Page:The Iliad and Odyssey of Homer (IA iliadodysseyofho02home).pdf/249

Book X. Your mast erected, and your canvas white Unfurl'd, sit thou; the breathing North shall waft Thy vessel on. But when ye shall have cross'd The broad expanse of Ocean, and shall reach The oozy shore, where grow the poplar groves And fruitless willows wan of Proserpine, Push thither through the gulphy Deep thy bark, And, landing, haste to Pluto's murky abode. There, into Acheron runs not alone Dread Pyriphlegethon, but Cocytus loud, From Styx derived; there also stands a rock, At whose broad base the roaring rivers meet. There, thrusting, as I bid, thy bark ashore, O Hero! scoop the soil, op'ning a trench Ell-broad on ev'ry side; then pour around Libation consecrate to all the dead, First, milk with honey mixt, then luscious wine, Then water, sprinkling, last, meal over all. Next, supplicate the unsubstantial forms Fervently of the dead, vowing to slay, (Return'd to Ithaca) in thy own house, An heifer barren yet, fairest and best Of all thy herds, and to enrich the pile With delicacies such as please the shades; But, in peculiar, to Tiresias vow A sable ram, noblest of all thy flocks. When thus thou hast propitiated with pray'r