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Till now by torrent Phlegethon she stays,
Her torch full feeding with its fiery blaze.
'Twas thus, when Ceres to the crater came,
She plunged each cypress in its jaws of flame;
All outlet closing with their bulky mass,
The flood forbidding on its way to pass.
Then raged the prisoned fires—deep thunders roll'd—
The struggling vapours would not be controll'd:
Bright glow'd the cone-crown'd tops: new ashes crowd
Etna's old heaps; the boughs are crackling loud.
These, for her nightly wanderings to provide,
She unextinct commanded to abide:
And steep'd the timber in mysterious juice,
Long time by Phœbus and the Moon in use,
Upon his steeds—her steers—their brightness to produce.
Now o'er the earth, by weary mortals hail'd,
Deep night and silence in their turn prevail'd.
Prepared her toilsome journey to commence,
Her breast she rends, and cries, departing thence,
"Not these the torches, daughter ever dear,
My mother's heart had hoped for thee to rear;
But such as gleam mid festive pomp and song,
When echoing heavens the nuptial strain prolong.
No, none amongst us, though of race divine,
Can 'scape the meshes which the Fates entwine.
