from human fight
The stream produc'd nor flimy ooze, nor weeds,
Nor miry rushes, nor the fpiky reeds;

But dealt enriching moisture all around,

:

The fruitful banks with chearful verdure crown'd,
And kept the spring eternal on the ground.

}

}

A nymph prefides, nor practis'd in the chace,
Nor skilful at the bow, nor at the race;
Of all the blue-ey'd daughters of the main,
The only stranger to Diana's train :
Her fifters often, as 'tis faid, wou'd cry,
"Fy, Salmacis, what always idle! fy,

Or take thy quiver, or thy arrows feize,
"And mix the toils of hunting with thy ease."
Nor quiver she nor arrows e'er would seize,
Nor mix the toils of hunting with her eafe.'
But oft would bathe her in the cryftal tide,
Oft with a comb her dewy locks divide;
Now in the limpid streams fhe view'd her face,
And drest her image in the floating glafs :
On beds of leaves fhe now repos'd her limbs,
Now gather'd flowers that grew about her ftreams;
And then by chance was gathering, as fhe food
To view the boy, and long for what the view'd.
Fain would the meet the youth with hafty feet,
She fain would meet him, but refus'd to meet
Before her looks were fet with niceft care,

And well deferv'd to be reputed fair.

Bright youth, the cries, whom all thy features prove "A god, and, if a god, the god of love;

But if a mortal, bleft thy nurse's breaft: "Bleft are thy parents, and thy fifters blest; "But oh how bleft! how more than bleft thy bride, "Ally'd in ́blifs, if any yet ally'd.

If fo, let mine the ftol'n enjoyments be; "If not, behold a willing bride in me."

The

The boy knew nought of love, and toucht with fhame,
He ftrove, and blusht, but still the blush became ;
In rifing blushes ftill fresh beauties rose;

The funny fide of fruit fuch blushes shows,
And fuch the moon, when all her filver white
Turns in eclipfes to a ruddy light.

The nymph ftill begs, if not a nobler blifs,
A cold falute at least, a fifter's kifs:
And now prepares to take the lovely boy
Between her arms. He, innocently coy,
Replies, "Or leave me to myself alone,
"You rude uncivil nymph, or I'll be gone."
"Fair stranger then," fays fhe," it fhall be fo;"
And, for the fear'd his threat, fhe feign'd to go;
But, hid within a covert's neighbouring green,
She kept him still in fight, herself unseen.
The boy now fancies all the danger o'er,
And innocently sports about the shore;
Playful and wanton to the stream he trips,
And dips his foot, and fhivers as he dips.
The coolness pleas'd him, and with eager hafte
His airy garments on the banks he cast ;
His godlike features, and his heavenly hue,
And all his beauties, were expos'd to view.
His naked limbs the nymph with rapture spies,
While hotter paffions in her bosom rise,
Flush in her cheeks, and sparkle in her eyes.
She longs, the burns to clasp him in her arms,

And looks and fighs, and kindles at his charms.
Now all undrest upon the banks he stood,
And clapt his fides, and leapt into the flood:

His lovely limbs the silver waves divide,

His limbs appear more lovely through the tide ;
As lilies fhut within a crystal case,

Receive a gloffy luftre from the glass,

“He's mine, he's all my own," the Naïad cries;
And flings off all, and after him she flies.
And now the fastens on him as he fwims,
And holds him clofe, and wraps about his limbs.
The more the boy refifted, and was coy,
The more the clapt, and kist the struggling boy.
So when the wriggling fnake is snatch'd on high
In eagle's claws, and hiffes in the fky,

Around the foe his twirling tail he flings,

And twifts her legs, and writhes about her wings.
The restless boy still obftinately strove

To free himself, and ftill refus'd her love.
Amidft his limbs fhe kept her limbs intwin'd,
"And why, coy youth, fhe cries, why thus unkind?
"Oh may the gods thus keep us ever join'd!
"Oh may we never, never part again!"

So pray'd the nymph, nor did fhe pray in vain :
For now fhe finds him, as his limbs she preft,
Grow nearer fill, and nearer to her breast;
Till, piercing each the other's flesh, they run
Together, and incorporate in one :

Laft in one face are both their faces join'd,
As when the stock and grafted twig combin'd
Shoot up the fame, and wear a common rind:
Both bodies in a fingle body mix,

A fingle body with a double fex.
N

The