Kitap 5
a stranger in this isle of Sicily
487
it yet delights me more than all the world.
‘I, Arethusa, claim this isle my home,
and do implore thee keep my throne secure,
O greatest of the Gods! A better hour,
when thou art lightened of thy cares, will come,
and when thy countenance again is kind;
and then may I declare what cause removed
me from my native place—and through the waves
of such a mighty ocean guided me
‘Through the porous earth
by deepest caverns, I uplift my head
and see unwonted stars. Now it befell,
as I was gliding far beneath the world,
where flow dark Stygian streams, I saw
thy Proserpine. Although her countenance
betrayed anxiety and grief, a queen She reigned
supremely great in that opacous world
queen consort mighty to the King of Hell.’
“Astonished and amazed, as thunderstruck,
when Proserpina's mother heard these words,
long while she stood till great bewilderment
gave way to heavy grief. Then to the skies,
ethereal, she mounted in her car
and with beclouded face and streaming hair
stood fronting Jove, opprobrious. ‘I have come
O Jupiter, a suppliant to thee,
both for my own offspring as well as thine.
If thy hard heart deny a mother grace,
yet haply as a father thou canst feel
some pity for thy daughter; and I pray
thy care for her may not be valued less
because my groaning travail brought her forth.—
My long-sought daughter has at last been found,
if one can call it, found, when certain loss
more certain has been proved; or so may deem
the knowledge of her state.—But I may bear
his rude ways, if again he bring her back.
‘Thy worthy child should not be forced to wed
