Page:The Dramas of Aeschylus (Swanwick).djvu/499

Rh That heavenly meadow fed from snow,

O'erswept by Typhon's strength,

And by the bale-averting flow

Of Neilos' water;—there, at length,

Frenzied she comes by toils unseemly spent,

And goading pangs by jealous Hera sent.

And mortals who the land possessed,

While pallid terror shook their breast,

Amazed a shape unwonted saw,—

Half heifer and half maid,

Mortal and brute, bi-formed. With awe,

The wondrous portent they surveyed.

Whó then was he who gently soothed to rest

Far-roaming Io, brize-stung, sore distrest?

Zeus, lord of ceaseless ages, thine,

Oh thine was that unharming might!

The breathing of thy love divine

Arrests at length her toilsome flight,

And gently, with the mournful tide

Of modest tears, her woes subside.

Then, as Fame truly tells, receiving there

Thy germ divine, her blameless child she bare,

From age to age supremely blest.

Hence the whole earth proclaims, "this seed