He who could often, and alone, withstand The foe, the fire, and Jove's own partial hand, Now cannot his unmastered grief sustain, But yields to rage, to madness, and disdain; Then snatching out his faulchion,--Thou, said he, Art mine; Ulysses lays no claim to thee. O often tried, and ever trusty sword, Now do thy last kind office to thy lord! 'Tis Ajax who requests thy aid, to show None but himself, himself could overthrow.-- He said, and with so good a will to die, Did to his breast the fatal point apply, It found his heart, a way till then unknown, Where never weapon entered but his own; No hands could force it thence, so fixt it stood, 'Till out it rushed, expelled by streams of spouting blood. The fruitful blood produced a flower[38], which grew } On a green stem, and of a purple hue; } Like his, whom unaware Apollo slew. } Inscribed in both, the letters are the same, But those express the grief, and these the name. FOOTNOTES: [37] Dolon demanded the horses of Achilles, as his reward for exploring the Grecian camp, but was intercepted and slain by Ulysses. [38] The Hyacinth. THE STORY OF ACIS, POLYPHEMUS, AND GALATEA, FROM THE THIRTEENTH BOOK OF OVID'S METAMORPHOSES. Acis, the lovely youth, whose loss I mourn, From Faunus and the nymph Symethis born, Was both his parents' pleasure; but to me Was all that love could make a lover be. The gods our minds in mutual bands did join; I was his only joy, and he was mine. Now sixteen summers the sweet youth had seen, And doubtful down began to shade his chin; When Polyphemus first disturbed our joy, And loved me fiercely, as I loved the boy. Ask not which passion in my soul was higher, My last aversion, or my first desire; Nor this the greater was, nor that the less, Both were alike, for both were in excess. Thee, Venus, thee both heaven and earth obey; Immense thy power, and boundless is thy sway. The Cyclops, who defied the ætherial throne, And thought no thunder louder than his own, The terror of the woods, and wilder far Than wolves in plains, or bears in forests are; The inhuman host, who made his bloody feasts On mangled members of his butchered guests, Yet felt the force of love, and fierce desire, And burnt for me, with unrelenting fire; Forgot his caverns, and his woolly care, } Assumed the softness of a lover's air, } And combed, with teeth of rakes, his rugged hair. } Now with a crooked scythe his beard he sleeks, And mows the stubborn stubble of his cheeks; Now in the crystal stream he looks, to try His simagres,[39] and rolls his glaring eye. His cruelty and thirst of blood are lost; And ships securely sail along the coast. The prophet Telemus (arrived by chance