The promised empire, and alternate reign: Be this the cause of more than mortal hate: The rest, succeeding times shall ripen into fate." The god obeys, and to his feet applies Those golden wings that cut the yielding skies. 430 His ample hat his beamy locks o'erspread, And veiled the starry glories of his head. He seized the wand that causes sleep to fly, Or in soft slumbers seals the wakeful eye; That drives the dead to dark Tartarean coasts, 435 Or back to life compels the wand'ring ghosts. Thus, through the parting clouds, the son of May Wings on the whistling winds his rapid way; Now smoothly steers through air his equal flight, Now springs aloft, and tow'rs th' ethereal height; 440 Then wheeling down the steep of heav'n he flies, And draws a radiant circle o'er the skies. Meantime the banished Polynices roves (His Thebes abandoned) through th' Aonian groves, While future realms his wand'ring thoughts delight, 445 His daily vision and his dream by night; Forbidden Thebes appears before his eye, From whence he sees his absent brother fly, With transport views the airy rule his own, And swells on an imaginary throne. 450 Fain would he cast a tedious age away, And live out all in one triumphant day.[77] He chides the lazy progress of the sun, And bids the year with swifter motion run. With anxious hopes his craving mind is tost, 455 And all his joys in length of wishes lost. The hero then resolves his course to bend } Where ancient Danaus' fruitful fields extend,[78] } And famed Mycene's lofty towers ascend, } (Where late the sun did Atreus' crimes detest, 460 And disappeared in horror of the feast.)[79] And now by chance, by fate, or furies led, From Bacchus' consecrated caves he fled, Where the shrill cries of frantic matrons sound, And Pentheus' blood enriched the rising ground.[80] 465 Then sees Cithæron tow'ring o'er the plain, And thence declining gently to the main. Next to the bounds of Nisus' realm repairs, Where treach'rous Scylla cut the purple hairs:[81] The hanging cliffs of Sciron's rock explores, 470 And hears the murmurs of the diff'rent shores:[82] Passes the strait that parts the foaming seas, And stately Corinth's pleasing site surveys. 'Twas now the time when Phoebus yields to night,[83] And rising Cynthia sheds her silver light, 475 Wide o'er the world in solemn pomp she drew Her airy chariot hung with pearly dew;[84] All birds and beasts lie hushed; sleep steals away The wild desires of men, and toils of day,