MAMMON:
I fear your sacred Majesty has lost 20
The appetite which you were used to have.
Allow me now to recommend this dish —
A simple kickshaw by your Persian cook,
Such as is served at the great King’s second table.
The price and pains which its ingredients cost 25
Might have maintained some dozen families
A winter or two — not more — so plain a dish
Could scarcely disagree. —
SWELLFOOT:
After the trial,
And these fastidious Pigs are gone, perhaps
I may recover my lost appetite, — 30
I feel the gout flying about my stomach —
Give me a glass of Maraschino punch.
PURGANAX (FILLING HIS GLASS, AND STANDING UP):
The glorious Constitution of the Pigs!
ALL:
A toast! a toast! stand up, and three times three!
DAKRY:
No heel-taps — darken daylights! —
LAOCTONOS:
Claret, somehow, 35
Puts me in mind of blood, and blood of claret!
SWELLFOOT:
Laoctonos is fishing for a compliment,
But ‘tis his due. Yes, you have drunk more wine,
And shed more blood, than any man in Thebes.
[TO PURGANAX.]
For God’s sake stop the grunting of those Pigs! 40
PURGANAX:
We dare not, Sire, ‘tis Famine’s privilege.
CHORUS OF SWINE:
Hail to thee, hail to thee, Famine!
Thy throne is on blood, and thy robe is of rags;
Thou devil which livest on damning;
Saint of new churches, and cant, and GREEN BAGS, 45
Till in pity and terror thou risest,
Confounding the schemes of the wisest;
When thou liftest thy skeleton form,
When the loaves and the skulls roll about,
We will greet thee-the voice of a storm 50
Would be lost in our terrible shout!
Then hail to thee, hail to thee, Famine!
Hail to thee, Empress of Earth!
When thou risest, dividing possessions;
When thou risest, uprooting oppressions, 55
In the pride of thy ghastly mirth;
Over palaces, temples, and graves,
We will rush as thy minister-slaves,
Trampling behind in thy train,
Till all be made level again! 60
MAMMON:
I hear a crackling of the giant bones
Of the dread image, and in the black pits
Which once were eyes, I see two livid flames.
These prodigies are oracular, and show
The presence of the unseen Deity. 65
Mighty events are hastening to their doom!
SWELLFOOT:
I only hear the lean and mutinous Swine
Grunting about the temple.
DAKRY:
In a crisis
Of such exceeding delicacy, I think
We ought to put her Majesty, the QUEEN, 70
Upon her trial without delay.
MAMMON:
THE BAG
Is here.
PURGANAX:
I have rehearsed the entire scene
With an ox-bladder and some ditchwater,
On Lady P — ; it cannot fail.
[TAKING UP THE BAG.]
Your Majesty
[TO SWELLFOOT.]
In such a filthy business had better 75
Stand on one side, lest it should sprinkle you.
A spot or two on me would do no harm,
Nay, it might hide the blood, which the sad Genius
Of the Green Isle has fixed, as by a spell,
Upon my brow — which would stain all its seas, 80
But which those seas could never wash away!
IONA TAURINA:
My Lord, I am ready — nay, I am impatient
To undergo the test.
[A GRACEFUL FIGURE IN A SEMI-TRANSPARENT VEIL PASSES UNNOTICED THROUGH
THE TEMPLE; THE WORD “LIBERTY” IS SEEN THROUGH THE VEIL, AS IF IT WERE
WRITTEN IN FIRE UPON ITS FOREHEAD. ITS WORDS ARE ALMOST DROWNED IN THE
FURIOUS GRUNTING OF THE PIGS, AND THE BUSINESS OF THE TRIAL. SHE
KNEELS ON THE STEPS OF THE ALTAR, AND SPEAKS IN TONES AT FIRST FAINT
AND LOW, BUT WHICH EVER BECOME LOUDER AND LOUDER.]
Mighty Empress! Death’s white wife!
Ghastly mother-in-law of Life! 85
By the God who made thee such,
By the magic of thy touch,
By the starving and the cramming
Of fasts and feasts! by thy dread self, O Famine!
I charge thee! when thou wake the multitude, 90
Thou lead them not upon the paths of blood.
The earth did never mean her foison
For those who crown life’s cup with poison
Of fanatic rage and meaningless revenge —
But for those radiant spirits, who are still 95
The standard-bearers in the van of Change.
Be they th’ appointed stewards, to fill
The lap of Pain, and Toil, and Age! —
Remit, O Queen! thy accustomed rage!
Be what thou art not! In voice faint and low 100
FREEDOM calls “Famine”, — her eternal foe,
To brief alliance, hollow truce. — Rise now!
[WHILST THE VEILED FIGURE HAS BEEN CHANTING THIS STROPHE, MAMMON, DAKRY, LAOCTONOS, AND SWELLFOOT, HAVE SURROUNDED IONA TAURINA, WHO, WITH HER HANDS FOLDED ON HER BREAST, AND HER EYES LIFTED TO HEAVEN, STANDS, AS WITH SAINT-LIKE RESIGNATION, TO WAIT THE ISSUE OF THE BUSINESS, IN PERFECT CONFIDENCE OF HER INNOCENCE.]
[PURGANAX, AFTER UNSEALING THE GREEN BAG, IS GRAVELY ABOUT TO POUR THE LIQUOR UPON HER HEAD, WHEN SUDDENLY THE WHOLE EXPRESSION OF HER FIGURE AND COUNTENANCE CHANGES; SHE SNATCHES IT FROM HIS HAND WITH A LOUD LAUGH OF TRIUMPH, AND EMPTIES IT OVER SWELLFOOT AND HIS WHOLE COURT, WHO ARE INSTANTLY CHANGED INTO A NUMBER OF FILTHY AND UGLY ANIMALS, AND RUSH OUT OF THE TEMPLE. THE IMAGE OF FAMINE THEN ARISES WITH A TREMENDOUS SOUND, THE PIGS BEGIN SCRAMBLING FOR THE LOAVES, AND ARE TRJPPED UP BY THE SKULLS; ALL THOSE WHO EAT THE LOAVES ARE TURNED INTO BULLS, AND ARRANGE THEMSELVES QUIETLY BEHIND THE ALTAR. THE IMAGE OF FAMINE SINKS THROUGH A CHASM IN THE EARTH, AND A MINOTAUR RISES.]
MINOTAUR:
I am the Ionian Minotaur, the mightiest
Of all Europa’s taurine progeny —
I am the old traditional Man-Bull; 105
And from my ancestors having been Ionian,
I am called Ion, which, by interpretation,
Is JOHN; in plain Theban, that is to say,
My name’s JOHN BULL; I am a famous hunter,
And can leaf any gate in all Boeotia, 110
Even the palings of the royal park,
Or double ditch about the new enclosures;
And if your Majesty will deign to mount me,
At least till you have hunted down your game,
I will not throw you. 115
IONA TAURINA [DURING THIS SPEECH SHE HAS BEEN PUTTING ON BOOTS AND
SPURS, AND A HUNTING-CAP, BUCKISHLY COCKED ON ONE SIDE, AND TUCKING UP
HER HAIR, SHE LEAPS NIMBLY ON HIS BACK]:
Hoa! hoa! tallyho! tallyho! ho! ho!
Come, let us hunt these ugly badgers down,
These stinking foxes, these devouring otters,
These hares, these wolves, these anything but men.
Hey, for a whipper-in! my loyal Pigs
Now let your noses be as keen as beagles’, 120
Your steps as swift as greyhounds’, and your cries
More dulcet and symphonious than the bells
Of village-towers, on sunshine holiday;
Wake all the dewy woods with jangling music.
Give them
no law (are they not beasts of blood?) 125
But such as they gave you. Tallyho! ho!
Through forest, furze, and bog, and den, and desert,
Pursue the ugly beasts! tallyho! ho!
FULL CHORUS OF I0NA AND THE SWINE:
Tallyho! tallyho!
Through rain, hail, and snow, 130
Through brake, gorse, and briar,
Through fen, flood, and mire,
We go! we go!
Tallyho! tallyho!
Through pond, ditch, and slough, 135
Wind them, and find them,
Like the Devil behind them,
Tallyho! tallyho!
[EXEUNT, IN FULL CRY; IONA DRIVING ON THE SWINE, WITH THE EMPTY GEEEN BAG.]
THE END.
HELLAS
A LYRICAL DRAMA.
MANTIS EIM EZTHLON AGONUN. — OEDIP. COLON.
This drama was composed at Pisa in the autumn of 1821, and dispatched to London, November 11. It was published, with the author’s name, by C. & J. Ollier in the spring of 1822. A transcript of the poem by Edward Williams is in the Rowfant Library. Ollier availed himself of Shelley’s permission to cancel certain passages in the notes; he also struck out certain lines of the text. These omissions were, some of them, restored in Galignani’s one-volume edition of “Coleridge, Shelley and Keats”, Paris, 1829, and also by Mrs. Shelley in the “Poetical Works”, 1839. A passage in the “Preface”, suppressed by Ollier, was restored by Mr. Buxton Forman (1892) from a proof copy of “Hellas” in his possession. The “Prologue to Hellas” was edited by Dr. Garnett in 1862 (“Relics of Shelley”) from the manuscripts at Boscombe Manor. Our text is that of the editio princeps, 1822, corrected by a list of “Errata” sent by Shelley to Ollier, April 11, 1822.
CONTENTS
PREFACE.
PROLOGUE TO HELLAS.
DRAMATIS PERSONAE:
HELLAS
TO HIS EXCELLENCY
PRINCE ALEXANDER MAVROCORDATO
LATE SECRETARY FOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS TO THE HOSPODAR OF WALLACHIA
THE DRAMA OF HELLAS IS INSCRIBED AS AN
IMPERFECT TOKEN OF THE ADMIRATION,
SYMPATHY, AND FRIENDSHIP OF
THE AUTHOR.
Pisa, November 1, 1821.
PREFACE.
The poem of “Hellas”, written at the suggestion of the events of the moment, is a mere improvise, and derives its interest (should it be found to possess any) solely from the intense sympathy which the Author feels with the cause he would celebrate.
The subject, in its present state, is insusceptible of being treated otherwise than lyrically, and if I have called this poem a drama from the circumstance of its being composed in dialogue, the licence is not greater than that which has been assumed by other poets who have called their productions epics, only because they have been divided into twelve or twenty-four books.
The “Persae” of Aeschylus afforded me the first model of my conception, although the decision of the glorious contest now waging in Greece being yet suspended forbids a catastrophe parallel to the return of Xerxes and the desolation of the Persians. I have, therefore, contented myself with exhibiting a series of lyric pictures, and with having wrought upon the curtain of futurity, which falls upon the unfinished scene, such figures of indistinct and visionary delineation as suggest the final triumph of the Greek cause as a portion of the cause of civilisation and social improvement.
The drama (if drama it must be called) is, however, so inartificial that I doubt whether, if recited on the Thespian waggon to an Athenian village at the Dionysiaca, it would have obtained the prize of the goat. I shall bear with equanimity any punishment, greater than the loss of such a reward, which the Aristarchi of the hour may think fit to inflict.
The only “goat-song” which I have yet attempted has, I confess, in spite of the unfavourable nature of the subject, received a greater and a more valuable portion of applause than I expected or than it deserved.
Common fame is the only authority which I can allege for the details which form the basis of the poem, and I must trespass upon the forgiveness of my readers for the display of newspaper erudition to which I have been reduced. Undoubtedly, until the conclusion of the war, it will be impossible to obtain an account of it sufficiently authentic for historical materials; but poets have their privilege, and it is unquestionable that actions of the most exalted courage have been performed by the Greeks — that they have gained more than one naval victory, and that their defeat in Wallachia was signalized by circumstances of heroism more glorious even than victory.
The apathy of the rulers of the civilised world to the astonishing circumstance of the descendants of that nation to which they owe their civilisation, rising as it were from the ashes of their ruin, is something perfectly inexplicable to a mere spectator of the shows of this mortal scene. We are all Greeks. Our laws, our literature, our religion, our arts have their root in Greece. But for Greece — Rome, the instructor, the conqueror, or the metropolis of our ancestors, would have spread no illumination with her arms, and we might still have been savages and idolaters; or, what is worse, might have arrived at such a stagnant and miserable state of social institution as China and Japan possess.
The human form and the human mind attained to a perfection in Greece which has impressed its image on those faultless productions, whose very fragments are the despair of modern art, and has propagated impulses which cannot cease, through a thousand channels of manifest or imperceptible operation, to ennoble and delight mankind until the extinction of the race.
The modern Greek is the descendant of those glorious beings whom the imagination almost refuses to figure to itself as belonging to our kind, and he inherits much of their sensibility, their rapidity of conception, their enthusiasm, and their courage. If in many instances he is degraded by moral and political slavery to the practice of the basest vices it engenders — and that below the level of ordinary degradation — let us reflect that the corruption of the best produces the worst, and that habits which subsist only in relation to a peculiar state of social institution may be expected to cease as soon as that relation is dissolved. In fact, the Greeks, since the admirable novel of Anastasius could have been a faithful picture of their manners, have undergone most important changes; the flower of their youth, returning to their country from the universities of Italy, Germany, and France, have communicated to their fellow-citizens the latest results of that social perfection of which their ancestors were the original source. The University of Chios contained before the breaking out of the revolution eight hundred students, and among them several Germans and Americans. The munificence and energy of many of the Greek princes and merchants, directed to the renovation of their country with a spirit and a wisdom which has few examples, is above all praise.
The English permit their own oppressors to act according to their natural sympathy with the Turkish tyrant, and to brand upon their name the indelible blot of an alliance with the enemies of domestic happiness, of Christianity and civilisation.
Russia desires to possess, not to liberate Greece; and is contented to see the Turks, its natural enemies, and the Greeks, its intended slaves, enfeeble each other until one or both fall into its net. The wise and generous policy of England would have consisted in establishing the independence of Greece, and in maintaining it both against Russia and the Turk; — but when was the oppressor generous or just?
[Should the English people ever become free, they will reflect upon the part which those who presume to represent their will have played in the great drama of the revival of liberty, with feelings which it would become them to anticipate. This is the age of the war of the oppressed against the oppressors, and every one of those ringleaders of the privileged gangs of murderers and swindlers, called Sovereigns, look to each other for aid against the common enemy, and suspend their mutual jealousies in the presence of a mightier fear. Of this holy alliance all the despots of the earth are virtual members. But a new race has arise
n throughout Europe, nursed in the abhorrence of the opinions which are its chains, and she will continue to produce fresh generations to accomplish that destiny which tyrants foresee and dread. (This paragraph, suppressed in 1822 by Charles Ollier, was first restored in 1892 by Mr. Buxton Forman [“Poetical Works of P. B. S.”, volume 4 pages 40-41] from a proof copy of Hellas in his possession.]
The Spanish Peninsula is already free. France is tranquil in the enjoyment of a partial exemption from the abuses which its unnatural and feeble government are vainly attempting to revive. The seed of blood and misery has been sown in Italy, and a more vigorous race is arising to go forth to the harvest. The world waits only the news of a revolution of Germany to see the tyrants who have pinnacled themselves on its supineness precipitated into the ruin from which they shall never arise. Well do these destroyers of mankind know their enemy, when they impute the insurrection in Greece to the same spirit before which they tremble throughout the rest of Europe, and that enemy well knows the power and the cunning of its opponents, and watches the moment of their approaching weakness and inevitable division to wrest the bloody sceptres from their grasp.
PROLOGUE TO HELLAS.
HERALD OF ETERNITY:
It is the day when all the sons of God
Wait in the roofless senate-house, whose floor
Is Chaos, and the immovable abyss
Frozen by His steadfast word to hyaline
The shadow of God, and delegate 5
Of that before whose breath the universe
Is as a print of dew.
Hierarchs and kings
Who from your thrones pinnacled on the past
Sway the reluctant present, ye who sit
Pavilioned on the radiance or the gloom 10
Of mortal thought, which like an exhalation
Steaming from earth, conceals the … of heaven
Which gave it birth. … assemble here
Before your Father’s throne; the swift decree
Yet hovers, and the fiery incarnation 15
Is yet withheld, clothed in which it shall
annul
The fairest of those wandering isles that gem
The sapphire space of interstellar air,
That green and azure sphere, that earth enwrapped 20
Less in the beauty of its tender light
Than in an atmosphere of living spirit
Percy Bysshe Shelley Page 118