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PROMETHEUS BOUND

Enjoining plainly and saying he should thrust me
Forth of the house, forth of the land, to wander
At large, a separate thing, even to the last
Confines of earth: and if he would not hearken,
Then should a thunder-stroke from Zeus, with flicker
Of flame, consume his house from under heaven.
Such were the prophecies of Loxias,
And such prevailed. He drave me forth, he shut
The doors behind me, groaning in his heart, 670
As I in mine that day: but force was on him,
The bridle of Zeus, to make him do this thing.
Then, in that instant, lo my bodily form
Was changed, and all my mind was gone awry,
And hornèd, as ye see, thrill'd by the sharp
Mouth of the pest, I rush'd, with furious leaping,
To drinking-pools of the Kerchneian stream,
The fount of Lerna. And there clave to me
A bitter herdsman, gall untemper'd, Argos,
Prodigious growth of the ground, fill'd full of eyes,

And dogg'd my goings. But him a sudden hand, 680

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