Kitap 3
Scarce could Ulysses by his friends be bound,
When first he listen'd to the charming sound,
Singing insinuates, learn all ye maids;
390
Oft when a face forbids, a voice persuades.
Whether on theatres loud strains we hear,
Or in Ruelles some soft Egyptian air.Those airs were a sort of sarabands, in vogue among the Egyptian and Gades. The movement was dissolute and provoked to lust, as one may see by Martial.
Well shall she sing, of whom I make my choice,
And with her lute accompany her voice.
395
The rocks were stirr'd, the beasts to listen staid
When on his lyre melodious Orpheus play'd,
Even Cerberus and hell that sound obey'd,
And stones officious were thy walls to raise.
0, Thebes, attracted by Amphion's lays.He means the wall of Thebes, built by the sound of Amphion's lyre. He was the son of Jupiter and Antiope. Eusebius writes that Amphion reigned at Thebes, and made rocks move with the sound of his lyre.
400
The dolphin, dumb itself, thy voice admir'd,
And was, Arion, by thy songs inspir'd.Arion was a celebrated musician of antiquity. of whom Ovid in the second book makes mention. Some say he was a poet and musician of Lesbos. Having got a great deal of money, and returning from his travels home by sea. the sailors robbed and threw him over-board; when a dolphin charmed with his music, conveyed hin safe to Peloponesus; where he procured Periander to put the sailors to death. The poet, by all these instances of the power of music, would persuade the ladies to learn it, as the version tells us.
Of sweet Callimachus the works rehearse,Callimachus was a considerable poet, and, according to Quintilian, the first that wrote elegies in Greek. He was the son of Battus, who built Cyrene.
