The Assembly of the Gods
O’er rolling stars, from heavenly stalls advancing,
The coaches soon were seen, and a long train
Of mules with litters, horses fleet and prancing,
Their trappings all embroidery, nothing plain;
And with fine liveries, in the sunbeams glancing,
More than a hundred servants, rather vain
Of handsome looks and of their stature tall,
Followed their masters to the Council Hall.
First came the Prince of Delos, Phœbus hight,
In a gay travelling carriage, fleetly drawn
By six smart Spanish chestnuts, shining bright,
Which with their tramping shook the aerial lawn;
Red was his cloak, three-cocked his hat, and light
Around his neck the golden fleece was thrown;
And twenty-four sweet damsels, nectar-sippers,
Were running near him in their pumps or slippers.
Pallas, with lovely but disdainful mien,
Came on a nag of Basignanian race;
Tight round her leg, and gathered up, was seen
Her gown, half Greek, half Spanish; o’er her face
Part of her hair hung loose, a natural screen,
Part was tied up, and with becoming grace;
A bunch of feathers on her head she wore,
And on her saddle-bow her falchion bore.
The Paphian Queen for her accommodation
Had two stage-coaches; richly decorated
Was that wherein she sat in conversation
With Cupid and the Graces; on them waited
Pages in habits suited to their station;
The other coach with courtiers gay was freighted,
The chamberlain and tutor debonnair,
And the chief cook, Dan Bacon, too was there.
But Ceres and the God of Wine appeared
At once, conversing; and the God of Ocean
Upon a dolphin’s back his form upreared,
Floating through waves of air with graceful motion;
Naked, all sea-weed, and with mud besmeared;
For whom his mother Rhea feels emotion,
Reproaching his proud brother,5 when she meets him,
Because so like a fisherman he treats him.
Diana, the sweet virgin, was not there;
She had risen early, and o’er woodland green
Had gone to wash her clothes in fountain fair
Upon the Tuscan shore—romantic scene.
And not returning till the northern star
Had rolled through dusky air and lost its sheen,
Her mother made excuses, quite provoking,
Knitting, at the same time, a worsted stocking.
Juno-Lucina did not go—and why?
She anxious wished to wash her sacred head.
Menippus, Jove’s chief taster, standing by,
For the disastrous Fates excuses made.
They had much tow to spin, and lint to dry,
And they were also busy baking bread.
The cellarman, Silenus, kept away,
To water the domestics’ wine that day.
On starry benches sit the famous warriors
Of the immortal kingdom, in a ring;
Now drums and cymbals, echoing to the barriers,
Announce the coming of the gorgeous king;
A hundred pages, valets, napkin-carriers
Attend, and their peculiar offerings bring.
And after them, armed with his club so hard,
Alcides, captain of the city guard.
And as the madness which his brain affected
Was not quite cured, officiously he strode,
And swung aloft his club, and blows directed
Along the crowd to clear the royal road.
Like drunken Swiss he looked, and seemed connected
With ruffians low who hire themselves abroad
On festal days, before the Pope to bluster,
Breaking of arms and skull-caps in a fluster.
With Jove’s broad hat and spectacles arrived
The light-heeled Mercury; in his hand he bore
A sack, in which, of other means deprived,
He damned poor mortals’ prayers, some million score;
Those he disposed in vessels, well contrived,
Which graced his father’s cabinet of yore;
And, wont attention to all claims to pay,
He regularly signed them twice a day.
Then Jove himself, in royal habit dressed,
With starry diadem upon his head,
And o’er his shoulders an imperial vest,
Worn upon holidays.—The king displayed
A sceptre, pastoral shape, with hooked crest;
In a rich jacket too was he arrayed,
Given by the inhabitants of Sericane,
And Ganymede held up his splendid train.
Alessandro Tassoni.