Your mast erected, and your canvas white
Unfurl'd, sit thou; the breathing North shall waft 615
Thy vessel on. But when ye shall have cross'd
The broad expanse of Ocean, and shall reach
The oozy shore, where grow the poplar groves
And fruitless willows wan of Proserpine,
Push thither through the gulphy Deep thy bark, 620
And, landing, haste to Pluto's murky abode.
There, into Acheron runs not alone
Dread Pyriphlegethon, but Cocytus loud,
From Styx derived; there also stands a rock,
At whose broad base the roaring rivers meet. 625
There, thrusting, as I bid, thy bark ashore,
O Hero! scoop the soil, op'ning a trench
Ell-broad on ev'ry side; then pour around
Libation consecrate to all the dead,
First, milk with honey mixt, then luscious wine, 630
Then water, sprinkling, last, meal over all.
Next, supplicate the unsubstantial forms
Fervently of the dead, vowing to slay,
(Return'd to Ithaca) in thy own house,
An heifer barren yet, fairest and best 635
Of all thy herds, and to enrich the pile
With delicacies such as please the shades;
But, in peculiar, to Tiresias vow
A sable ram, noblest of all thy flocks.
When thus thou hast propitiated with pray'r 640
All
