“Now brave Pirithous, bold Ixion’s son,
The love of fair Hippodame had won.
The cloud begotten race, half men, half beast,
Invited, came to grace the nuptial feast:
In a cool cave’s recess the treat was made,
Whose entrance trees with spreading boughs o’ershade.
They sat; and, summon’d by the bridegroom, came,
To mix with those the Lapithaean name:
Nor wanted I. The roofs with joy resound;
And, ‘Hymen, Io Hymen,’ rung around.
Raised altars shone with holy fires: the bride,
Lovely herself, (and lovely, by her side,
A bevy of bright nymphs, with sober grace,)
Came glittering like a star, and took her place:
Her heavenly form beheld, all wish’d her joy;
And little wanted; but in vain their wishes all employ:
“For one, most brutal of the brutal brood,
Or whether wine or beauty fired his blood,
Or both at once, beheld with joyful eyes
The bride, at once resolved to make his prize.
Down went the board; and, fastening on her hair,
He seized with sudden force the frighted fair.
’Twas Eurytus began: his bestial kind
His crime pursued; and each, as pleased his mind,
Or her whom chance presented, took: the feast
An image of a taken town express’d.
“The cave resounds with female shrieks; we rise,
Mad with revenge, to make a swift reprise:
And Theseus first: ‘What frenzy has possess’d,
Oh Eurytus,’ he cried, ‘thy brutal breast,
To wrong Pirithous, and not him alone,
But while I live, two friends conjoin’d in one?’
“To justify his threat, he thrusts aside
The crowd of centaurs, and redeems the bride.
The monster naught replied; for words were vain,
And deeds could only deeds unjust maintain;
But answers with his hand, and forward press’d,
With blows redoubled, on his face and breast.
An ample goblet stood, of antique mould,
And rough with figures of the rising gold;
The hero snatch’d it up, and toss’d in air
Full at the front of the foul ravisher:
He falls, and falling, vomits forth a flood
Of wine, and foam, and brains, and mingled blood.
Half roaring, and half neighing, through the hall,
‘Arms! arms!’ the double-form’d with fury call;
To wreak their brother’s death: a medley flight
Of bowls and jars at first supply the fight;
Once instruments of feasts, but now of fate:
Wine animates their rage, and arms their hate.
“Bold Amycus from the robb’d vestry brings
The chalices of heaven, and holy things
Of precious weight: a sconce that hung on high,
With tapers fill’d, to light the sacristy,
Torn from the cord, with his unhallow’d hand,
He threw amid the Lapithaean band.
On Celadon the ruin fell, and left
His face of feature, and of form bereft:
So, when some brawny sacrificer knocks,
Before an altar led, an offer’d ox,
His eyeballs, rooted out, are thrown to ground;
His nose, dismantled, in his mouth is found;
His jaws, cheeks, front, one undistinguished wound.
“This Belates, the avenger, could not brook,
But, by the foot, a maple board he took,
And hurl’d at Amycus: his chin it bent
Against his chest, and down the centaur sent;
Whom, sputtering bloody teeth, the second blow
Of his drawn sword despatch’d to shades below.
“Grineus was near, and cast a furious look
On the side altar, censed with sacred smoke,
And bright with flaming fires: ‘The gods,’ he cried,
‘Have with their holy trade our hands supplied:
Why use we not their gifts?’ Then from the floor
An altar stone he heaved, with all the load it bore:
Altar, and altar’s freight, together flew,
Where thickest throng’d the Lapithaean crew,
And at once Broteas and Oryus slew.
Oryus’ mother, Mycale, was known
Down from her sphere to draw the labouring moon.
“Exadius cried: ‘Unpunish’d shall not go,
This fact, if arms are found against the foe.
He look’d about, where on a pine were spread
The votive horns of a stag’s branching head:
At Grineus these he throws; so just they fly,
That the sharp antlers stuck in either eye:
Breathless and blind he fell, with blood besmear’d;
His eyeballs, beaten out, hung dangling on his beard.
Fierce Rhaetus from the hearth a burning brand
Selects, and whirling waves, till from his hand
The fire took flame, then dash’d it on the right,
On fair Charaxus’ temples, near the sight:
The whistling pest came on, and pierced the bone,
And caught the yellow hair, that shrivell’d while it shone:
Caught, like dry stubble fired, or like seerwood;
Yet from the wound ensued no purple flood,
But look’d a bubbling mass of frying blood.
His blazing locks sent forth a crackling sound,
And hiss’d, like red-hot iron within the smithy drown’d.
The wounded warrior shook his flaming hair;
Then (what a team of horse could hardly rear)
He heaves the threshold stone, but could not throw;
The weight itself forbad the threaten’d blow;
Which, dropping from his lifted arms, came down
Full on Cometes’ head, and crush’d his crown.
Nor Rhaetus then restrained his joy, but said:
‘So by their fellows may our foes be sped:’
Then with redoubled strokes he plies his head:
The burning lever not deludes his pains;
But drives the batter’d scull within the brains.
“Thus flush’d, the conqueror, with force renew’d,
Evagrus, Dryas, Corythus, pursued.
First Corythus, with downy cheeks, he slew,
Whose fall when fierce Evagrus had in view,
He cried: ‘What palm is from a beardless prey?’
Rhaetus prevents what more he had to say,
And drove within his mouth the fiery death,
Which enter’d hissing in, and choked his breath.
At Dryas next he flew: but weary chance
No longer would the same success advance;
For while he whirl’d in fiery circles round
The brand, a sharpen’d stake strong Dryas found,
And in the shoulder’s joint inflicts the wound.
The weapon stuck, which, roaring out with pain,
He drew; nor longer durst the fight maintain,
But turn’d his back, for fear, and fled amain.
With him fled Orneus, with like dread possess’d;
Thaumas, and Medon, wounded in the breast;
And Mermeros, in the late race renown’d,
Now limping ran, and tardy, with his wound.
Pholus and Melaneous from fight withdrew,
And Abas maim’d, who boars encountering slew:
And Augur Astylos, whose art in vain
From fight dissuaded the four-footed train,
Now beat the hoof with Nessus on the plain,
But to his fellow cried: ‘Be safely slow;
Thy death deferr’d is due to great Alcides’ bow.’
“Meantime strong Dryas urged his chance so well,
That Lycidas, Areos, Imbreus, fell,
All one by one, and fighting face to face:
Crenaeus fled, to fall with more disgrace;
For, fearful, while he look’d behind, he bore,
Between his nose and front, the blow before.
Amid the noise and tumult of the fray,
Snoring, and drunk with wine, Aphidas lay;
Ev’n then the bowl within his hand he kept,
And on a bear’s rough hide securely slept:
Him Phorbas with his flying dart transfix’d:
‘Take thy next draught with Stygian waters mix’d,
And sleep thy fill,’ the insulting victor cried:
Surprised with death unfelt, the centaur died:
The ruddy vomit, as he breathed his soul,
Repass’d his throat, and fill’d his empty bowl.
“I saw Petraeus’ arms employ’d around
A well-grown oak, to root it from the ground:
This way and that he wrench’d the fibrous bands;
The trunk was like a sapling in his hands,
And still obey’d the bent: while thus he stood,
Pirithous’ dart drove on, and nail’d him to the wood:
Lycus and Chromis fell, by him oppress’d:
Helops and Dictys added to the rest
A nobler palm: Helops through either ear,
Transfix’d, received the penetrating spear:
This Dictys saw, and, seized with sudden fright,
Leap’d headlong from the hill of steepy height,
And crush’d an ash beneath, that could not bear his weight:
The shatter’d tree receives his fall, and strikes
Within his full-blown paunch the sharpen’d spikes.
Strong Aphareus had heaved a mighty stone,
The fragment of a rock, and would have thrown;
But Theseus, with a club of harden’d oak,
The cubit-bone of the bold centaur broke,
And left him maim’d; nor seconded the stroke:
Then leap’d on tall Bianor’s back; (who bore
No mortal burden but his own before;)
Press’d with his knees his sides: the double man,
His speed with spurs increased, unwilling ran.
One hand the hero fasten’d on his locks;
His other plied him with repeated strokes;
The club rang round his ears and batter’d brows:
He falls, and, lashing up his heels, his rider throws.
“The same Herculean arms Nedymnus wound,
And lay by him Lycotas on the ground;
And Hippasus, whose beard his breast invades;
And Ripheus, hunter of the woodland shades;
And Tereus, used with mountain bears to strive,
And from their dens to draw the indignant beasts alive.
“Demoleon could not bear this hateful sight,
Or the long fortune of the Athenian knight,
But pull’d with all his force, to disengage
From earth a pine, the product of an age:
The root stuck fast: the broken trunk he sent
At Theseus: Theseus frustrates his intent,
And leaps aside; by Pallas warn’d the blow
To shun: (for so he said, and we believed it so.)
Yet not in vain the enormous weight was cast,
Which Crantor’s body sunder’d at the waist;
Thy father’s ’squire, Achilles, and his care,
Whom, conquer’d in the Pelopeian war,
Their king, his present ruin to prevent,
A pledge of peace implored, to Peleus sent.
“Thy sire, with grieving eyes, beheld his fate,
And cried, ‘Not long, loved Crantor, shalt thou wait
Thy vow’d revenge.’ At once he said, and threw
His ashen spear, which quiver’d as it flew;
With all his force and all his soul applied,
The sharp point enter’d in the centaur’s side:
Both hands to wrench it out the monster join’d,
And wrench’d it output left the steel behind;
Stuck in his lungs it stood: enraged he rears
His hoofs, and down to ground thy father bears.
Thus trampled under foot, his shield defends
His head; his other hand the lance portends:
Ev’n while he lay extended on the dust,
He sped the centaur with one single thrust:
Two more his lance before transfix’d from far;
And two his sword had slain in closer war.
To these was added Dorylas, who spread
A bull’s two goring horns round his head:
With these he push’d: in blood already died,
Him fearless I approach’d, and thus defied:
‘Now, monster, now by proof it shall appear
Whether thy horns are sharper, or my spear.’
At this, I threw: for want of other ward,
He lifted up his hand, his front to guard:
His hand it pass’d, and fix’d it to his brow:
Loud shouts of ours attend the lucky blow.
Him Peleus finish’d, with a second wound,
Which through the navel pierced: he reel’d around,
And dragg’d his dangling bowels on the ground;
Trod what he dragg’d, and what he trod, he crush’d,
And to his mother earth with empty belly rush’d.”