THE BOOK WAS DRENCHED - OUDL Home

Who from thy golden seat, thy central throne,
Utterest thine oracle: my voice shall reach
Thine ear: ungrateful lover, to my husband,
No grace requiting2 thou hast given a son
To bless his house; my son and thine, unown'd,
Perish'd a prey to birds; the robes that wrapp'd
The infant's limbs, his mother's work, lost with him.
Delos abhors thee, and the laurel boughs
With the soft foliage of the palm o'erhung,
Grasping whose round trunk with her hands divine,
Latona thee, her hallow'd offspring, bore.
LEADER
Ah, what a mighty treasury of ills
Is open'd here, a copious source of tears!
TUTOR
Never, my daughter, can I sate my eyes
With looking on thy face: astonishment
Bears me beyond my senses. I had stemm'd
One tide of evils, when another flood
High-surging overwhelm'd me from the words
Which thou hast utter'd, from the present ills
To an ill train of other woes transferr'd.
What say'st thou? Of what charge dost thou implead
The god? What son hast thou brought forth? Where placed him
A feast for vultures? Tell me all again.
CREUSA
Though I must blush, old man, yet I will speak.
TUTOR
I mourn with generous grief at a friend's woes.
CREUSA
Hear then: the northward-pointing cave thou knowest,
And the Cecropian rocks, which we call Macrai.
TUTOR
Where stands a shrine to Pan, and altars nigh.
CREUSA
There in a dreadful conflict I engaged.
TUTOR
What! my tears rise ready to meet thy words.