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PHI.
Thou whom I have longed to see,
Thy dear voice is law to me.

NEO.
I obey with gladdened heart.

HER.
Lose no time: at once depart!
Bright occasion and fair wind
Urge your vessel from behind.

PHI.
Come, let me bless the region ere I go.
Poor house, sad comrade of my watch, farewell!
Ye nymphs of meadows where soft waters flow
Thou ocean headland, pealing thy deep knell,
Where oft within my cavern as I lay
My hair was moist with dashing south-wind’s spray,
And ofttimes came from Hermes’ foreland high
Sad replication of my storm-vext cry;
Ye fountains and thou Lycian water sweet,–
I never thought to leave you, yet my feet
Are turning from your paths,–we part for aye.
Farewell! and waft me kindly on my way,
O Lemnian earth enclosed by circling seas,
To sail, where mighty Fate my course decrees,
And friendly voices point me, and the will
Of that heroic power, who doth this act fulfil.

CH.
Come now all in one strong band;
Then, ere loosing from the land,
Pray we to the nymphs of sea
Kind protectresses to be,
Till we touch the Trojan strand.

[THE END]

NOTES:

SOME PROPER NAMES

AIDONEUS, Hades or Pluto.
ARES, The War-God, a destructive Power.
DEO, Demeter.
ERINYES, the Furies.
HELIOS, The Sun-God.
RHEA, the Mother of the Gods.
THEBE, the town of Thebes personified.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Through Chrysa’s cruel sting. Chrysa was an island near the Troad, sacred to a goddess of the name. Her precinct was guarded by a serpent, whose bite, from which Philoctetes suffered, was incurable. See below p. 254, l. 1327.

[2] The fosterer of my sire. Phoenix, the tutor of Achilles.

[3] For I ne’er | Had seen him. The legend which makes Achilles go to Troy from Scyros is probably ignored.

[4] Vile offset of an evil tree. Alluding to the supposed birth of Odysseus. See on Ai., l. 190, p. 60 [sic. should be p. 49].

[5] Of old Chalcodon. One of the former generation, a friend and neighbour of Poeas the father of Philoctetes.

[6] Of him, whose home is in the skies. Heracles, imagined as transfigured on Mount Oeta.

[7] The sky-roofed fold. The open precinct that was sacred to the goddess, merely surrounded by a wall. See above, note on p. 222, l. 194.

[8] Phoebus’ child. Asclepius.