DEM. Nine days I wander'd o'er the land. From Enna to the eastern strand I sought, and when the first night came I lit my torch in Etna's flame. But neither 'mid the chestnut woods 420 That rustle o'er his stony floods; Nor yet at daybreak on the meads Where bountiful Symaethus leads His chaunting boatmen to the main; Nor where the road on Hybla's plain Is skirted by the spacious corn; Nor where embattled Syracuse With lustrous temple fronts the morn; Nor yet by dolphin'd Arethuse; Nor when I crossed Anapus wide, 430 Where Cyane, his reedy bride, Uprushing from her crystal well, Doth not his cold embrace repel; Nor yet by western Eryx, where Gay Aphrodite high in air Beams gladness from her marble chair; Nor 'mong the mountains that enfold Panormos in her shell of gold, Found I my Cora: no reply Came to my call, my helpless cry, 440 Cora, my Cora! CH. Hast thou not found her, then? Tell us--O tell! DEM. What wonder that I never found Her whom I sought on mortal ground, When she--(now will ye understand?)-- Dwelt in the land that is no land, The fruitless and unseason'd plain Where all lost things are found again; Where man's distract imaginings Head-downward hang on bat-like wings, 450 'Mid mummied hopes, sleep-walking cares, Crest-faln illusions and despairs, The tortur'd memories of crime, The outcasts of forgotten time? CH. Where is she, Queen?--where?--where? DEM. Nor had I known, Had not himself high Helios seen and told me. CH. Alas! Alas! We cannot understand-- We pray, dear Queen, may great Zeus comfort thee. DEM. Yea, pray to Zeus; but pray ye for yourselves, That he have pity on you, for there is need. 460 Or let Zeus hear a strange, unwonted prayer That in his peril he will aid himself; For I have said, nor coud his Stygian oath Add any sanction to a mother's word, That, if he give not back my daughter to me, Him will I slay, and lock his pining ghost In sleepy prisons of unhallowing hell. CH. (_aside_). Alas! alas! she is distraught with grief.-- What comfort can we make?-- How reason with her?-- 469 (_to_ D.) This coud not be, great Queen. How coud it be That Zeus should be destroy'd, or thou destroy him? DEM. Yea, and you too: so make your prayer betimes. CH. We pray thee, Lady, sit thou on this bank And we will bring thee food; or if thou thirst, Water. We know too in what cooling caves The sly Fauns have bestow'd their skins of wine.