78
REMAINS OF HESIOD.
The larger cargo doubles every gain,
Let but the winds their adverse blasts restrain.
If thy rash thoughts on merchandise be placed,
Lest debts ensnare or joyless hunger waste,
Learn now the courses of the roaring sea,
Though ships and voyages are strange to me.
Ne'er o'er the sea's broad way[1] my course I bore
Save once from Aulis to th' Eubœan shore:
From Aulis, where the Greeks in days of yore,
The winds awaiting, kept the harbouring shore:
From sacred Greece a mighty army there
Lay bound for Troy, wide famed for women fair.
Let but the winds their adverse blasts restrain.
If thy rash thoughts on merchandise be placed,
Lest debts ensnare or joyless hunger waste,
Learn now the courses of the roaring sea,
Though ships and voyages are strange to me.
Ne'er o'er the sea's broad way[1] my course I bore
Save once from Aulis to th' Eubœan shore:
From Aulis, where the Greeks in days of yore,
The winds awaiting, kept the harbouring shore:
From sacred Greece a mighty army there
Lay bound for Troy, wide famed for women fair.
- ↑ O'er the sea's broad way.] From the following extracts it will not appear extraordinary that this prodigious voyage of Hesiod should have afforded him but little opportunity of acquiring a practical knowledge of navigation. On an inspection of the map we must, however, concede that the passage from Aulis direct to Chalcis is somewhat wider than the part of the strait crossed by a draw-bridge.
"Elle (Chalcis) est située dans un endroit où à la faveur de deux promontoires qui's'avançent de part et d'autre, les côtes de l'île touchent presque à celles de Bèotie.
"Ce leger intervalle, qu'on appelle Euripe, est en partie comblé par une digue. A chacune de ses extrémités est une tour pour le défendre, et un pont-lever pour laisser passer un vaisseau."Barthelemy, Voyages d'Anacharsis, tom. ii. p. 82.
