Page:Ovid's Metamorphoses (Vol. 1) - tr Garth, Dryden, et. al. (1727).djvu/298

214 Your Father's Life and Health is in your Hand, And can ye thus like idle Gazers stand? Unless you are of common Sense bereft, If yet one Spark of Piety is left, Dispatch a Father's Cure, and disengage The Monarch from his toilsome Load of Age: Come—drench your Weapons in his putrid Gore; 'Tis Charity to wound, when Wounding will restore. Thus urg'd, the poor deluded Maids proceed, Betray'd by Zeal, to an inhumane Deed, And, in Compassion, make a Father bleed. Yes, she who had the kindest, tend'rest Heart, Is foremost to perform the bloody Part. Yet, tho' to act the Butchery betray'd, They could not bear to see the Wounds they made; With Looks averted, backward they advance, Then strike, and stab, and leave the Blows to Chance. Waking in Consternation, he essays (Weltring in Blood) his feeble Arms to raise: Environ'd with so many Swords—From whence This barb'rous Usage? what is my Offence? What fatal Fury, what infernal Charm, 'Gainst a kind Father does his Daughters arm? Hearing his Voice, as Thunder-struck, they stopt, Their Resolution, and their Weapons dropt: Medea then the mortal Blow bestows, And that perform'd, the tragick Scene to close, His Corpse into the boiling Cauldron throws. Then, dreading the Revenge that must ensue, High mounted on her Dragon-Coach she flew; And in her stately Progress thro' the Skies, Beneath her shady Pelion first she spies, With Othrys, that above the Clouds did rise; With skilful Chiron's Cave, and neighb'ring Ground, For old Cerambus' strange Escape renown'd, By Nymphs deliver'd, when the World was drown'd; Who