The horses' names he knew not in the fright:

Nor would he loose the reins, nor could he hold them

tight.

Now all the horrors of the heav'ns he spies,
And monstrous shadows of prodigious size,
That deck'd with stars, lie scatter'd o'er the skies.
There is a place above, where Scorpio bent
In tail and arms surrounds a vast extent;
In a wide circuit of the heav'ns he shines,
And fills the space of two celestial signs.
Soon as the youth beheld him, vex'd with heat,
Brandish his sting, and in his poison sweat,
Half dead with sudden fear, he dropt the reins;
The horses felt them loose upon their manes,
And, flying out through all the plains above,
Ran uncontrol'd where'er their fury drove;
Rush'd on the stars, and through a pathless way
Of unknown regions hurry'd on the day.
And now above, and now below they flew,
And near the earth the burning chariot drew.

The clouds disperse in fumes, the wond'ring Moon
Beholds her brother's steeds beneath her own;
The highlands smoke, cleft by the piercing rays,
Or, clad with woods, in their own fuel blaze.
Next o'er the plains, where ripen'd harvests grow,
The running conflagration spreads below.
But these are trivial ills: whole cities burn,
And peopled kingdoms into ashes turn.

The mountains kindle as the car draws near,
Athos and Tmolus red with fires appear;
Eagrian Hamus (then a single name)
And virgin Helicon increase the flame;
Taurus te glare amid the sky,
And Ida, spite of all her fountains, dry.
Eryx, and Othrys, and Citbæron, glow;
And Rhodope, no longer cloth'd in snow;
High Pindus, Mimas, and Parnassus sweat,
And Ætna rages with redoubled heat.

Ev'n Scythia, through her hoary regions warm'd,
In vain with all her native frost was arm'd.
Cover'd with flames, the tow'ring Appennine,
And Caucasus, and proud Olympus shine;
And, where the long-extended Alps aspire,
Now stands a huge continu'd range of fire.

Th' astonish'd youth, where'er his eyes could turn, Beheld the universe around him burn:

The world was in a blaze; nor could he bear
The sultry vapours and the scorching air,
Which from below, as from a furnace, flow'd;
And now the axletree beneath him glow'd:
Lost in the whirling clouds, that round him broke,
And white with ashes, hov'ring in the smoke,
He flew where'er the horses drove, nor knew
Whither the horses drove, or where he flew.

'Twas then, they say, the swarthy Moor begun
To change his hue, and blacken in the sun.
Then Lybia first, of all her moisture drain'd,
Became a barren waste, a wild of sand.
The water-nymphs lament their empty urns,
Boeotia, robb'd of silver Dirce, mourns,
Corinth Pyrene's wasted spring bewails,
And Argos grieves whilst Amymone fails.
The floods are drain'd from every distant coast,
Ev'n Tanaïs, though fix'd in ice, was lost.
Enrag'd Caicus and Lycormas roar,

And Xanthus, fated to be burnt once more.
The fam'd Meander, that unweary'd strays
Through mazy windings, smokes in every maze.
From his lov'd Babylon Euphrates flies;
The big-swoln Ganges and the Danube rise
In thick'ning fumes, and darken half the skies.
In flames Ismenos and the Phasis roll'd,
And Tagus floating in his melted gold.
The Swans, that on Cayster often try'd
Their tuneful songs, now sung their last, and dy'd.
The frighted Nile ran off, and under ground
Conceal'd his head, nor can it yet be found;

His seven-divided currents all are dry,

And where they roll'd, seven gaping trenches lie.
No more the Rhine or Rhone their course maintain,
Nor Tiber, of his promis'd empire vain.

The ground, deep cleft, admits the dazzling ray, And startles Pluto with the flash of day.

The seas shrink in, and to the sight disclose
Wide naked plains, where once their billows rose ;
Their rocks are all discover'd, and increase
The number of the scatter'd Cyclades.
The fish in shoals about the bottom creep,
Nor longer dares the crooked dolphin leap:
Gasping for breath, th' unshapen Phocæ die,
And on the boiling wave extended lie.
Nereus, and Doris with her virgin train,
Seek out the last recesses of the main;
Beneath unfathomable depths they faint,
And secret in their gloomy caverns pant.
Stern Neptune thrice above the waves upheld
His face, and thrice was by the flames repell'd.
The Earth at length, on every side embrac'd
With scalding seas, that floated round her waist,
When now she felt the springs and rivers come,
And crowd within the hollow of her womb,
Uplifted to the heavens her blasted head,

And clapp'd her hand upon her brows, and said; (But first impatient of the sultry heat,

Sunk deeper down, and sought a cooler seat:) "If you, great king of gods, my death approve, And I deserve it, let me die by Jove;

If I must perish by the force of fire,

Let me transfix'd with thunderbolts expire.

See, whilst I speak, my breath the vapours choke,
(For now her face lay wrapp'd in clouds of smoke)
See my sing'd hair, behold my faded eye,
And wither'd face, where heaps of cinders lie!
And does the plough for this my body tear?
This the reward for all the fruits I bear,
Tortur'd with rakes, and harass'd all the year?

That herbs for cattle daily I renew,

And food for man, and frankincense for you?
But grant me guilty; what has Neptune done?
Why are his waters boiling in the sun?
The wavy empire, which by lot was given,

Why does it waste, and further shrink from heaven?
If I nor he your pity can provoke,

See you own heav'ns, the heav'ns begin to smoke!
Should once the sparkles catch those bright abodes,
Destruction seizes on the heav'ns and gods;
Atlas becomes unequal to his freight,

And almost faints beneath the glowing weight.
If heav'n, and earth, and sea, together burn,
All must again into their chaos turn.
Apply some speedy cure, prevent our fate,
And succour nature, ere it be too late."

She ceas'd; for chok'd with vapours round her spread,
Down to the deepest shades she sunk her head.
Jove call'd to witness every power above,
And ev❜n the god, whose son the chariot drove,
That what he acts he is compell'd to do,

Or universal ruin must ensue.

Straight he ascends the high ethereal throne,

From whence he us'd to dart his thunder down,
From whence his showers and storms he us'd to pour,
But now could meet with neither storm nor shower.
Then, aiming at the youth, with lifted hand,
Full at his head he hurl'd the forky brand,
In dreadful thund'rings. Thus th' almighty sire
Suppress'd the raging of the fires with fire."

At once from life, and from the chariot driven, Th' ambitious boy fell thunder-struck from heaven. The horses started with a sudden bound,

And flung the reins and chariot to the ground:
The studded harness from their necks they broke,
Here fell a wheel, and here a silver spoke,
Here were the beam and axle torn away;

And scatter'd o'er the earth, the shining fragments lay.

The breathless Phaeton, with flaming hair,
Shot from the chariot, like a falling star,
That in a summer's ev'ning from the top
Of heav'n drops down, or seems at least to drop;
Till on the Po his blasted corpse was hurl'd,
Far from his country, in the western world.

PHAETON'S SISTERS TRANSFORMED INTO TREES.

The Latian nymphs came round him, and amaz'd On the dead youth, transfix'd with thunder, gaz'd; And, whilst yet smoking from the bolt he lay, His shatter'd body to a tomb convey,

And o'er the tomb an epitaph devise:

"Here he who drove the sun's bright chariot lies;

His father's fiery steeds he could not guide,
But in the glorious enterprise he dy'd."

Apollo hid his face and pin'd for grief,
And, if the story may deserve belief,
The space of one whole day is said to run,
From morn to wonted ev'n, without a sun:
The burning ruins, with a fainter ray,
Supply the sun, and counterfeit a day,
A day that still did nature's face disclose:
This comfort from the mighty mischief rose.

But Clymene, enrag'd with grief, laments,
And, as her grief inspires, her passion vents:
Wild for her son, and frantic in her woes,
With hair dishevell'd, round the world she goes,
To seek where'er his body might be cast;
Till, on the borders of the Po, at last
The name inscrib'd on the new tomb appears:
The dear, dear name she bathes in flowing tears,
Hangs o'er the tomb, unable to depart,
And hugs the marble to her throbbing heart.

Her daughters too lament, and sigh, and mourn,
(A fruitless tribute to their brother's urn,)
And beat their naked bosoms, and complain,
And call aloud for Phaeton in vain: