Swift fly his arrows o’er the billowy main,
Wing’d with his fires, nor flies a shaft in vain:
Thus, ere the face the lover’s breast inspires,
The voice of fame awakes the soft desires.
While from the bow-string start the shafts divine,
His ivory moon’s wide horns incessant join,
Swift twinkling to the view: and wide he pours,
Omnipotent in love, his arrowy showers.
E’en Thetis’ self confess’d the tender smart,
And pour’d the murmurs of the wounded heart:
Soft o’er the billows pants the am’rous sigh;
With wishful languor melting on each eye
The love-sick nymphs explore the tardy sails
That waft the heroes on the ling’ring gales.
Give way, ye lofty billows, low subside,
Smooth as the level plain, your swelling pride,
Lo, Venus comes! Oh, soft, ye surges, sleep,
Smooth be the bosom of the azure deep,
Lo, Venus comes! and in her vig’rous train
She brings the healing balm of love-sick pain.
White as her swans,573* and stately as they rear
Their snowy crests when o’er the lake they steer,
Slow moving on, behold, the fleet appears,
And o’er the distant billow onward steers.
The beauteous Nereids, flush’d in all their charms,
Surround the goddess of the soft alarms:
Right to the isle she leads the smiling train,
And all her arts her balmy lips explain;
The fearful languor of the asking eye,
The lovely blush of yielding modesty,
The grieving look, the sigh, the fav’ring smile,
And all th’ endearments of the open wile,
She taught the nymphs — in willing breasts that heav’d
To hear her lore, her lore the nymphs receiv’d.
As now triumphant to their native shore
Through the wide deep the joyful navy bore,
Earnest the pilot’s eyes sought cape or bay,
For long was yet the various wat’ry way;
Sought cape or isle, from whence their boats might bring
The healthful bounty of the crystal spring:
When sudden, all in nature’s pride array’d,
The Isle of Love its glowing breast display’d.
O’er the green bosom of the dewy lawn
Soft blazing flow’d the silver of the dawn,
The gentle waves the glowing lustre share,
Arabia’s balm was sprinkled o’er the air.
Before the fleet, to catch the heroes’ view,
The floating isle fair Acidalia drew:
Soon as the floating verdure caught their sight,574*
She fix’d, unmov’d, the island of delight.
So when in child-birth of her Jove-sprung load,
The sylvan goddess and the bowyer god,
In friendly pity of Latona’s woes,575*
Amid the waves the Delian isle arose.
And now, led smoothly o’er the furrow’d tide,
Right to the isle of joy the vessels glide:
The bay they enter, where on ev’ry hand,
Around them clasps the flower-enamell’d land;
A safe retreat, where not a blast may shake
Its flutt’ring pinions o’er the stilly lake.
With purple shells, transfus’d as marble veins,
The yellow sands celestial Venus stains.
With graceful pride three hills of softest green
Rear their fair bosoms o’er the sylvan scene;
Their sides embroider’d boast the rich array
Of flow’ry shrubs in all the pride of May;
The purple lotus and the snowy thorn,
And yellow pod-flowers ev’ry slope adorn.
From the green summits of the leafy hills
Descend, with murm’ring lapse, three limpid rills:
Beneath the rose-trees loit’ring, slow they glide,
Now, tumbles o’er some rock their crystal pride;
Sonorous now, they roll adown the glade,
Now, plaintive tinkle in the secret shade,
Now, from the darkling grove, beneath the beam
Of ruddy morn, like melted silver stream,
Edging the painted margins of the bowers,
And breathing liquid freshness on the flowers.
Here, bright reflected in the pool below,
The vermeil apples tremble on the bough;
Where o’er the yellow sands the waters sleep
The primros’d banks, inverted, dew-drops weep;
Where murm’ring o’er the pebbles purls the stream
The silver trouts in playful curvings gleam.
Long thus, and various, ev’ry riv’let strays,
Till closing, now, their long meand’ring maze,
Where in a smiling vale the mountains end,
Form’d in a crystal lake the waters blend:576*
Fring’d was the border with a woodland shade,
In ev’ry leaf of various green array’d,
Each yellow-ting’d, each mingling tint between
The dark ash-verdure and the silv’ry green.
The trees, now bending forward, slowly shake
Their lofty honours o’er the crystal lake;
Now, from the flood the graceful boughs retire
With coy reserve, and now again admire
Their various liv’ries, by the summer dress’d,
Smooth-gloss’d and soften’d in the mirror’s breast.
So, by her glass the wishful virgin stays,
And, oft retiring, steals the ling’ring gaze.
A thousand boughs aloft to heav’n display
Their fragrant apples, shining to the day;
The orange here perfumes the buxom air,
And boasts the golden hue of Daphne’s hair.577*
Near to the ground each spreading bough descends,
Beneath her yellow load the citron bends;
The fragrant lemon scents the cooly grove;
Fair as (when rip’ning for the days of love)
The virgin’s breasts the gentle swell avow,
So, the twin fruitage swell on every bough.
Wild forest-trees the mountain sides array’d
With curling foliage and romantic shade:
Here spreads the poplar, to Alcides dear;
And dear to Phœbus, ever verdant here,
The laurel joins the bowers for ever green,
The myrtle bowers belov’d of beauty’s queen.
To Jove the oak his wide-spread branches rears;
And high to heav’n the fragrant cedar bears;
Where through the glades appear the cavern’d rocks,
The lofty pine-tree waves her sable locks;
Sacred to Cybělē the whisp’ring pine
Loves the wild grottoes where the white cliffs shine;
Here towers the cypress, preacher to the wise,
Less’ning from earth her spiral honours rise,
Till, as a spear-point rear’d, the topmost spray
Points to the Eden of eternal day.
Here round her fost’ring elm the smiling vine,
In fond embraces, gives her arms to twine,
The num’rous clusters pendant from the boughs,
The green here glistens, here the purple glows;
For, here the genial seasons of the year
Danc’d hand in hand, no place for winter here;
His grisly visage from the shore expell’d,
United sway the smiling seasons held.
Around the swelling fruits of deep’ning red,
Their snowy hues the fragrant blossoms spread;
Between the bursting buds of lucid green
The apple’s ripe vermilion blush is seen;
For here each gift Pomona’s
hand bestows
In cultur’d garden, free, uncultur’d flows,
The flavour sweeter, and the hue more fair,
Than e’er was foster’d by the hand of care.
The cherry here in shining crimson glows;
And, stain’d with lover’s blood,578* in pendent rows,
The bending boughs the mulberries o’erload;
The bending boughs caress’d by Zephyr nod.
The gen’rous peach, that strengthens in exile
Far from his native earth, the Persian soil,
The velvet peach, of softest glossy blue,
Hangs by the pomegranate of orange hue,
Whose open heart a brighter red displays
Than that which sparkles in the ruby’s blaze.
Here, trembling with their weight, the branches bear,
Delicious as profuse, the tap’ring pear.
For thee, fair fruit, the songsters of the grove
With hungry bills from bower to arbour rove.
Ah, if ambitious thou wilt own the care
To grace the feast of heroes and the fair,
Soft let the leaves, with grateful umbrage, hide
The green-tinged orange of thy mellow side.
A thousand flowers of gold, of white and red,
Far o’er the shadowy vale579* their carpets spread,
Of fairer tap’stry, and of richer bloom,
Than ever glow’d in Persia’s boasted loom:
As glitt’ring rainbows o’er the verdure thrown,
O’er every woodland walk th’ embroid’ry shone.
Here o’er the wat’ry mirror’s lucid bed
Narcissus, self-enamour’d, hangs the head;
And here, bedew’d with love’s celestial tears,
The woe-mark’d flower of slain Adonis rears580*
Its purple head, prophetic of the reign
When lost Adonis shall revive again.
At strife appear the lawns and purpled skies,
Which from each other stole the beauteous dyes:581*
The lawn in all Aurora’s lustre glows,
Aurora steals the blushes of the rose,
The rose displays the blushes that adorn
The spotless virgin on the nuptial morn.
Zephyr and Flora emulous conspire
To breathe their graces o’er the field’s attire;
The one gives healthful freshness, one the hue
Fairer than e’er creative pencil drew.
Pale as the love-sick hopeless maid they dye
The modest violet; from the curious eye
The modest violet turns her gentle head,
And, by the thorn, weeps o’er her lowly bed.
Bending beneath the tears of pearly dawn
The snow-white lily glitters o’er the lawn;
Low from the bough reclines the damask rose,
And o’er the lily’s milk-white bosom glows.
Fresh in the dew, far o’er the painted dales,
Each fragrant herb her sweetest scent exhales.
The hyacinth bewrays the doleful Ai,582*
And calls the tribute of Apollo’s sigh;
Still on its bloom the mournful flower retains
The lovely blue that dy’d the stripling’s veins.
Pomona, fir’d with rival envy, views
The glaring pride of Flora’s darling hues;
Where Flora bids the purple iris spread,
She hangs the wilding’s blossom white and red;
Where wild-thyme purples, where the daisy snows
The curving slopes, the melon’s pride she throws;
Where by the stream the lily of the vale,
Primrose, and cowslip meek, perfume the gale,
Beneath the lily, and the cowslip’s bell,
The scarlet strawberries luxurious swell.
Nor these alone the teeming Eden yields,
Each harmless bestial crops the flow’ry fields;
And birds of ev’ry note, and ev’ry wing,
Their loves responsive thro’ the branches sing:
In sweet vibrations thrilling o’er the skies,
High pois’d in air, the lark his warbling tries;
The swan, slow sailing o’er the crystal lake,
Tunes his melodious note; from ev’ry brake
The glowing strain the nightingale returns,
And, in the bowers of love, the turtle mourns.
Pleas’d to behold his branching horns appear,
O’er the bright fountain bends the fearless deer;
The hare starts trembling from the bushy shade,
And, swiftly circling, crosses oft the glade.
Where from the rocks the bubbling founts distil,
The milk-white lambs come bleating down the hill;
The dappled heifer seeks the vales below,
And from the thicket springs the bounding doe.
To his lov’d nest, on fondly flutt’ring wings,
In chirping bill the little songster brings
The food untasted; transport thrills his breast;
’Tis nature’s touch, ’tis instinct’s heav’n-like feast.
Thus bower and lawn were deck’d with Eden’s flowers,
And song and joy imparadis’d the bowers.
And soon the fleet their ready anchors threw:
Lifted on eager tip-toe at the view,
On nimble feet that bounded to the strand
The second Argonauts583* elance to land.
Wide o’er the beauteous isle584* the lovely fair
Stray through the distant glades, devoid of care.
From lowly valley and from mountain grove
The lovely nymphs renew the strains of love.
Here from the bowers that crown the plaintive rill
The solemn harp’s melodious warblings thrill;
Here from the shadows of the upland grot
The mellow lute renews the swelling note.
As fair Diana, and her virgin train,
Some gaily ramble o’er the flow’ry plain,
In feign’d pursuit of hare or bounding roe,
Their graceful mien and beauteous limbs to show;
Now seeming careless, fearful now and coy,
(So, taught the goddess of unutter’d joy),
And, gliding through the distant glades, display
Each limb, each movement, naked as the day.
Some, light with glee, in careless freedom take
Their playful revels in the crystal lake;
One trembling stands no deeper than the knee
To plunge reluctant, while in sportful glee
Another o’er her sudden laves the tide;
In pearly drops the wishful waters glide,
Reluctant dropping from her breasts of snow;
Beneath the wave another seems to glow;
The am’rous waves her bosom fondly kiss’d,
And rose and fell, as panting, on her breast.
Another swims along with graceful pride,
Her silver arms the glist’ning waves divide,
Her shining sides the fondling waters lave,
Her glowing cheeks are brighten’d by the wave,
Her hair, of mildest yellow, flows from side
To side, as o’er it plays the wanton tide,
And, careless as she turns, her thighs of snow
Their tap’ring rounds in deeper lustre show.
Some gallant Lusians sought the woodland prey,
And, thro’ the thickets, forc’d the pathless way;
Where some, in shades impervious to the beam,
Supinely listen’d to the murm’ring stream:
When sudden, through the boughs, the various dyes
Of pink, of scarlet, and of azure rise,
Swift from the verdant banks the loit’rers spring,
Down drops the arrow from the half-drawn string:
Soon they behold ’twas not the rose’s hue,
The jonquil
’s yellow, nor the pansy’s blue:
Dazzling the shades the nymphs appear — the zone
And flowing scarf in gold and azure shone.
Naked as Venus stood in Ida’s bower,
Some trust the dazzling charms of native power;
Through the green boughs and darkling shades they show
The shining lustre of their native snow,
And every tap’ring, every rounded swell
Of thigh, of bosom, as they glide, reveal.
As visions, cloth’d in dazzling white, they rise,
Then steal unnoted from the flurried eyes:
Again apparent, and again, withdrawn,
They shine and wanton o’er the smiling lawn.
Amaz’d and lost in rapture of surprise,
“All joy, my friends!” the brave Veloso cries,
“Whate’er of goddesses old fable told,
Or poet sung of sacred groves, behold.
Sacred to goddesses divinely bright
These beauteous forests own their guardian might.
From eyes profane, from ev’ry age conceal’d,
To us, behold, all Paradise reveal’d!
Swift let us try if phantoms of the air,
Or living charms, appear divinely fair!”
Swift at the word the gallant Lusians bound,
Their rapid footsteps scarcely touch the ground;
Through copse, through brake, impatient of their prey,
Swift as the wounded deer, they spring away:
Fleet through the winding shades, in rapid flight,
The nymphs, as wing’d with terror, fly their sight;
Fleet though they fled, the mild reverted eye
And dimpling smile their seeming fear deny.
Fleet through the shades in parted rout they glide:
If winding path the chosen pairs divide,
Another path by sweet mistake betrays,
And throws the lover on the lover’s gaze:
If dark-brow’d bower conceal the lovely fair,
The laugh, the shriek, confess the charmer there.
Luxurious here the wanton zephyrs toy,
And ev’ry fondling fav’ring art employ.
Fleet as the fair ones speed, the busy gale
In wanton frolic lifts the trembling veil;
White though the veil, in fairer brighter glow,
The lifted robe displays the living snow:
Quick flutt’ring on the gale the robe conceals,
Then instant to the glance each charm reveals;
Reveals, and covers from the eyes on fire,
Reveals, and with the shade inflames desire.
One, as her breathless lover hastens on,
With wily stumble sudden lies o’erthrown;
Confus’d, she rises with a blushing smile;
The lover falls the captive of her guile:
Tripp’d by the fair, he tumbles on the mead,
Luis de Camoes Collected Poetical Works Page 115