Let them, as custom is, approach by lot,
For as the god doth guide, I prophesy.
[She retires into the temple, and after a brief pause returns terror-stricken.]
Things dire to tell, direful for eyes to see,
Have forced me from the fane of Loxias,
So that no strength I have, no power to move;
But lacking speed of limb, with hands I run;
For age, when scared, is nought; a very child.
Towards the wreath-encircled nook I creep,
And at earth's navel-stone, behold a man 40
Defiled before the gods, as suppliant,
Holding his seat;—his hands still dripping gore,
His sword new-drawn, his lofty olive-branch
With ample fillets piously enwreathed,
White bands of wool;—for so I speak it plain.
But lo! before this man, on seats reclined,
A wondrous company of women sleeps;
Women? nay, Gorgons let me say; nor yet
To Gorgonean types compare I them.
Ere now in paintings [Harpies] I have seen,
Snatching the meal of Phineus. These to sight 50
Are wingless, black, and loathsome utterly.
With breathings unapproachable they snore,
Forth from their eyes drippeth a loathsome rheum;
Their garb too vile the effigies to touch
Of gods immortal, or the roofs of men.
Tribe of this sisterhood I ne'er have seen;
Neither may region boast such brood to rear
