MERCURY

I have. This can you see? not study how to help? Great Jove I will: But thus conditioned, you will interpose Your awful power betwixt me and Juno's hate. Then Argus die; One fatal stroke shall shut and hundred eyes. This shape may prove suspectless, and the fittest To cloud a godhead in; my plumed hat And feathered sandals, by the which I am known, I have left at foot of this descending hill: My snaky Rod I have to this sheephook turned. Accommodated thus, to Argus now, Aristors son: behooves him keep good watch, Whom Mercury (Jove's son) intends to catch. But Many-eyes have spied me. The servant to the great Saturnia Does me no common grace. What shepherd but not only knows your name, ut fears your strength? First resolve me; S that fair heifer of some neighbour heard, You drag thus in and halter? Argus, not possible. But what if Some goddess should live in this shape disguised, To whom you are so churlish. I could tell you A story to that end. Thus the Pierides report: The Giants Assembled and made war against the gods, Heap Ossa upon Pelion, Caucasus Upon Pernassus, Pindus above them; Hill upon mountain, mountain upon hill, Till they had made a scale that reach to heaven. The conflict then began: the monstrous Typhon Was Captain of the Giants: Of the gods Great Jove, Archduke. The Generals met and fought. In brief (to cut off circumstance) the earth Prevailed against heaven. The gods are forced to fly: Jove, chaced by Typhon into Egypt, changed Himself into a Ram: Apollo, frighted, Turns to a Crow, Bacchus into a Goat, Juno a Cow, Diana to a Cat; Venus into a Fish, and took the sea; Mars to a Pigmy, lest he should be known: And Mercury, surnamed the crafty God, Into a Fox. Why may not then Some goddess be included in this shape? My fellow shepherd's Behind that rock (from whence and echo grows) For the more grace have chused that place as fittest, Pressed to bestow their cunning upon you, Whom they havé herd, much tired with watching long What you please. First from Pan The God of Shepherds. In the memory Of the Nymph Syrinz, Music strike and tell, How in the Arcadian plains it once befell. Syrinx, one of Diana's train, Hunting with her on the plain, Armed alike with shafts and bow; Each from other would you know? Which from which could not be told, Save ones was horn, the others gold. Now it begins to work. Pan he sees himself makes fine, In his cap he pricks a Pine: Now grows careless of his herd, Sits by brooks to prune his beard, Meets her, and hath mind to woo, Much he speaks, and more would do. It'll do anon. Still he proffers, she denies; He pursues (for Syrinx flies.) Passed her knees her coats up flew, He would feign see something new: By the leg and thigh he guest (It seems) the virtue of the rest. This adds wings unto his pace, The goal for which he is in chase. She adds feathers to her speed; Now it was no more than needs. Almost caught, Alas she cries, Some chaste God my shape disguise. Here's a charm for them. Laedon hears, and girts her round, Spies a reed that makes sweet found: Such is Syrinx. Wondering Pan Puts it to his mouth anon: Yet Syrinx thou art mine he said, And so of her his first pipe made. My charm hath took effect; with these thine eyes Take thy last sleep, thou hast not one to see; My task is done, and Io thou now free. Madam, I did your servant no great wrong, have teaching him to relish a new song. Sir I shall. No sooner was this mighty Queen appeased, to the rough hair dropped from her tender skin, er horns fell off, her eyes appeared to shine a less orb, her mouth and lips contracted oath into compass, and their native sweetness, r shoulders are restored, fingers and hands; r parted hoof divided into five, owe with two feet contented, for on them e straightway stood erect, and of a Cow, we whiteness, nought retaining, and even yet e fears to speak, lest she in stead of words old bellow forth her mind.