Ent’ring the fields, first let my vows call on
The Muses’ whole quire out of Helicon
Into my heart, for such a poem’s sake,
As lately I did in my tables take,
And put into report upon my knees.
A fight so fierce, as might in all degrees
Fit Mars himself, and his tumultuous hand,
Glorying to dart to th’ ears of every land
Of all the voice-divided;[1] and to show
How bravely did both Frogs and Mice bestow
In glorious fight their forces, even the deeds
Daring to imitate of Earth’s Giant Seeds.
Thus then men talk’d; this seed the strife begat:
The Mouse once dry, and ’scaped the dangerous cat,
Drench’d in the neighbour lake her tender beard,
To taste the sweetness of the wave it rear’d.
The far-famed Fen-affecter, seeing him, said:
“Ho, stranger! What are you, and whence, that tread
This shore of ours? Who brought you forth? Reply
What truth may witness, lest I find you lie.
If worth fruition of my love and me,
I’ll have thee home, and hospitality
Of feast and gift, good and magnificent,
Bestow on thee; for all this confluent
Resounds my royalty; my name, the great
In blown-up-count’nances and looks of threat,
Physignathus,[2] adored of all Frogs here
All their days’ durance, and the empire bear
Of all their beings; mine own being begot
By royal Peleus,[3] mix’d in nuptial knot
With fair Hydromedusa,[4] on the bounds
Near which Eridanus[5] his race resounds.
And thee mine eye makes my conceit inclined
To reckon powerful both in form and mind,
A sceptre-bearer, and past others far
Advanc’d in all the fiery fights of war.
Come then, thy race to my renown commend.”
The Mouse made answer: “Why inquires my friend?
For what so well know men and Deities,
And all the wing’d affecters of the skies?
Psicharpax[6] I am call’d; Troxartes’[7] seed,
Surnamed the mighty-minded. She that freed
Mine eyes from darkness was Lichomyle,[8]
King Pternotroctes’[9] daughter, showing me,
Within an aged hovel, the young light,
Fed me with figs and nuts, and all the height
Of varied viands. But unfold the cause,
Why, ’gainst similitude’s most equal laws
Observed in friendship, thou mak’st me thy friend?
Thy life the waters only help t’ extend;
Mine, whatsoever men are used to eat,
Takes part with them at shore; their purest cheat,
Thrice boulted, kneaded, and subdued in paste,
In clean round kymnels, cannot be so fast
From my approaches kept but in I eat;
Nor cheesecakes full of finest Indian wheat,
That crusty-weeds[10] wear, large as ladies’ trains;
Liverings,[11] white-skinn’d as ladies; nor the strains,
Of press’d milk, renneted; nor collops cut
Fresh from the flitch; nor junkets, such as put
Palates divine in appetite; nor any
Of all men’s delicates, though ne’er so many
Their cooks devise them, who each dish see deckt
With all the dainties all strange soils affect.[12]
Yet am I not so sensual to fly
Of fields embattled the most fiery cry,
But rush out straight, and with the first in fight
Mix in adventure. No man with affright
Can daunt my forces, though his body be
or never so immense a quantity,
But making up, even to his bed, access,
His fingers’ ends dare with my teeth compress,
His feet taint likewise, and so soft seize both
They shall not taste th’ impression of a tooth.
Sweet sleep shall hold his own in every eye
Where my tooth takes his tartest liberty.
But two there are, that always, far and near,
Extremely still control my force with fear,
The Cat, and Night-hawk, who much scathe confer
On all the outrays where for food I err.
Together with the straits-still-keeping trap,[13]
Where lurks deceitful and set-spleen’d mishap.
But most of all the Cat constrains my fear,
Being ever apt t’ assault me everywhere;
For by that hole that hope says I shall ’scape,
At that hole ever she commits my rape.
The best is yet, I eat no pot-herb grass,
Nor radishes, nor coloquintidas,
Nor still-green beets, nor parsley; which you make
Your dainties still, that live upon the lake.”
The Frog replied: “Stranger, your boasts creep all
Upon their bellies; though to our lives fall
Much more miraculous meats by lake and land,
Jove tend’ring our lives with a twofold hand,
Enabling us to leap ashore for food,
And hide us straight in our retreatful flood.
Which, if you will serve, you may prove with ease.
I’ll take you on my shoulders; which fast seize,
If safe arrival at my house y’ intend.”
He stoop’d, and thither spritely did ascend,
Clasping his golden neck, that easy seat
Gave to his sally; who was jocund yet,
Seeing the safe harbours of the king so near,
And he a swimmer so exempt from peer.
But when he sunk into the purple wave,
He mourn’d extremely, and did much deprave
Unprofitable penitence; his hair
Tore by the roots up, labour’d for the air
With his feet fetch’d up to his belly close;
His heart within him panted out repose,
For th’ insolent plight in which his state did stand;
Sigh’d bitterly, and long’d to greet the land,
Forced by the dire need of his freezing fear.
First, on the waters he his tail did stere,
Like to a stern; then drew it like an oar,
Still praying the Gods to set him safe ashore;
Yet sunk he midst the red waves more and more,
And laid a throat out to his utmost height;
Yet in forced speech he made his peril slight,
And thus his glory with his grievance strove:
“Not in such choice state was the charge of love
Borne by the bull, when to the Cretan shore
He swum Europa through the wavy roar,
As this Frog ferries me, his pallid breast
Bravely advancing, and his verdant crest
(Submitted to my seat) made my support,
Through his white waters, to his royal court.”
But on the sudden did apparance make
An horrid spectacle,—a Water-snake
Thrusting his freckled neck above the lake.
Which seen to both, away Physignathus
Dived to his deeps, as no way conscious
Of whom he left to perish in his lake,
But shunn’d black fate himself, and let him take
The blackest of it; who amidst the fen
Swum with his breast up, hands held up in vain,
Cried _Peepe_, and perish’d; sunk the waters oft,
And often with his sprawlings came aloft,
Yet no way kept down death’s relentless force,
But, full of water, made an heavy corse.
Before he perish’d yet, he threaten’d thus:
“Thou lurk’st not yet from heaven, Physignathus,
Though yet thou hid’st here, that hast cast from thee,
As from a rock, the shipwrack’d life of me,
Though thou thyself no better was than I,
O worst of things, at any faculty,
Wrastling or race. But, for thy perfidy
In this my wrack, Jove bears a wreakful eye;
And to the host of Mice thou pains shalt pay,
Past all evasion.” This his life let say,
And left him to the waters. Him beheld
Lichopinax,[14] placed in the pleasing field,
Who shriek’d extremely, ran and told the Mice;
Who having heard his wat’ry destinies,
Pernicious anger pierced the hearts of all,
And then their heralds forth they sent to call
A council early, at Troxartes’ house,
Sad father of this fatal shipwrack’d Mouse;
Whose dead corse upwards swum along the lake,
Nor yet, poor wretch, could be enforced to make
The shore his harbour, but the mid-main Swum.
When now, all haste made, with first morn did come
All to set council; in which first rais’d head
Troxartes, angry for his son, and said:
“O friends, though I alone may seem to bear
All the infortune, yet may all met here
Account it their case. But ’tis true, I am
In chief unhappy, that a triple flame
Of life feel put forth, in three famous sons;
The first, the chief in our confusions,
The Cat, made rape of, caught without his hole:
The second, Man, made with a cruel soul,
Brought to his ruin with a new-found sleight,
And a most wooden engine of deceit,
They term a Trap, mere murth’ress of our Mice.
The last, that in my love held special price,
And his rare mother’s, this Physignathus
(With false pretext of wafting to his house)
Strangled in chief deeps of his bloody stream.
Come then, haste all, and issue out on them,
Our bodies deck’d in our Dædalean arms.”
This said, his words thrust all up in alarms,
And Mars himself, that serves the cure of war,
Made all in their appropriates circular.
First on each leg the green shales of a bean
They closed for boots, that sat exceeding clean;[15]
The shales they broke ope, boothaling by night,
And ate the beans; their jacks art exquisite
Had shown in them, being cats’ skins, everywhere
Quilted with quills; their fenceful bucklers were
The middle rounds of can’sticks; but their spear
A huge long needle was, that could not bear
The brain of any but be Mars his own
Mortal invention; their heads’ arming crown
Was vessel to the kernel of a nut.
And thus the Mice their powers in armour put.
This the Frogs hearing, from the water all
Issue to one place, and a council call
Of wicked war; consulting what should be
Cause to this murmur and strange mutiny.
While this was question’d, near them made his stand
An herald with a sceptre in his hand,
Embasichytrus[16] call’d, that fetch’d his kind
From Tyroglyphus[17] with the mighty mind,
Denouncing ill-named war in these high terms:
“O Frogs! the Mice send threats to you of arms,
And bid me bid ye battle and fix’d fight;
Their eyes all wounded with Psicharpax’ sight
Floating your waters, whom your king hath kill’d,
And therefore all prepare for force of field,
You that are best born whosoever held.”
This said, he sever’d: his speech firing th’ ears
Of all the Mice, but freez’d the Frogs with fears,
Themselves conceiting guilty; whom the king
Thus answer’d, rising, “Friends! I did not bring
Psicharpax to his end; he, wantoning
Upon our waters, practising to swim,
Aped us,[18] and drown’d without my sight of him.
And yet these worst of vermin accuse me,
Though no way guilty. Come, consider we
How we may ruin these deceitful Mice.
For my part, I give voice to this advice,
As seeming fittest to direct our deeds:
Our bodies decking with our arming weeds,
Let all our pow’rs stand rais’d in steep’st repose
Of all our shore; that, when they charge us close,
We may the helms snatch off from all so deckt,
Daring our onset, and them all deject
Down to our waters; who, not knowing the sleight.
To dive our soft deeps, may be strangled straight,
And we triumphing may a trophy rear,
Of all the Mice that we have slaughter’d here.”
These words put all in arms; and mallow leaves
They drew upon their legs, for arming greaves.[19]
Their curets, broad green beets; their bucklers were
Good thick-leaved cabbage, proof ’gainst any spear;
Their spears sharp bulrushes, of which were all
Fitted with long ones; their parts capital
They hid in subtle cockleshells from blows.
And thus all arm’d, the steepest shores they chose
T’ encamp themselves; where lance with lance they lined,
And brandish’d bravely, each Frog full of mind.
Then Jove call’d all Gods in his flaming throne,
And show’d all all this preparation
For resolute war; these able soldiers,
Many, and great, all shaking lengthful spears,
In show like Centaurs, Or the Giants’ host.
When, sweetly smiling, he inquired who, most
Of all th’ Immortals, pleased to add their aid
To Frogs or Mice; and thus to Pallas said:
“O Daughter! Must not your needs aid these Mice,
That, with the odours and meat sacrifice
Used in your temple, endless triumphs make,
And serve you for your sacred victuals’ sake?”
Pallas replied: “O Father, never I
Will aid the Mice in any misery.
So many mischiefs by them I have found,
Eating the cotton that my distaffs crown’d,[20]
My lamps still haunting to devour the oil.
But that which most my mind eats, is their spoil
Made of a veil, that me in much did stand,
On which bestowing an elaborate hand,
A fine woof working of as pure a thread;
Such holes therein their petulancies fed
That, putting it to darning, when ’twas done,
The darner a most dear pay stood upon
For his so dear pains, laid down instantly;
Or, to forbear, exacted usury.[21]
So, borrowing from my fane the weed I wove,
I can by no means th’ usurous darner move
To let me have the mantle to restore.
And this is it that rubs the angry sore
Of my offence took at these petulant Mice.
Nor will I yield the Frogs’ wants my supplies,
For their infirm minds that no confines keep;
For I from war retir’d, and wanting sleep,
All leap’d ashore in tumult, nor would stay
Till one wink seized mine eyes, and so I lay
Sleepless, and pain’d with headache, till first light
The cock had crow’d up. Therefore, to the fight
Let no God go assistant, lest a lance
Wound whosoever offers to advance,
Or wishes but their aid, that scorn all foes;
Should any God’s access their spirits oppose.
Sit we then pleased to see from heaven their fight.”
She said, and all Gods join’d in her delight.
And now both hosts to one field drew the jar,
Both heralds bearing the ostents of war.
And then the wine-gnats,[22] that shrill trumpets sound,
Terribly rung out the encounter round;
Jove thund’red; all heaven sad war’s sign resounded.
And first Hypsiboas[23] Lichenor[24] wounded,
Standing th’ impression of the first in fight.
His lance did in his liver’s midst alight,
Along his belly. Down he fell; his face
His fall on that part sway’d, and all the grace
Of his soft hair fil’d with disgraceful dust.
Then Troglodytes[25] his thick javelin thrust
In Pelion’s[26] bosom, bearing him to ground,
Whom sad death seiz’d; his soul flew through his wound.
Seutlæus[27] next Embasichytros slew,
His heart through-thrusting. Then Artophagus[28] threw
His lance at Polyphon,[29] and struck him quite
Through his mid-belly; down he fell upright,
And from his fair limbs took his soul her flight.
Limnocharis,[30] beholding Polyphon
Thus done to death, did, with as round a stone
As that the mill turns, Troglodytes wound,
Near his mid-neck, ere he his onset found;
Whose eyes sad darkness seiz’d. Lichenor[31] cast
A flying dart off, and his aim so placed
Upon Limnocharis; that sure he thought[32]
The wound he wish’d him; nor untruly wrought
The dire success, for through his liver flew
The fatal lance; which when Crambophagus[33] knew,
Down the deep waves near shore he, diving, fled;
But fled not fate so; the stern enemy fed
Death with his life in diving; never more
The air he drew in; his vermilion gore
Stain’d all the waters, and along the shore
He laid extended; his fat entrails lay
(By his small guts’ impulsion) breaking way
Out at his wound. Limnisius[34] near the shore
Destroy’d Tyroglyphus. Which frighted sore
The soul of Calaminth,[35] seeing coming on,
For wreak, Pternoglyphus;[36] who got him gone
With large leaps to the lake, his target thrown
Into the waters. Hydrocharis[37] slew
King Pternophagus,[38] at whose throat he threw
A huge stone, strook it high, and beat his brain
Out at his nostrils. Earth blush’d with the stain
His blood made on her bosom. For next prise,
Lichopinax to death did sacrifice
Borboroccetes’[39] faultless faculties;
His lance enforced it; darkness closed his eyes.
On which when Prassophagus[40] cast his look,
Cnissodioctes[41] by the heels he took,
Dragg’d him to fen from off his native ground,
Then seized his throat, and soused him till he drown’d
But now Psicharpax wreaks his fellows’ deaths,
And in the bosom of Pelusius[42] sheaths,
In centre of his liver, his bright lance.
He fell before the author of the chance;
His soul to hell fled. Which Pelobates[43]
Taking sad note of, wreakfully did seize
His hand’s gripe full of mud, and all besmear’d
His forehead with it so, that scarce appear’d
The light to him. Which certainly incensed
His fiery spleen; who with his wreak dispensed
No point of time, but rear’d with his strong hand
A stone so massy it oppress’d the land,
And hurl’d it at him; when below the knee
It strook his right leg so impetuously
It piecemeal brake it; he the dust did seize,
Upwards everted. But Craugasides[44]
Revenged his death, and at his enemy
Discharged a dart that did his point imply
In his mid-belly. All the sharp-pil’d spear
Got after in, and did before it bear
His universal entrails to the earth,
Soon as his swoln hand gave his jav’lin birth.
Sitophagus,[45] beholding the sad sight,
Set on the shore, went halting from the fight,
Vex’d with his wounds extremely; and, to make
Way from extreme fate, leap’d into the lake.
Troxartes strook, in th’ instep’s upper part,
Physignathus; who (privy to the smart
His wound imparted) with his utmost haste
Leap’d to the lake, and fled. Troxartes cast
His eye upon the foe that fell before,
And, seeing him half-liv’d, long’d again to gore
His gutless bosom; and, to kill him quite,
Ran fiercely at him. Which Prassseus’[46] sight
Took instant note of, and the first in fight
Thrust desp’rate way through, casting his keen lance
Off at Troxartes; whose shield turn’d th’ advance
The sharp head made, and check’d the mortal chance.
Amongst the Mice fought an egregious
Young springall, and a close-encount’ring Mouse,
Pure Artepibulus’s[47] dear descent;
A prince that Mars himself show’d where he went.
(Call’d Meridarpax,[48]) of so huge a might,
That only he still domineer’d in fight
Of all the Mouse-host. He advancing close
Up to the lake, past all the rest arose
In glorious object, and made vaunt that he
Came to depopulate all the progeny
Of Frogs, affected with the lance of war.
And certainly he had put on as far
As he advanced his vaunt, he was endu’d
With so unmatch’d a force and fortitude,
Had not the Father both of Gods and men
Instantly known it, and the Frogs, even then
Given up to ruin, rescued with remorse.
Who, his head moving, thus began discourse:
“No mean amaze affects me, to behold
Prince Meridarpax rage so uncontroll’d,
In thirst of Frog-blood, all along the lake.
Come therefore still, and all addression make,
Despatching Pallas, with tumultuous Mars,
Down to the field, to make him leave the wars,
How potently soever he be said[49]
Where he attempts once to uphold his head.”
Mars answer’d: “O Jove, neither She nor I,
With both our aids, can keep depopulacy
From off the Frogs! And therefore arm we all,
Even thy lance letting brandish to his call
From off the field, that from the field withdrew
The Titanois, the Titanois that slew,
Though most exempt from match of all earth’s Seeds,
So great and so inaccessible deeds
It hath proclaim’d to men; bound hand and foot
The vast Enceladus; and rac’d by th’ root
The race of upland Giants.” This speech past,
Saturnius a smoking lightning cast
Amongst the armies, thund’ring then so sore,
That with a rapting circumflex he bore
All huge heaven over. But the terrible ire
Of his dart, sent abroad, all wrapt in fire,
(Which certainly his very finger was)
Amazed both Mice and Frogs. Yet soon let pass
Was all this by the Mice, who much the more
Burn’d in desire t’ exterminate the store
Of all those lance-loved soldiers. Which had been,
If from Olympus Jove’s eye had not seen
The Frogs with pity, and with instant speed
Sent them assistants. Who, ere any heed
Was given to their approach, came crawling on
With anvils on their backs, that, beat upon[50]
Never so much, are never wearied yet;
Crook-paw’d, and wrested on with foul cloven feet,
Tongues in their mouths,[51] brick-back’d, all over bone,
Broad shoulder’d, whence a ruddy yellow shone,
Distorted, and small-thigh’d; had eyes that saw
Out at their bosoms; twice four feet did draw
About their bodies; strong-neck’d, whence did rise
Two heads; nor could to any hand be prise;
They call them lobsters; that ate from the Mice
Their tails, their feet, and hands, and wrested all
Their lances from them, so that cold appall
The wretches put in rout, past all return.
And now the Fount of Light forbore to burn
Above the earth; when, which men’s laws commend,
Our battle in one day took absolute end.