Page:The Iliad and Odyssey of Homer (IA iliadodysseyofho02home).pdf/432

424 Around Icarius' daughter; on her couch Reclining, soon as she reclin'd, she dozed, And yielded to soft slumber all her frame. Then, that the suitors might admire her more, The glorious Goddess cloath'd her, as she lay, With beauty of the skies; her lovely face She with ambrosia purified, with such As Cytherea chaplet-crown'd employs Herself, when in the eye-ensnaring dance She joins the Graces; to a statelier height Beneath her touch, and ampler size she grew, And fairer than the elephantine bone Fresh from the carver's hand. These gifts conferr'd Divine, the awful Deity retired. And now, loud-prattling as they came, arrived Her handmaids; sleep forsook her at the sound, She wiped away a tear, and thus she said. Me gentle sleep, sad mourner as I am, Hath here involved. O would that by a death As gentle chaste Diana would herself This moment set me free, that I might waste My life no longer in heart-felt regret Of a lamented husband's various worth And virtue, for in Greece no Peer had he! She said, and through her chambers' stately door Issuing, descended; neither went she sole, But with those two fair menials of her train. Arriving, most majestic of her sex,