Memoir and Poems of Phillis Wheatley/Niobe
NIOBE IN DISTRESS FOR HER CHILDREN
SLAIN BY APOLLO.
From Ovid's Metamorphoses, Book 6th, and from a view of the
Painting of Mr. Richard Wilson.
Apollo's wrath, to man the dreadful spring
Of ills innumerous, tuneful goddess sing!
Thou who didst first the ideal pencil give,
And taught the painter in his works to live,
Inspire with glowing energy of thought
What Wilson painted, and what Ovid wrote.
Muse! lend thine aid, nor let me sue in vain,
Though last and meanest of the rhyming train!
Oh! guide my pen in lofty strains to show
The Phrygian queen all beautiful in woe.
'T was where Mæonia spreads her wide domain
Niobe dwelt, and held her potent reign:
See in her hand the regal sceptre shine,
The wealthy heir of Tantalus divine,
He most distinguished by Dodonean Jove,
To approach the tables of the gods above:
Her grandsire Atlas, who with mighty pains
The etherial axis on his neck sustains:
Her other grandsire on the throne on high
Rolls the loud pealing thunder of the sky.
Her spouse, Amphion, who from Jove too springs,
Divinely taught to sweep the sounding strings.
Seven sprightly sons the royal bed adorn,
Seven daughters, beauteous as the rising morn,
As when Aurora fills the ravished sight,
And decks the orient realms with rosy light,
From their bright eyes the living splendors play,
Nor can beholders bear the flashing ray.
Wherever, Niobe, thou turnst thine eyes,
New beauties kindle and new joys arise!
But thou hadst far the happier mother proved,
If this fair offspring had been less beloved:
What if their charms exceed Aurora's tint,
No words could tell them, and no pencil paint.
Thy love, too vehement, hastens to destroy
Each blooming maid, and each celestial boy.
Now Manto comes, endued with mighty skill,
The past to explore, the future to reveal.
Through Thebes wide streets Tiresia's daughter came,
Divine Latona's mandate to proclaim:
The Theban maids to hear the order ran,
When thus Mæonia's prophetess began:
"Go Thebans! great Latona's will obey,
"And pious tribute at her altars pay:
"With rites divine, the Goddess be implored,
"Nor be her sacred offspring unadored."
Thus Manto spoke. The Theban maids obey,
And pious tribute to the Goddess pay.
The rich perfumes ascend the waving spires,
And altars blaze with consecrated fires;
The fair assembly moves with graceful air,
And leaves of laurel bind the flowing hair.
Niobe comes with all her royal race,
With charms unnumbered, and superior grace:
Her Phrygian garments of delightful hue,
Inwove with gold, refulgent to the view,
Beyond description beautiful, she moves
Like heavenly Venus, 'midst her smiles and loves.
She views around the supplicating train,
And shakes her graceful head with stern disdain,
Proudly she turns around her lofty eyes,
And thus reviles celestial deities:
"What madness drives the Theban ladies fair
"To give their incense to surrounding air?
"Say, why this new-sprung deity preferred?
"Why vainly fancy your petitions heard?
"Or say why Cœus' offspring is obeyed,
"While to my goddesship no tribute's paid?
"For me no altars blaze with living fires,
"No bullock bleeds, no frankincense transpires;
"Though Cadmus' palace not unknown to fame,
"And Phrygian rations all revere my name.
"Where er I turn my eyes vast wealth I find.
"Lo here an empress with a goddess joined.
"What! shall a Titaness be deified,
"To whom the spacious earth a couch denied?
"Nor heaven, nor earth, nor sea received your queen,
"Till pitying Deios took the wanderer in.
"Round me what a large progeny is spread!
"No frowns of fortune has my soul to dread.
"What if indignant she decrease my train?
"More than Latona's number will remain.
"Then hence, ye Theban dames, hence haste away,
"Nor longer offerings to Latona pay;
"Regard the orders of Amphion's spouse,
"And take the leaves of laurel from your brows."
Niobe spoke. The Theban maids obeyed,
Their brows unbound, and left the rites unpaid.
The angry goddess heard, then silence broke
On Cynthus' summit, and indignant spoke:
"Phœbus! behold thy mother in disgrace,
"Who to no Goddess yields the prior place,
"Except to Juno's self, who reigns above,
"The spouse and sister of the thundering Jove.
"Niobe, sprung from Tantalus, inspires
"Each Theban bosom with rebellious fires:
"No reason her imperious temper quells,
"But all her father in her tongue rebels;
"Wrap her own sons, for her blaspheming breath,
"Apollo! wrap them in the shades of death."
Latona ceased, and ardent thus replies
The God whose glory decks the expanded skies.
"Cease thy complaints; mine be the task assigned
"To punish and to scourge the rebel mind."
This Phebe joined. They wing their instant flight;
Thebes trembled as the immortal powers alight.
With clouds encompassed, glorious Phœbus stands,
The feathered vengeance quivering in his hands.
Near Cadmus' walls a plain extended lay,
Where Thebes' young princes passed in sport the day;
There the bold coursers bounded o'er the plains,
While their great masters held the golden reins.
Ismenus first, the racing pastime led,
And ruled the fury of his flying steed.
"Ah me!" he sudden cries, with shrieking breath,
While in his breast he feels the shaft of death;
He drops the bridle on his courser's mane,
Before his eyes in shadows swims the plain;
He, the first-born of great Amphion's bed,
Was struck the first, first mingled with the dead.
Then didst thou, Sypylus, the language hear
Of fate portentous whistling through the air;
As when the impending storm the sailor sees,
He spreads his canvas to the favoring breeze.
So to thine horse thou guv'st the golden reins,
Gav'st him to rush impetuous o'er the plains:
But ah! a fatal shaft from Phœbus' hand
Smites through thy neck and sinks thee on the sand.
Two other brothers were at wrestling found,
And in their pastime clasped each other round:
A shaft that instant from Apollo's hand
Transfixed them both and stretched them on the sand:
Together they their cruel fate bemoaned,
Together languished and together groaned:
Together, too, the unbodied spirits fled,
And sought the gloomy mansions of the dead.
Alphenor saw, and trembling at the view,
Beat his torn breast, that changed its snowy hue.
He flies to raise them in a kind embrace;
A brother's fondness tiiumphs in his face:
Alphenor fails in this fraternal deed;
A dart despatched him, (so the fates decreed.)
Soon as the arrow left the deadly wound,
His issuing entrails smoked upon the ground.
What woes on blooming Damasichon wait!
His sighs portend his near impending fate.
Just where the well-made leg begins to be.
And the soft sinews form the supple knee.
The youth, sore wounded by the Delian god,
Attempts to extract the crime avenging rod;
But while he strives the will of fate to avert,
Divine Apollo sends a second dart;
Swift through his throat the feathered mischief flies;
Bereft of sense, he drops his head and dies.
Young Iloneus, the last, directs his prayer,
And cries, "My life, ye gods celestial, spare."
Apollo heard, and pity touched his heart,
But ah! too late, for he had sent the dart:
Thou, too, oh Iloneus doomed to fall,
The fates refuse that arrow to recall.
On the swift wings of ever-flying Fame,
To Cadmus' palace soon the tiding came.
Niobe heard, and with indignant eyes
She thus expressed her anger and surprise:
"Why is such privilege to them allowed?
"Why thus insulted by the Delian god?
"Dwells there such mischief in the powers above?
"Why sleeps the vengeance of immortal Jove?"
For now Amphion, too, with grief oppressed,
Had plunged the deadly dagger in his breast.
Niobe now, less haughty than before,
With lofty head directs her steps no more.
She, who late told her pedigree divine,
And drove the Thebans from Latona's shrine,
How strangely changed! yet beautiful in woe,
She weeps, nor weeps unpitied by the foe.
On each pale corse the wretched mother, spread,
Lay overwhelmed with grief, and kissed her dead,
Then raised her arms, and thus, in accents slow,
"Be sated, cruel goddess, with my woe!
"If I've offended, let these streaming eyes,
"And let this seven-fold funeral suffice;
"Ah! take this wretched life you deign to sure;
"With them I too am carried to the grave:
"Rejoice triumphant, my victorious foe,
"But show the cause from whence your triumphs flow.
"Though I unhappy mourn these children slain,
"Yet greater numbers to my lot remain."
She ceased, the bow-string twanged with awful sound.
Which struck with terror all the assembly round,
Except the queen, who stood unmoved alone,
By her distresses more presumptuous grown.
Near the pale corses stood their sisters fair,
In sable vestures and dishevelled hair;
One, while she draws the fatal shaft away,
Faints, falls, and sickens in the light of day.
To soothe her mother, lo! another flies,
And blames the fury of the inclement skies,
And, while her words a filial pity show,
Struck dumb—indignant seeks the shades below.
Now from the fatal place, another flies,
Falls in her flight, and languishes and dies.
Another on her sister drops in death;
A fifth in trembling terror yields her breath;
While the sixth seeks some gloomy cave in vain,
Struck with the rest, and mingled with the slain.
One only daughter lives, and she the least;
The queen close clasped the daughter to her breast.
"Ye heavenly powers, ah! spare me one," she cried.
"Ah! spare me one," the vocal hills replied
In vain she begs, the Fates her suit deny;
In her embrace she sees her daughter die.
"The queen, of all her family bereft,[1]
"Without or husband, son, or daughter left,
"Grew stupid at the shock. The passing air
"Made no impression on her stiff'ning hair.
"The blood forsook her face: amidst the flood
"Poured from her cheeks, quite fixed her eye-balls stood.
"Her tongue, her palate, both obdurate grew,
"Her curdled veins no longer motion knew;
"The use of neck, and arms, and feet was gone,
"And even her bowels hardened into stone:
"A marble statue now the queen appears,
But from the marble steal the silent tears."
- ↑ This verse to the end is the work of another hand.