Twelve days were past, and now the dawning light
The gods had summoned to the Olympian height:
Jove, first ascending from the watery bowers,[1]
Leads the long order of ethereal Powers.
When like the morning mist, in early day,
Rose from the flood the daughter of the sea;
And to the seats divine her flight addressed.
There, far apart, and high above the rest,
The Thunderer sat; where old Olympus shrouds
His hundred heads in heaven, and props the clouds.
Suppliant the goddess stood: one hand she placed
Beneath his beard, and one his knees embraced.
"If e'er, O father of the gods!" she said,
"My words could please thee, or my actions aid;
Some marks of honour on my son bestow,
And pay in glory what in life you owe.
Fame is at least by heavenly promise due
To life so short, and now dishonoured too.
Avenge this wrong, O ever just and wise!
Let Greece be humbled, and the Trojans rise;
Till the proud king, and all the Achaian race
Shall heap with honours him they now disgrace."
Thus Thetis spoke, but Jove in silence held
The sacred counsels of his breast concealed;
Not so repulsed, the goddess closer pressed,
Still grasped his knees, and urged the dear request.
"O sire of gods and men! thy suppliant hear,
Refuse, or grant; for what has Jove to fear?
Or, oh! declare, of all the powers above,
Is wretched Thetis least the care of Jove?"
She said, and sighing thus the god replies,
Who rolls the thunder o'er the vaulted skies:
"What hast thou asked? Ah, why should Jove engage
In foreign contests, and domestic rage,
The gods' complaints, and Juno's fierce alarms,
While I, too partial, aid the Trojan arms?
Go, lest the haughty partner of my sway
With jealous eyes thy close access survey;
But part in peace, secure thy prayer is sped:
Witness the sacred honours of our head,
The nod that ratifies the will divine,
The faithful, fixed, irrevocable sign;
- ↑ This is a noticeable instance of Pope's method of translation. All that Homer says, after he has related that the gods returned to Olympus, is, "all together, and Zeus led them." It has been pointed out that Dryden has, "Jove at their head, ascending from the sea." Pope was on the look-out for picturesque phrases, and did not scruple to borrow, or invent, whether there was anything in the original to correspond or not.
