for his lost wife, he wept, and said to them,
“It is this weapon which incites my tears,
son of the goddess—who would think it so?
But so it does and for a long time will,
however long the life my fate decrees,
for this has ruined me and my poor wife:
would that I never had this gift at all!
Cephalus, Procris, and Aurora
“Her name was Procris: it’s likelier you’ve heard
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about her ravished sister, Orithyia,
but were you to compare the two of them
in looks and manner, Procris was more worthy
of being ravished! Her father Erectheus
joined me to her as Love joined her to me.
I was called ‘fortunate,’ and so I was;
and had the gods not otherwise ordained,
I would perhaps still know felicity.
“But in the second month of our marriage,
while I was setting nets out to take deer,
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high on the peak of flowering Hymettus,
pale Aurora, fresh from driving off
nocturnal gloom, first saw, then ravished me,
against my will! Now may it please the goddess,
I am permitted to report the truth:
and by her rosy mouth (a sight worth seeing),
and by her power over night and day,
and by that nectar she was nurtured on,
I still loved Procris! She was in my heart,
her name was always trembling on my lips.
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I spoke of nothing but the ties that bound us,
of fresh delights and recent pleasures proven,
of the first doings on our deserted bed.
“Such talk upset Aurora: ‘Stop your whining,
you thankless dolt! You may have your Procris,
but if I’ve any gift at all of foresight,
you’ll wish you hadn’t!’ Angrily she sent me
back to my wife, and, while I was returning,
I turned her warnings over in my mind,
and—as I thought on them—began to fear
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that my young wife had not observed my rights.
“Her youth and beauty led me to believe her
an adulteress; her character forbade me
to believe it. Nonetheless, the one
from whom I was just now returning set
quite a good example of misconduct—
besides, we lovers are a fearful lot.
“I settled upon making myself wretched
by trying to disturb her constant nature
through bribery. Aurora churned my fear,
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and helped me out by altering my looks.
(It seemed to me that I could feel the change.)
“Unrecognized, I slipped into Athena’s
beloved city, and entered my own home:
there were no signs of anything amiss;
all were concerned about their vanished master,
and only by a thousand stratagems
did I contrive an audience with Procris.
“Dumbstruck at sight of her, I nearly dropped
my scheme for testing her fidelity;
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I barely kept from blurting out the truth
and giving her the kisses she deserved.
“Though she was sad, none could be lovelier
than she was in her sorrow, longing for
the husband taken from her. Imagine, Phocus,
how beautiful this woman must have been
when even grief served as her ornament!
Why tell how often her modesty withstood
my challenges, how often she would meet
my offers with, ‘I keep myself for one,
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wherever he may be; him I love, only.’
“What man in his right mind would not have been
contented by such proof of loyalty?
I was not satisfied. Out to draw blood
(my own!) I battled on, and offered her
a fortune just to spend one night with me,
then added even more to what I’d offered,
and finally got her to hesitate—
at which, unlucky winner, I cried out,
‘O wretch! Here was a false adulterer;
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I was your own true husband! Faithless one,
by my own witness, you are apprehended!’
“But she made no response to me at all,
and silenced by her overwhelming shame,
fled her deceitful husband and his house;
detesting the entire race of men
because of the wrong that I had done to her,
she roamed the mountains, giving herself over
to the preoccupations of Diana.
“Abandoned, I was desolate: a fire
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scorched me right to the marrow of my bones.
I begged her pardon and confessed my sins,
admitting that I too might have succumbed,
tempted by such gifts—if they’d been offered.
“And when I had confessed such things to her,
after avenging her injured honor, she
returned to me; years passed in sweet agreement.
“And, as if she herself were not gift enough,
she gave me another one: a hunting dog,
a present from her very own Diana,
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and said, ‘He will be fastest of them all.’
At the same time she gave me this javelin,
which, as you see, I’m holding in my hands.
You’re curious about the other gift?
Then listen to this marvelous account;
you’ll find excitement in its novel plot:
The plague at Thebes
“The son of Laius, Oedipus, had solved
the riddle of the Sphinx, which none before him
had ever done; straightway, the dark prophet
leapt headfirst from the summit of a cliff,
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heedless of her own ambiguities.
“At once, another plague was loosed on Thebes,
and this fierce beast left many of the farm folk
frightened for themselves and for their flocks.
We local lads came out and drew a cordon
around the fields; lightly the swift beast
leapt over the highest point of our nets!
“The dogs were loosed, but she escaped them all,
and mocked the hunting party with her speed,
by flying no more slowly than a bird!
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The others begged me to release my “Storm”
(which was the name my present had been given);
he’d long been struggling against the leash
and straining at his collar; on release,
he disappeared, was nowhere to be found.
“Instead, we saw his tracks left in the dust,
but he himself had vanished from our sight.
No spear, no ball of lead shot from a sling,
no reedy arrow from a Cretan bow
was ever swifter in its flight than he.
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“There was a nearby hill whose summit gave
a view of the surrounding fields below.
I climbed it and observed this novel race,
wherein the beast seemed almost to be caught
yet slipped—it seemed—out of his very mouth!
Nor did the sly one run in a straight line,
but to deceive the jaws that followed her,
she circled round to keep her foe from springing.
“I thought it time to use my javelin,
and as I balanced it in my right hand
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and fit my fingers to the throwing loop,
I t
ook my eyes from them for just a moment,
and when I looked again at where they were,
I saw (oh, marvelous!) the two of them,
now marble figures standing in midfield!
You would have thought that she appeared to flee,
and he to capture her. Most certainly
some god had wished that neither know defeat—
if any god had been attending them.”
Cephalus, Aura, and Procris
At this point he fell silent. Phocus asked,
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“What charge do you bring against the javelin?”
The other man then set out his indictment:
“From our joys, dear Phocus, sprang our sorrows.
I will speak first of our happiness,
for it is pleasing to recall those first
years of our marriage, when, as husband and wife,
we were both equally blest in our loves,
and closely bound to one another by
mutual care and loving comradeship.
“No one could come between us: if great Jove
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had offered marriage, she would have declined;
and I was interested in no other,
not even Venus, if she herself appeared,
for in our hearts the flames burned equally.
“In early morning, when the sun’s first rays
touched on the hilltops, youthful eagerness
to go off hunting drew me to the woods;
no horse, no servants, and no keen-nosed hounds
would come along with me on these excursions,
nor did I bring my knotted nets: for safety,
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all that I needed was my javelin.
“When I was sated with the slaughter of game,
I would go seek some cool refreshing shade
and gentle breeze that emanated from
the chilly hollows. I named that cool breeze ‘Aura,’
and sought her gentle breath in midday heat,
waiting for her to refresh me from my labors.
“I had a song that I would sing to her
that went, as I recall, like this: ‘Sweet Aura, come,
please me and ease me now with your embrace,
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most welcome one—and as you do so well,
relieve me of the fever which consumes me!’
Perhaps I added (as Fate led me to)
additional endearments to the breeze:
‘You give me such great pleasure,’ I would say,
‘you are my dear refreshment and delight,
you make me love these woods and lonely places;
what joy to catch your breath upon my lips!’
“Now someone overheard these words of mine
and misinterpreted their ambiguities;
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and hearing me so often summon ‘Aura,’
assumed that I was speaking to a nymph
of the same name, whom he thought my lover!
“At once this rash informer went to Procris
and whispered in her ear the false story
of my alleged infidelity!
How credulous love is! My wife collapsed
from grief (I later learned) in a dead swoon.
“Recovering at last, she called herself
the wretched victim of a cruel fate,
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complained of my betrayal, and, aroused
by an insubstantial charge, by nothing, really,
grew frightened of this phantom with a name,
and wept—my luckless darling—just as though
her rival had been real.
“Often, however,
she doubted and she hoped, in her wretchedness,
that she might be mistaken, and rejected
what she had heard as unreliable;
she would not hold her husband to be sinful,
unless she witnessed his misdeeds herself.
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“On the next day, when Aurora’s early light
had driven night off, I made for the woods,
and after a successful hunt, reclined
on the soft grass and called out, ‘Aura, come,
alleviate the stresses of my labors!’
“And suddenly, while I was calling her,
I thought I heard a groaning sound, and yet
I cried out once more, ‘Come, my dearest, come!’
Hearing a rustling in the fallen leaves,
I took it for some beast and hurled my javelin:
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Procris emerged, clutching her wounded breast,
and cried out Woe is me!’
“As soon as I
had recognized my faithful darling’s voice,
I rushed to where I heard it coming from,
beside myself with fear of what I’d find:
and found her dying, with her garments soaked
and soiled in her own blood, and, oh, how awful!
“Attempting to withdraw from her torn breast
the very present she had given me,
I raised her body, dearer than my own,
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and tore the bloody garment from her wound
and wrapped and bandaged it as best I could,
in an attempt to stanch the flow of blood;
I prayed she would not die and leave me
guilty of her murder.
“Though she was failing
and very close to death, she forced herself
to speak these few words By our faithful vows,
and by the gods above—and by those gods
soon mine below—by what is owed my love,
unchanging even as I die—the love
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that is the very cause of my own death—
do not let Aura take my place in bed!’
“She spoke, and I immediately knew
how she had been mistaken about the name,
and I explained the truth of it to her,
but to what end was any explanation?
“She fell back in my arms, and her last strength
fled with her blood. As long as she could fix
her eyes on anything, she looked at me,
and on my lips I caught her luckless spirit;
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but she died easily and seemed content.”
With copiously flowing tears, the hero
brought this to mind again. But look—Aeacus
enters, accompanied by his two sons
and by his newly recruited citizens,
impressive in their weaponry and armor,
all gratefully received by Cephalus.
BOOK VIII
IMPIOUS ACTS AND EXEMPLARY LIVES
Nisus and Scylla Minos and Ariadne Daedalus and Icarus Daedalus and Perdix Meleager and Althaea Acheloüs and Theseus The Echinades and Perimele Baucis and Philemon Erysichthon and his daughter
Nisus and Scylla
And now when Lucifer had driven off
the night, revealing the next brand-new day,
the east wind fell and wet, dark clouds arose;
the south wind mildly offered safe return
to Cephalus and his assembled troops,
bringing them home much sooner than expected.
Meanwhile, along Megara’s coast, King Minos
was pillaging, and trying out his forces
against its capital, now held by Nisus,
who had, among the venerable locks
10
of grey upon his head, a tuft of purple,
which guaranteed the safety of his realm.
The war was entering its sixth month, still
undecided, as wingèd Victory
flew back and forth uncertainly between
the two combatants. A royal tower rose
upon those singing walls, where, it is said,
Apollo had set his golden lyre down:
&nbs
p; its music lingered still within the stones.
In peacetime, Scylla, daughter of King Nisus,
20
would often come and toss a pebble here
to make the rocks sing; now, in time of war,
she came as often to observe the duels,
and as the war dragged on, not only learned
the names of the chief contenders on both sides,
but recognized them by the arms they bore,
their horses, styles of dress, and Cretan quivers;
she knew Europa’s son the best of all,
the countenance of Minos being more
familiar to her than it should have been.
30
What if his face is hidden in a helmet?
Why, helmets frame his beauty! And that shield
he carries, hammered out of gleaming bronze—
how well the gleaming shield becomes the man!
And does he cast his javelin with vigor?
Then she commends his skillful manliness.
And does he draw the bowstring to his ear?
Why, no—that must be Phoebus with the bow!
But when he raised his visor to reveal
his countenance, and purple-cloaked, he clenched
40
his horse’s back and sat that milk-white steed,
using the reins upon its foaming jaws,
why then, the virgin daughter of King Nisus
lost herself almost, almost lost her mind:
happy the spear that his hand grasped, she thought,
and happy the reins that lay within his grip.
She would go off to him, were it permitted,
a virgin treading through the enemy lines,
or from her tower fly into his camp,
or turn the city over to the foe—
50
or do whatever else Minos might wish.
As she sat gazing at his tents, she said,
“What should I feel about this dreadful war?
Should I rejoice or grieve? I cannot say:
I grieve for my beloved enemy,
but without war, I never would have known him!
Were I his hostage, he could end it now,
I’d be with him and be his pledge of peace!
“If she who bore you were as beautiful
as you are, O my loveliest of kings,
60
no wonder, then, that Jove was mad for her!
Thrice happy would I be if I had wings
to fly into his camp, and there confess
my passion for him and demand to know
what dowry the great king would have me for!
“As long as it were not my city’s life!
Far better that my dreams of marriage die
than that they should be realized by treason!
—Though many, on the other hand, have found it
most useful to be vanquished by a foe
70
who, when appeased, grants them his clemency.