Page:The poems of George Eliot (Crowell, 1884).djvu/476

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ARION.


(Herod, i. 24.)


ARION, whose melodic soul
Taught the dithyramb to roll
Like forest fires, and sing
Olympian suffering,


Had carried his diviner lore
From Corinth to the sister shore
Where Greece could largelier be,
Branching o'er Italy.


Then weighted with his glorious name
And bags of gold, aboard he came
'Mid harsh seafaring men
To Corinth bound again.


The sailors eyed the bags and thought;
"The gold is good, the man is naught-
And who shall track the wave
That opens for his grave?"


With brawny arms and cruel eyes
They press around him where he lies
In sleep beside his lyre.
Hearing the Muses quire.