s boy shall stand a living mark, to prove
My husband's baseness, and the strumpet's love:
But vengeance shall awake: those guilty charms,
That drew the Thunderer from Juno's arms,
No longer shall their wonted force retain,
Nor please the god, nor make the mortal vain.'
This said, her hand within her hair she wound,
Swung her to earth, and dragged her on the ground.
The prostrate wretch lifts up her arms in prayer;
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Her arms grow shaggy, and deformed with hair,
Her nails are sharpened into pointed claws,
Her hands bear half her weight, and turn to paws;
Her lips, that once could tempt a god, begin
To grow distorted in an ugly grin.
And, lest the supplicating brute might reach
The ears of Jove, she was deprived of speech:
Her surly voice through a hoarse passage came
In savage sounds: her mind was still the same.
The furry monster fixed her eyes above,
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And heaved her new unwieldy paws to Jove,
And begged his aid with inward groans; and though
She could not call him false, she thought him so.
How did she fear to lodge in woods alone,
And haunt the fields and meadows once her own!
How often would the deep-mouthed dogs pursue,
Whilst from her hounds the frighted huntress flew!
How did she fear her fellow-brutes, and shun
The shaggy bear, though now herself was one!
How from the sight of rugged wolves retire,
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Although the grim Lycaon was her sire!
But now her son had fifteen summers told,
Fierce at the chase, and in the forest bold;
When, as he beat the woods in quest of prey,
He chanced to rouse his mother where she lay.
She knew her son, and kept him in her sight,
And fondly gazed: the boy was in a fright,
And aimed a pointed arrow at her breast,
And would have slain his mother in the beast;
But Jove forbade, and snatched them through the air
_140
In whirlwinds up to heaven, and fixed them there:
Where the new constellations nightly rise,
And add a lustre to the northern skies.
When Juno saw the rival in her height,
Spangled with stars, and circled round with light,
She sought old Ocean in his deep abodes,
And Tethys; both revered among the gods.
They ask what brings her there: 'Ne'er ask,' says she,
'What brings me here, heaven is no place for me.
You'll see, when night has covered all things o'er,
_150
Jove's starry bastard and triumphant whore
Usurp the heavens; you 'll see them