Book 9

9. Look upon the ninth, and you will see the son of Maia, the daughters of Lamus, and Mystis, and the running of Ino.

And Zeus the father, receiving Dionysus, the warden of the fiery

lap of Semele, half-finished, leaping forth from the birth-bringing

thunderbolt, stitched him into his male thigh,

and awaited the radiance of the birth-perfecting Moon;

and the hand of the son of Cronos, the steerer of the birth,

was itself the midwife of the much-stitched childbearing,

loosing the labour-bringing threads of his child-bearing thigh.

And as Zeus laboured, the rim of his thigh grew womanly,

and the babe of the untimely month was born by a motherless ordinance,

passing as a male from a female womb to a second womb.

When he had peered forth from the god-begotten birth,

the birth-attendant Seasons crowned him with an ivy garland,

the heralds of things to come, and on his flower-tressed head,

beneath the twisting coils of well-horned serpents,

they wreathed bull-natured Dionysus the horned.

And taking him by the birth-hill within Dracanus

in his arched arm, Hermes the son of Maia

flew through the air; and to new-born Lyaeus

he gave his father's name from the manner of his birth,

calling him Dionysus, because, lifting his burden on his foot,

the son of Cronos went limping with his weighted thigh,

since the lame is called "nysos" in the Syracusan tongue;

and they named the new-born god Eiraphiotes,

because his father had stitched him into his well-laboured thigh.

And as he darted from the unwashed birth,

his kinsman Hermes lifted the tearless boy on his arm,

and gave the babe, the very image of the well-horned Moon's form,

to the daughters of Lamus, the river Nymphs,

to nurse the child of Zeus, the grape-tender; and they, receiving him,

embraced Bacchus, and into the mouth of the child each

made gush up the milky moisture of their unpressed breasts.

And the child, stretching his eye toward the opposite heaven,

lay sleepless on his back, and with alternate kicks,

beating the air, delighted in a twofold throb,

and gazed at the unfamiliar pole, and in wonder

he laughed, beholding the starry rim of his father.

And the bride of Zeus, seeing the babe, was scourged;

and the daughters of Lamus, by the wrath of heavy-angered Hera,

were driven raving by the lash of a demonic madness;

in the house they assailed the handmaids, and at the crossroads

they carved up the wayfaring man with a stranger-slaying knife;

shuddering, they cried aloud, and with a whirling rush

they rolled the eyes of their disordered faces;

everywhere, hither and thither, with mind-wandering frenzies

they ran, with the rolling leap of their unsteady feet;

and the wind-blown breezes set their locks raving into the air,

wandering; and about the bosom of each maiden

the saffron tunic was whitened with a foam-haired droplet.

And now, in the alien wave of their roaming madness,

they would have hacked the babe Bacchus, still an infant, with a knife,

had not winged Hermes, with the plundering tread of an unmarked foot,

stolen Bacchus away and snatched him up again,

and, holding the just-rescued babe in his life-saving bosom,

carried him to the birth-chamber of newly-delivered Ino.

She was lifting up, from her own childbed where he had leapt forth,

the boy still an infant, Melicertes upon her arm,

with child-tending hands; and her breasts swelled,

gushing forth the dew of pressing milk.

And with loving lips the god soothed the bride,

pouring a marvellous word into her oracular throat:

Receive, woman, a new son, and lay in your bosom

the child of your sister Semele, whom beside the chamber

the whole gleam of the lightning did not consume, nor did the very

mother-slaying sparks of the thunderbolt destroy him.

And let the babe be guarded in a shadowy house,

and let neither the daytime eye of Phaethon

nor the nightly eye of Selene behold him within the hollow hall,

nor, as he plays as a boy—even if she is called bull-faced—

let jealous, heavy-angered Hera see him hidden.

Receive your sister's son; and to you the son of Cronos

will grant rewards worthy of your toils in nursing him.

Blessed were you among all the daughters of Cadmus;

for already Semele has been laid low by the flaming arrow,

and the earth will cover Autonoe with her dead son,

and Cithaeron will raise a single tomb for them both,

and mountain-roaming Agave will behold the doom

of Pentheus perishing, touching the bastard dust,

become a child-slayer, abandoning her city; but you alone

shall be proud, the dweller in so great a sea,

exchanging your house for the abode of Poseidon, and sea-dwelling

as Thetis, as Galatea, you shall be called the Water-nymph Ino;

Cithaeron shall not hide you in an earthy hollow,

but you shall become one of the Nereids; and instead of Cadmus,

with a better hope you shall call Nereus your father,

living with your son, immortal Melicertes,

as Leucothea, holding the key of the poured-out calm,

mistress of fair sailing after Aeolus; and in fair weather

the merchant-loving sailor, trusting in you, shall sail the sea,

setting up a single altar to the Earth-shaker and to Melicertes,

sacrificing to both; and the dark-haired god will receive

Palaemon as the charioteer of the sea-chariot.

So speaking, unerring Hermes ran to heaven,

whirling in the air the windy soles of his sandals.

And Ino did not disobey, but with a tender-loving heart

she cradled motherless Bacchus in her child-tending arm,

and, spreading wide her arm for a yoked pair of children,

she offered a twofold breast to Palaemon and to Dionysus;

and she set the babe beside her handmaid, the bride Mystis,

Mystis the fair-haired Sidonian, whom while still a maiden

her father Cadmus had reared as the bride-tender of Ino;

she then, taking Bacchus from her god-nourishing breasts,

set him down in a shadowy, hard-to-find chamber;

and the self-proclaiming radiance, announcing the birth of Zeus,

blazed, lighting up his face;

the shadowy walls of the hall grew white,

and the light of unseen Dionysus hid the gloom.

And all night long Ino sat beside Bromios at play;

and often, unsteady, leaping up, Melicertes

with answering lips drew at the neighbouring breast,

creeping beside Dionysus who babbled the cry of Euoi.

And Mystis nursed the god, after the breast of her mistress,

sitting beside Lyaeus with sleepless eyes;

and the wise handmaid, with an art that bore the name of Mystis,

being taught the rites of nocturnal Dionysus

and making ready the sleepless mystery for Lyaeus,

was first to shake the rattle, and clashed for Bacchus

the cymbals, whirling them, loud-ringing, on a double bronze,

first to kindle the night-danced flame of the pine,

she shouted the cry of Euoi for sleepless Dionysus,

first, kneading the curving flower into a cluster,

she bound her loosened hair with a vine-wreath,

and herself she plaited the thyrsus yoked with wine-dark ivy,

and at its topmost tip she fastened the iron point,

hidden in leaves, that it might not wound Bacchus;

and she devised to fasten upon her naked breast

the bronze cymbals, and on her waist the skins of fawns;

and, taught by Dionysus playing as a boy,

she first hung the serpent-twined band upon her skin,

intertwined, for the sacred mystery-basket pregnant with rites,

and the coiling serpent, circling its knots about the double girdle,

was bent in a snaky bond.

But the all-seeing Hera, with unswerving eyes,

saw him under the many-bolted seal of the hall,

guarded in the recess of the secret house of Mystis;

and she swore by the avenging, nether water of Styx

to flood the house of Ino with every kind of evil.

And now she would have destroyed the offspring of Zeus; but Hermes,

snatching him, carried him to the ridge of the Cybeline wood;

and swift-sandalled Hera ran after with fair-footed tread

from on high, unsteady; but he outran the course of Hera,

and put on the boundless form of first-born Phanes,

and Hera, awed before the first-sown god, gave way,

cowering before the false rays of his face,

and did not perceive the crafty image of the bastard form;

and on lighter feet, crossing the mountain ground,

bearing the horned son in his enfolding arms,

he gave him to the mother of Zeus his sire, lion-feeding Rheia,

and spoke a word to the goddess of noble childbirth:

Receive, goddess, a new son of your Zeus, who, when he has

fought the battle of the Indians, after the earth will come to the pole of stars,

a great grace to angry Hera; for it was not fitting

that he whom the son of Cronos bore should have Ino as his nurse;

let the mother of Zeus be the nurse of Dionysus,

being the mother of Zeus and the nurse of his grandson.

So speaking, swift-kneed Hermes went to heaven,

wheeling his windy wing on the dappled breezes;

and, changing the higher form of self-born Phanes,

he sank back again into his ancient shape,

leaving Bacchus, grown again, to his child-tending mother.

And the goddess nursed him, and while he was still a boy

she set him as a rider upon a chariot of raw-eating lions;

and the whirling Corybants within the god-receiving court

wreathed Dionysus with a child-tending dance,

and clashed their swords, and with alternate strokes

they beat upon their shields with tumbling iron,

hiding the boyhood of growing Dionysus;

and the child, hearing the midwife-echo of the shields,

was reared by the fatherly nurture of the Corybants.

And at nine years old, holding a beast-slaying hunt,

with swifter feet he overtook the bounding of the hare,

and, wielding with his childish hand the deer-slaying might,

he held up a dappled fawn, raising it on his neck,

and, holding a bold, gleaming-backed tiger stretched on his shoulder,

he lifted it on high, aloft, free of any bond . . .

holding lion-cubs in his hands he showed them to his mother Rheia,

snatching the new offspring from their oft-changing breasts,

and, dragging fearful lions still alive,

he stretched them as gifts to his mother, that she might yoke to her car

the pair, pressing their feet with both his hands.

And Rheia, in wonder, watched with gladdening laughter

the manhood and the feats of new-born Dionysus;

and seeing Iobacchus the driver of grim lions,

the father, the son of Cronos, laughed with delighting eyes.

And Euios clothed his skin with shaggy tunics,

having a boyish vigour just come to its perfection,

bearing the dappled covering of a deer upon his shoulders,

holding the gleaming counterfeit pattern of the heavenly stars;

and driving she-wolves into the folds beneath the Phrygian land,

he yoked his car with spotted leopards,

as if honouring an image of his father's grounds;

and often, riding on the chariot of immortal Rheia,

bearing in his small, soft-skinned hand the wheel of the bridle,

he checked the swift car of the hastening lions;

and increasing the courage in his heart for high-ruling Zeus,

he stretched out his right hand to the mouth of a raging she-bear,

throwing his fearless fingers into its fearful jaws,

his childish fingers; and the gentle beast stood still,

yielding its enslaved mouth to childish Lyaeus,

and kissed the fingers of Bacchus with rough caresses.

So he grew up beside crag-loving Rheia,

a child still in fresh bloom, mountain-reared. And around the rocks

the Pans circled the dancing son of Thyone,

bounding about the cliffs on their shaggy-shanked feet,

shouting the cry of Euoi to Bacchus; and as they wheeled in the dance,

the goat-hoof clattered with the leaping of their feet.

And Semele in Olympus, still breathing of the thunderbolt,

raised her proud neck and spoke with high-minded voice:

Hera, you have been despoiled; the offspring of Semele is the better;

Zeus bore my son and became a mother instead of me,

the father sowed and bore, he whom he begot, and in a self-bearing,

bastard womb he bore the child, and by necessity changed his nature.

Bacchus is mightier than Enyalios; for you sowed

your Ares alone, and did not bring him to birth in a thigh.

And Thebes has hidden the glory of Ortygia; for heavenly Leto,

pursued, bore Apollo in secret;

Leto bore Phoebus, and the son of Cronos did not labour;

Maia bore Hermes, and her consort did not bring him to birth;

but openly the father bore my son. Ah, great marvel,

behold Dionysus in the arms of her who bore your Zeus,

clasped on her child-tending arm; and the steward

of the everlasting world, the first-sown beginning of the gods,

the all-mother, became the nurse of Bromios; for to the babe

Bacchus she offered the breast which high-ruling Zeus had drawn.

What son of Cronos did she labour over, what Ares did Rheia rear,

your child? Cybele, who is called your mother,

bore Zeus and reared Bacchus in one bosom;

she carried them both, the son and the sire.

Nor could fatherless Hephaestus contend with the birth of Semele,

unsown of a father, whom self-bearing Hera bore,

limping on his slender feet with an unequal tread,

stealthily counterfeiting an imperfect mother's childbirth.

Maia was not at all like Semele, whose son Hermes,

her counterfeit, the crafty one, armed like Ares,

deceived Hera, until he drew the milk of her breasts.

Yield to me; for Semele alone got a husband for herself

who sowed and laboured over one and the same offspring.

Most blessed is Semele for the grace of her son; for our

Dionysus, without guile, will come to the dance of the stars,

dwelling in his father's heaven, because he received

the milk of a god-nourishing breast from so great a goddess;

he will come self-bidden to heaven, and has no need,

having drawn a better breast than the milk of Hera.

So she spoke, glorying even in heaven; and in anger

the bride of Zeus startled the wandering exile Ino,

falling unforeseen upon the hall of Athamas,

still wroth at Dionysus while he was yet a boy.

And fleeing from the chamber, ill-wedded Ino ran,

unsandalled, leaping over the rugged hills,

pursuing the track of unannounced Dionysus;

and the roaming bride went on through mountain after mountain,

until she came down to ravine-cut Delphian Pytho;

and hardly did she bend her step beside the snake-feeding thicket,

raving uncontrollably; and over her naked breast,

tearing her garment, the herald of grief,

she was borne in dread madness; and at the cry

of the mind-wandering bride, of changing note, the shepherd trembled.

Often, on the prophetic seat of the tripod,

she fitted a thrice-coiling serpent in her squalid hair,

twined in coils, and clasping it about her slender head

she bound her long hair with a snaky bond;

and she chased the maiden pilgrims. Then there was no libation,

nor public sacrifice, nor beside the temple

did the Delphian man dance; and with the long-plaited ivy's

limb-devouring tendrils the women were scourged.

And the hunter, seeing mountain-roaming Ino, shrank away,

leaving the linen snare of his hunting-stakes; and from the high crest

the goatherd drove his goats beneath the cavernous fold of a rock,

and, driving his sweating oxen beneath the yoke-band,

the old plowman shuddered at the leapings of Ino.

And the oracular Pythian maiden, restraining the alien echo

of the earthly cry, ran through the mountain,

shaking from her head her wonted Panopean laurel;

and sinking beneath the heights of the deep-cliffed crag

she dwelt in the Delphic cave for fear of raging Ino.

But rushing through the noon-day shade of the much-winding wood,

she did not escape all-seeing Apollo; and near the thicket,

in pity, he came swiftly, and, changing into a mortal form,

he drew near the nymph, and the very surface of Ino's body

with sparing hands he wreathed with the wise laurel,

and brought sweet sleep upon her; and with ambrosia

he anointed the whole skin of grieving, slumbering Ino,

drenching her frenzied limbs with a toil-loosing droplet.

And there for a time she stayed within the Parnassian wood

until the fourth year, and beside the oracular rock

she set up the dances of the still-childish Bacchus

by the prophecies of Phoebus; and with sleepless pine-torches

the Corycian Bacchae followed the fragrant rites,

and with sacred hands they gathered the remedies,

drugs that ward off madness, and healed the woman.

And at the bidding of Athamas his attendants went as wanderers

seeking everywhere; and the handmaids themselves,

roaming the hills, went along on much-winding paths,

seeking the wandering track of their vanished mistress,

straying beyond reach; and the gloomy nail

of the wailing women tore their reddened cheeks,

and they armed their willing fingers against their rosy breasts;

and sending much echo through the city with their wailings,

the house, filled with grievous sorrow, raised the cry of lament;

and crafty-minded Mystis bore the more constraint,

and had a twofold grief, while the wretched one still wandered,

toil-enduring Ino, and Dionysus was carried off.

But lord Athamas did not mourn his plaintive bride,

rather, leaving unremembered the longing for vanished Ino,

after the bed of his former bride, twice-bearing Nephele,

he went to the delicate bed of deep-girdled Themisto,

and, leading to a third marriage the daughter of Hypseus,

he cast away his love of Ino; and like a nurse playing tenderly,

sending him aloft in a high-soaring whirl through the air,

he lifted up babbling Melicertes, consoling him;

and to him weeping he offered, instead of the milk-bearing nipple,

a male breast, and checked his longing for the mother who bore him.

And from the bed of Athamas Themisto reared up

well-armoured sons, the defenders against War,

Schoeneus and Leucon, a new and manly stock,

at her first childbirth; and after both the mother

bore two offspring of a common single childbirth,

Porphyreon, and reared at her rich breast

Ptoos, the boyish shoot of ward-from-evil youth,

both well-beloved and of equal age, whom one day the mother

destroyed as the children of a stepmother, Themisto,

thinking them the twofold race of fair-childed Ino.