With countless eyes set staring at my steps: And though an unexpected sudden doom Drew him from life, I, curse-tormented still, Am driven from land to land before the scourge The gods hold o'er me. So thou hast heard the past, And if a bitter future thou canst tell, Speak on. I charge thee, do not flatter me Through pity, with false words; for, in my mind, Deceiving works more shame than torturing doth. _Chorus._ Ah! silence here! Nevermore, nevermore Would I languish for The stranger's word To thrill in mine ear-- Nevermore for the wrong and the woe and the fear So hard to behold, So cruel to bear, Piercing my soul with a double-edged sword Of a sliding cold. Ah Fate! ah me! I shudder to see This wandering maid in her agony. _Prometheus._ Grief is too quick in thee and fear too full: Be patient till thou hast learnt the rest. _Chorus._ Speak: teach To those who are sad already, it seems sweet, By clear foreknowledge to make perfect, pain. _Prometheus._ The boon ye asked me first was lightly won,-- For first ye asked the story of this maid's grief As her own lips might tell it. Now remains To list what other sorrows she so young Must bear from Herè. Inachus's child, O thou! drop down thy soul my weighty words, And measure out the landmarks which are set To end thy wandering. Toward the orient sun First turn thy face from mine and journey on Along the desert flats till thou shalt come Where Scythia's shepherd peoples dwell aloft, Perched in wheeled waggons under woven roofs, And twang the rapid arrow past the bow-- Approach them not; but siding in thy course The rugged shore-rocks resonant to the sea, Depart that country. On the left hand dwell The iron-workers, called the Chalybes, Of whom beware, for certes they are uncouth And nowise bland to strangers. Reaching so The stream Hybristes (well the _scorner_ called), Attempt no passage,--it is hard to pass,-- Or ere thou come to Caucasus itself, That highest of mountains, where the river leaps The precipice in his strength. Thou must toil up Those mountain-tops that neighbour with the stars, And tread the south way, and draw near, at last, The Amazonian host that hateth man, Inhabitants of Themiscyra, close Upon Thermodon, where the sea's rough jaw Doth gnash at Salmydessa and provide A cruel host to seamen, and to ships A stepdame. They with unreluctant hand Shall lead thee on and on, till thou arrive Just where the ocean-gates show narrowest On the Cimmerian isthmus. Leaving which, Behoves thee swim with fortitude of soul The strait Mæotis. Ay, and evermore That traverse shall be famous on men's lips, That strait, called Bosphorus, the horned-one's road, So named because of thee, who so wilt pass