“LET us turn hitherward our bark,” they cried,
“And, ’mid the blisses of this happy isle,
Past toil forgetting and to come, abide
In joyfulness awhile.
And then, refreshed, our tasks resume again,
If other tasks we yet are bound unto,
Combing the hoary tresses of the main
With sharp swift keel anew.”
O heroes, that had once a nobler aim,
O heroes, sprung from many a godlike line,
What will ye do, unmindful of your fame,
And of your race divine?
But they, by these prevailing voices now
Lured, evermore draw nearer to the land,
Nor saw the wrecks of many a goodly prow,
That strewed that fatal strand;
Or seeing, feared not—warning taking none
From the plain doom of all who went before,
Whose bones lay bleaching in the wind and sun,
And whitened all the shore.
“QUIN HUC, FREMEBANT.”
“QUIN huc,” fremebant, “dirigimus ratem:
Hic, dote læti divitis insulæ,
Paullisper hæremus, futuri
Nec memores operis, nec acti:
“Curas refecti cras iterabimus,
Si qua supersunt emeritis novæ
Pexisse pernices acuta
Canitiem pelagi carina.”
O rebus olim nobilioribus
Pares: origo Dî quibus ac Deæ
Heroës! oblitine famiæ
Hæc struitis, generisque summi?
Atqui propinquant jam magis ac magis,
Ducti magistra voce, solum: neque
Videre prorarum nefandas
Fragmina nobilium per oras;
Vidisse seu non poenitet—ominis
Incuriosos tot præëuntium,
Quorum ossa sol siccantque venti,
Candet adhuc quibus omnis ora.