That she should be the offspring of Phœbus too, in a place where the
sun’s rays have so much power, was a well-imagined fable one may _feel_;
and her instructions to Ulysses for his succeeding voyage, just, apt,
and proper: enjoining him a prayer to Crateis the mother of Scylla, to
pacify her rapacious daughter’s fury, is the least intelligible of all
Circe’s advice, to me. But when I saw the nasty trick they had at Naples,
of spreading out the ox-hides to dry upon the sea shore, as one drives to
Portici; the Sicilian herds, mentioned in the Odyssey, and their crawling
skins, came into my head in a moment.
We have left these scenes of fabulous wonder and real pleasure however;
left the warm vestiges of classic story, and places which have produced
the noblest efforts of the human mind; places which have served as no
ignoble themes for truly immortal song; all quitted now! all left for
recollection to muse on, and for fancy to combine: but these eyes I fear
will never more survey them. Well! no matter--
When like the baseless fabric of a vision,
The cloud-capt tow’rs, the gorgeous palaces,
The solemn temples, the great globe itself,
Yea all which it inherit, shall dissolve;
And like some unsubstantial pageant faded
Leave not a wreck behind.