Book 27

27. The twenty-seventh follows the ranks in which the son of Cronos arms the dwellers of Olympus for battle on behalf of Bromius.

And now, shaking off the wing of toil-loosing Sleep, war-bearing Dawn opened the gates of the east, and left the radiant bed of Cephalus; and, struck by Phaethon facing it, black Ganges grew white; and the newly-scored cone of mist fled and withdrew, cleft by the beams; and from his dewy car the morning fruit was bathed in vernal dews. And there was tumult. And Phaethon, the flaming shepherd of the ever-flowing years, reined in the course of his fire-fed horses, hearing the helmet-glancing echo of neighboring War, and challenged the army to do battle with witnessing fire, hurling his hot, rosy shaft; and over the earth a strange shower of bloody moisture rainy Zeus poured from heaven, the first announcement of Indian slaughter. And with the murderous drops of the warlike snowfall the thirsty back of the dark dust grew red, of the Indian soil; and from newly-burnished iron a radiance flashed, matched against the Sun's beams. And the appearing phalanxes for the tumult armed the Indians overbearing Deriades, and, urging on the warriors, he belched a word of threat from his throat: 'My slaves, fight, trusting in your wonted Victory, and the bold one whom they call the horned son of Thyone make a servant of equally-horned Deriades. Slay for me the Pans too with the smiting iron; and if they are gods, and it is not lawful to cleave the body of unwounded Pan with the cutting iron, the mountain-ranging Pans I will take as plunder, who within the thicket herd the tribes of desert-roaming elephants. Many beasts are here too, with which I will join the Beasts together and the Pans of mountain-ranging Dionysus; and to my daughter I will give the bridal-tending swarm, the under-servants of the table of feasting Morrheus. And let some man from Phrygia, comrade of wine-dark Bacchus, bathe his body in the streams of the Indian river, and instead of the Sangarius call upon his native Hydaspes; let another man, who came with Dionysus from Alybe, labor here as a hireling, and, the streams of his silver river forsaken, drink the gold-gleaming Ganges. Withdraw from me, Dionysus, fleeing the spear of Deriades; here too there is a boundless sea; but after the wave of the Arabian sea let mine too receive you; this broader deep belches a wild water, and is able to cover both the Satyrs and Bacchus and the rank of the Bassarids; not gentle here is Nereus, no Indian Thetis will receive you, nor in her bosom will save you fleeing back after the host-receiving wave, out of respect for my heavy-roaring native Hydaspes. But you will say: I bring the Olympian blood of the son of Cronos. Earth bore the sky engraved with the dance of stars; you have your race from heaven; but my Earth shall cover you; and Cronos the raw-eater, the devourer of his young children, born from heaven, the bosom of the field swallowed down. I am the champion of a spear-bold army; I am mightier than Lycurgus, who drove you and your unwarlike Bacchants; your race, fallen from Zeus, does not dismay me; for of your wretchedly-fated Semele I heard the fire-struck wedlock; do not proclaim the lightning that gave Zeus his bridal bed, do not speak of the head of the son of Cronos or the male thigh; the childbirths of laboring Zeus do not dismay me: often I have seen my own wife in labor. And with you, if he will, your father, self-bearing Zeus, may arm against me Athena, a female ally for a male, whom they call Victory, that, dashing the crags, I may bloody the head of Pallas with a flesh-cutting stone or with a daring spear, and from my well-horned bow I will shoot the thigh of threatening Dionysus, the leader of the bull-horned Satyrs; and, when he is wounded, on Zeus and Bromius and Pallas I will fasten reproach; and if the lame god arms himself with both of them, I have need of skillful Hephaestus, that for himself too he may forge manifold arms for Deriades. I never tremble at a female champion; and if he shakes the lightning of his father, I have my native water. And the bold one whom they call the kindred blood of Lyaeus, Aeacus, the offshoot of the heavenly father Zeus, I will send mangled to the Zeus below, to Hades; nor would Zeus, flying through the air, snatch him away. And I hear that many sons of the son of Cronos have fallen; Dardanus was from Zeus and perished, and Minos died, nor did the bull-eyed bed of Zeus rescue him; and if he gives judgment even in Hades, what grudge is it to the Indians, if Aeacus judges among the dead? And if he wishes, let him hold his lordship, smitten as he is, and the scepters of the pit. And the earthborn Cyclopes, who touch Olympus with their long limbs, slay them—lest you fix the point of the spear in the middle of the belly or the neck, but let the bronze-heavy shaft be driven, pierced, into the wheeling eye. Do not slay the earthly Cyclopes; for of them too I have need; and, sitting beside the Indian hearth, let Brontes complete for me a heavy-roaring trumpet equal in din to the thunderclaps, that I may be a Zeus below, and let Steropes make a new radiance to match the lightning even here; and I will confound him, fighting against the Satyrs, that he may rend his heart the more, the jealous son of Cronos, as he beholds Deriades thundering and lightening, in dread of the lord of the Indians, the high-born hurler of the fiery thunderbolt. What grudge is it, if I arm my fighting hand with the firebolt? My mother's father, the master of the fiery stars, the whole withered, fiery Phaethon, a flaming champion; and if of my father, the river, I bear the blood, with a watery weapon fighting I will raise up a watery battle against Dionysus, covering the hated heads of the Bacchants with the river's streams. And, cutting with the smiting iron the bodies of the deep-dwelling Telchines, entomb them in the neighboring sea, that are dear to father Poseidon; and of the cunning car bring the gray harness and the race of water-faring horses, the sea-gifts of victory, to Deriades. And the heavy-fettered dweller of the unwedded Athena, the offspring of fiery Hephaestus, with blazing fire burn, whom they call Erechtheus; for of him too he bears the far-famed blood, of Erechtheus, whom once at her breast the maiden, bed-fleeing, motherless Pallas reared, hidden, guarded by a sleepless, blazing lamp; let him stay hidden, covered in an Indian blazing chest, and in the empty fence of the gloomy maiden-chamber. And the nimble servants of the well-leaping oxhide, knowers of the well-helmeted warlike dance, bring me the unarmored Corybantes; and over her slain twin children let Cabeiro weep, the veil-less Lemnian; and, casting away his tongs, sooty Hephaestus, the destroyer of his own offspring seated, let him behold over the car of the Cabeiri, mounting the bronze-hoofed horses, Deriades. I slay the sons of Zeus; but for Morrheus to master Aristaeus I grudge not, the hare-hunting son of Phoebus, the driver of the worthless, war-loving bee. You with sickles and the double-striking blade slay the tender ranks of the Bassarids, and the high-horned child of Zeus the horned river-son shall destroy, lest anyone cower, seeing the driver of the lioness or the champion mounted on the flank of the wild bear, or the grim mouth of the yoked beasts; for who will escape the leopard or the lion of the arming elephants?' So spoke the king, and the Indians went to the tumult, some upon the backs of the iron-bearing elephants, others arrayed together upon the storm-footed horses. And near was a boundless army of foot-soldiers, some points, some bearing the shield, one the cover of the quiver; another man lifted up the bronze-wrought sickle, a reaper of war, and another marched, raising the shield and swift bows and windy arrows. And they set up the battle by the mouth of the neighboring Indus, running forward into the plain. And from the well-treed thicket with shields and swords and unbreakable leaves thyrsus-bearing Dionysus armed his warriors. And, facing the four winds against fiery Dawn, he set up the army of the Bacchants, divided in four: the first beside the deep-treed ankles of the wheeling Bear, where, borne in the coil of the far-scattered rivers, the Zeus-fallen water of the Caucasian crag comes down, along that same shore, where in a far-stretching channel heavy-roaring Hydaspes leads his back-rolling flood; and the other phalanx he fitted, where, of the earth's midmost part, bending crown-wise toward the western clime, two-mouthed, mountain-ranging Indus winds his stream, crowning sea-girdled Patalene with his streams; and the third he arranged, where, by the southern gulf with crimsoning wave the midday brine is drawn; and the fourth, well-bronzed army the lord set up beneath the eastern shore, whence, wetting the reed-bed, flowing down with fragrant waters comes Ganges. And to each chosen well-greaved phalanx he appointed four well-helmeted leaders, and, urging on the army, he cried with people-rousing voice: 'Bassarids, come too and dance, and of the foes slay the barbarian tribes, and mingle thyrsi with spears, mingle them with swords too; and instead of the wonted table let the battle-rousing trumpet become for my Satyrs my lyre; and the green foliage of the fruit, casting its spear of iron, let the vintage conquer the sharpened shafts; and instead of the night-revel dance of Dionysus let my pipe sound the changed hymn of Enyo, leaving the after-supper Echo of mind-delighting Bromius. If Hydaspes bends a slave's knee to me and rises no more in a malicious swell against the Bacchants, I will be gracious to meet, and all his bright water with the streams of the winepress I will change into Euian wine, making sweet streams, and the ridge of the wild wood I will girdle with leaves and make it vine-clad; but if again with his evil-averting outpourings he aids the slain Indians and his son Deriades, man-grown, holding the horned form of a river, then, bridging the stream of the overweening river, with unwetted footsteps travel the thirsty water, and, treading dry Hydaspes on the bare sand, let the horse-loving, foot-going hoof scrape the dust. And if the much-terrifying champion of the war-mad Indians is the offspring of the heavenly race of Phaethon, and if Phaethon should raise a fiery Enyo against me, honoring the horned travail of his own daughter, then again, against the offspring of my son of Cronos in Phaethonian battle, I arm a sea-watery quencher of fire; and to the Thrinacian isle I will go, where the flocks and the cattle of the heavenly, fire-gleaming Charioteer are, and the daughter of the Sun, like a spear-won maiden, Lampetie unwilling I will drag under the yoke of slavery, that she may bend her knee; and let Astris wander to the mountain, mourning her heavy-fettered companion Deriades; let her come, if she will, an exile to the land of the Celts, that, become a plant with the daughters of Helios, she too may often weep with dirge-loving streams. Hasten for me too: and the circles of the black-skinned face of the captive Indians whiten with mystic gypsum, and the bold one, wreathed with the vine-cluster . . . fasten the fawnskin upon bronze-clad Deriades; and bending a slave's knee to Bromius after victory let the Indian lord cast his breastplate to the storms, covering his body with a better, shaggy breastplate, and let him bind his foot with purple buskins, leaving his silver greaves to the winds, and, after the bloody bows and the deeds of wonted tumult, let him be taught the night-danced rites of Dionysus, whirling the barbarous winepress-locks of his hair. And the heads of the foes bring as tokens of victory to windy Tmolus, pierced upon the witnessing thyrsus. And many ranks of the Indians I will remove from the war, having taken them alive after the battle, and beside the gates of the Lydians I will fix the horns of raging Deriades.' So speaking he gave courage; and the Bacchants pressed on, and the Sileni cried aloud the song of war-loving Echo, and the Satyrs shouted from their unison throats; and with the sounding drum a unison echo roared, a dread bellow, and of the rattle-loving women with alternating hands a double-beating echo was struck; and the army-rousing pipe cried the pastoral Phrygian rhythm. And, leading the way of the army, pressing heavy in the tumult, the Mygdonian flame gleamed, leaping through the air, announcing the fiery birth-pang of Bacchus; and from the well-horned brow of the old Silenus a flashing gleamed; and of the mountain-stalled Bacchant a serpent, bound, was fastened in her unbraided hair; and the Satyrs warred; and they were whitened with the mystic gypsum, and on their cheeks hung a dreadful thing, the bastard look of a false, voiceless face. And one, lashing a maddened tigress against the foes, scattered the cars of the yoked elephants; and hoary Maron was armed with a coiling shoot, cleaving the bodies of the fighting Indians with the branch of the cultivated vine.—And all, as many as are dwellers of Olympus, sitting beside Zeus within the god-receiving hall, were assembled in full force upon the gold-laden thrones. And as they feasted, drawing from the mixing-bowl, fair-haired Ganymede poured the sweet nectar. For not then did the Achaean War-god roar against the Trojans, as before—so that fair-haired Hebe might again mix the cups for the blessed ones, and the Trojan cupbearer be far from the immortals, lest he hear the fate of his fatherland. To them, gathered together, counseling Zeus made his address, and spoke to Apollo and Hephaestus and Athena: 'God-speaking lord of Pytho, of the oracular axis, sceptered lord of archery, light-bearer, brother of Bacchus, remember Parnassus and your own Dionysus; the short-lived vine has not escaped you; you know yourself too the mystic twin pine of both crags; but fight as champion for your brother Lyaeus, the helper of the Bassarids, stretching your Olympian bow; and honor your shared rock of Parnassus, where, reveling, the dance-treading Bacchant cried out, making ready a song for you and for sleepless Dionysus, kindling the Delphic fire joined for both of you. Remember, famed for the bow, your lion-slaying Cyrene; do grace to both, to Agreus and to Dionysus; as Nomios, fight as champion for the pastoral race of the Satyrs. Ward off the heavy-minded jealousy of Hera, lest ever the stepmother of Phoebus laugh, if Dionysus is put to flight— she who, holding wrath against me and jealousy of my loves, ever arms herself against my children; I will not teach you the travail of your own mother, when, holding the twin burden of her children, much-wandering Leto went, scourged by the child-bearing goads of birth, when the stream of Peneius fled, when Dirce refused your mother, when even Asopus himself held to flight, the heavy-kneed one, drawing his step behind, until Delos brought help, the birth-aiding, until Leto the old palm, with its worthless leaves, gave delivery. And you, fearless daughter of Zeus the father and of no mother, defend your brother, Pallas, the orderer of your fatherland; rescue your dwellers who follow Dionysus, and do not look on the slain children of your Marathon; honor the city-bearing branch of the shore-land olive; do grace to the old Icarian; for to him too varied-clustered Dionysus will give his fruit; remember Triptolemus and well-plowing Celeus, do not dishonor the fruitful baskets of Metaneira; for of your grape-laden helper Bacchus Zeus the begetting father bore the travail in his pregnant thigh, but your female travail he brought forth from his head. But, shaking your coeval birth-spear, and brandishing the aegis, the steerer of Enyo, become a helper to my Satyrs, since they too wear the shaggy tunics of the mountain-ranging goat; and the god of the country-dwellers, lord of the pastoral pipe, goat-fed Pan has need of your aegis, who once, contending alongside my inviolate scepters, fought against the Titans, and of the milk-bearing nurse, the goat Amaltheia, was the mountain-ranging shepherd; rescue him hereafter as a helper in the Attic battle, the Mede-slaying deliverer of shaken Marathon; shake your aegis, fighting as a shield before Lyaeus, your dark-aegis brother, who will rescue your fatherland, driving out the Boeotian leader; and the citizen of Eleuthera will sing a life-saving song, faithfully raising the Euian cry to Apaturius, son of Thyone, if the Athenians strike up the mingled Phrygian rhythm after the marsh-Bacchus, for Eleusinian Dionysus. O ever-shifting Olympian race! Ah, great wonder! Beside the stranger Deriades stands Argive Hera, but Attic Athena refuses the Cecropian phalanxes, and, bearing faithful service to his mother, leaving my son Bacchus and the Thracian army that follows Dionysus, my Thracian Ares rescues the Indian throng. But, fighting alongside Dionysus with flaming fire, I alone arm myself against all, until Bacchus shall annihilate the dark race, root and all. And you, maiden-loving bridegroom of fruitful Earth, do you keep quiet, Hephaestus, and care nothing for Marathon, where is the marriage-light of the unwed goddess? I will not teach you the mystic sparks of your ever-shining lamp. Remember the chest of the boy-nursing maiden-chamber, in which was the Earthborn boy, in which the maiden reared your self-completed seed at her male breast; lift your birth-bringing axe, that you may save with your birth-blow the dwellers of your Athena. Do you keep quiet, Hephaestus, and will you not save your children? Lift the wonted torch, the shield-bearer of the Cabeiri, and stretch out your eye, and your ancient bride, your child-loving Cabeiro, watch her reproaching you; the Lemnian Alcimacheia has need of your might.' As he spoke, the gods, dwellers of Olympus, hastened, common helpers, Athena and Apollo, and fiery Hephaestus went with the Trito-born. And with other immortals went Hera, running together, holding Ares by the hand and broad-flowing Hydaspes, the fellow-laborer of the foes in the shared-zealous tumult, with whom Fear and Panic went as companions, with whom too herself, the adversary of Bromius, sheaf-bearing Deo came, grudging against life-giving, grape-loving Dionysus, because he found the drink of wine, refuting the older boast of primal Zagreus, the so-called Dionysus.