Page:The poems of Gaius Valerius Catullus - Francis Warre Cornish.djvu/111



'tears thee from me, unwilling me, whose failing 'eyes are not yet satisfied with the dear image ' of my son, I will not let thee go gladly with ' cheerful heart, nor suffer thee to bear the tokens of ' prosperous fortune: but first will bring forth many ' laments from my heart, soiling my gray hairs with 'earth and showered dust: thereafter will I hang ' dyed sails on thy roving mast, that so the tale of ' my grief and the fire that burns in my heart may ' be marked by the canvas stained with Iberian 'azure. But if she who dwells in holy Itonus, who 'vouchsafes to defend our race and the abodes of ' Erechtheus, shall grant thee to sprinkle thy right 'hand with the bull's blood, then be sure that these ' biddings live, laid up in thy mindful heart, and ' that no length of time blur them: that as soon as ' thy eyes shall come within sight of our hills, thy 'yardarms may lay down from them their mourning ' raiment, and the twisted cordage raise a white sail: ' that so I may see at once and gladly welcome the ' signs of joy, when a happy hour shall set thee here ' in thy home again.'

These biddings at first did Theseus preserve with constant mind; but then they left him, as clouds driven by the blast of the winds leave the lofty head of the snowy mountain. But the father, as he gazed out from his tower top, wasting his eyes care-worn in constant tear-floods, when first he saw the canvas of the bellying sail, threw himself headlong from the summit of the rocks, believing Theseus destroyed by ruthless fate. Thus bold Theseus, as he entered the chambers of his home, darkened with mourning for his father's death, himself received such grief as by forgetful ness of heart he had caused to the daughter of Minos. And she