To face her enemy might well avail: Wherefore to Cypris' shrine her steps she bent, Hoping the goddess in her hate might hale Her body to the skies for punishment, Whate'er to be; yet now her fiercest wrath Seem'd happiest fortune, seeing 'twas the path Whereby alone unto her love she went. NOVEMBER 1 But Aphrodite to the house of Zeus Being bound, bade beckon out her milkwhite steeds, Four doves, that ready to her royal use In golden cages stood and peck'd the seeds: Best of the nimble air's high-sailing folk That wore with pride the marking of her yoke, And cooed in envy of her gentle needs. 2 These drew in turn her chariot, when in state Along the heaven with all her train she fared; And oft in journeying to the skiey gate Of Zeus's palace high their flight had dared, Which darkest vapour and thick glooms enshroud Above all else in the perpetual cloud, Wherethro' to mount again they stood prepared, 3 Sleeking their feathers, by her shining car; The same Hephæstos wrought for her, when he, Bruised in his hideous fall from heaven afar, Was nursed by Thetis, and Eurynomè, The daughter of the ever-refluent main; With whom he dwelt till he grew sound again, Down in a hollow cave beside the sea: 4 And them for kindness done was prompt to serve, Forging them brooches rich in make and mode, Earrings, and supple chains of jointed curve, And other trinkets, while he there abode: And none of gods or men knew of his home, But they two only; and the salt sea-foam To and fro past his cavern ever flow'd. 5 'Twas then he wrought this work within the cave, Emboss'd with rich design, a moonèd car; And when return'd to heaven to Venus gave, In form imagined like her crescent star; Which circling nearest earth, maketh at night To wakeful mortal men shadow and light Alone of all the stars in heaven that are. 6 Two slender wheels it had, with fretted tires Of biting adamant, to take firm hold Of cloud or ether; and their whirling fires Threw off the air in halo where they roll'd: And either nave that round the axle turn'd A ruby was, whose steady crimson burn'd Betwixt the twin speed-mingling fans of gold. 7 Thereon the naked goddess mounting, shook The reins; whereat the doves their wings outspread, And rising high their flight to heaven they took: And all the birds, that in those courts were bred, Of her broad eaves the nested families, Sparrows and swallows, join'd their companies Awhile and twitter'd to her overhead. 8