elude or to resist the purposes
Of aegis-bearing Jove. With thee abides,
He bids me say, the most unhappy man
Of all who round the city of Priam waged
The battle through nine years, and, in the tenth,
Laying it waste, departed for their homes.
But in their voyage, they provoked the wrath
Of Pallas, who called up the furious winds
And angry waves against them. By his side
Sank all his gallant comrades in the deep.
Him did the winds and waves drive hither. Him
Jove bids thee send away with speed, for here
He must not perish, far from all he loves.
So is it preordained that he behold
His friends again, and stand once more within
His high-roofed palace, on his native soil."
He spoke; Calypso, glorious goddess, heard,
And shuddered, and with winged words replied:
"Ye are unjust, ye gods, and, envious far
Beyond all other beings, cannot bear
That ever goddess openly should make
A mortal man her consort. Thus it was
When once Aurora, rosy-fingered, took
Orion for her husband; ye were stung,
Amid your blissful lives, with envious hate,
Till chaste Diana, of the golden throne,
Smote him with silent arrows from her bow,
And slew him in Ortygia. Thus, again,
When bright-haired Ceres, swayed by her own heart,
In fields which bore three yearly harvests, met
Iasion as a lover, this was known
Ere long to Jupiter, who flung from high
A flaming thunderbolt, and laid him dead.
And now ye envy me, that with me dwells
A mortal man. I saved him, as he clung,
Alone, upon his floating keel, for Jove
Had cloven, with a bolt of fire from heaven,
His galley in the midst of the black sea,
And all his gallant comrades perished there.
Him kindly I received; I cherished him,
And promised him a life that ne'er should know
Decay or death. But, since no god has power
To elude or to withstand the purposes
Of aegis-bearing Jove, let him depart,
If so the sovereign moves him and commands,
Over the barren deep. I send him not;
For neither ship arrayed with oars have I,
Nor seamen, o'er the boundless waste of waves
To bear him hence. My counsel I will give,
And nothing will I hide that he should know,
To place him safely on his native shore."
The herald Argos-queller answered her:
"Dismiss him thus, and bear in mind the wrath
Of Jove, lest it be kindled against thee."
Thus having said, the mighty Argicide
Departed, and the