The Sun.
London, England, 1850-05-10 00:00:00

VULCAN AND VENUS.

'From Aletheia ; or, the Doom of Mythology, a new
Poem just published by the Messrs. Longman
and Co.)
Wnite though the goddess, black the god of fire,
Black with the reeking of his dusky forge,
While Vesta bids her tongues of light aspire.
Dark Mulciber his furnace mouth doth gorge
With the loud blasts his windy bellows blow,
Snorting the cinders to a rosy glow.
Before his anvil stands the brawny lord,
His forehead encircl'd with labour's grimy tan;
His deep breath heaving to his work abhorr'd,
His body crippled by its earthward ban;
On smoking thunderbolt with batter'd flank
His ponderous hammer whirls with leaden clank.
Down from his shaggy chest, in glistering drops,
The warm sweat fills, as trom the fainting noon
Of sultry autumn days, o'er bristling crops,
The cloudless skies rain forth their scanty boon,
So from the fruitful season of his prime
Ooze the rare showers that nurture deeds sublime.
The Subterranean thus, with gnarled thews
. .

Melts, mid the dismal discord of his home,
Where, hurling blocks that stubborn metals brnize,
Toil the huge Cyclop and the pigmy Gnome—
There Vulcan thrills, amid the tumult dire,
Whene'er to him the victim loves expire.
Yet sweeter thrilled the pulse of his rude life
When from the creaming of the ruby tide
That lav'd the shores of Cyprus with a strife
Of shells and blossoms, scattered side by side,
Born from the foam, his naked spouse, between
The opening valves shone forth of pearls the Queen.
And wafted stately to the floral strand
By cool ambrosial breathings from the lips
Of the gay z.phyrs, o'er the glittering sand
Of purple Cytherea, on the tips
Of the fresh billows, like a flower afloat,
Glode the strange glory in its fragile boat.
Then downward pressed the seasons to the beach
Of all things beautiful, to her the feir
Young goddess of all beauty, fondly each,
And lavishly, their treasures proffered there,
The summer citron, and the harvest rice,
The vernal crocus and prismatic ice.
A gorgeous carpet for her path lay strewn,
The jonquil, and the pansy, and the musk ;
And luscious banquets from the trees were blown,
Figs from the bough, and almonds from the husk,
The pleasures numberless, and Graces three,
Around her frolick'd in rude ecslisy.
And still she stands, as stood her marble shade,

In Paphos, or as 3 et the magic mould
Smiles from the pedestal—a shrinking maid
Dazzling the daring pilgrims who behold
That miracle of art, whose timorous arms
Veil, ytt reveal, inebriating charms.
'Round her lithe waist th' elastic girdle spans
Rising and falling as her passions swell,
Token of man's futurity, which fans
The life that vacillates 'twixt heaven and hell,
Type of eternity, whose round doth roll—
The zone of joy, the cestus of the soul.
Down from the slacken'd stress of her small hand

Flutter the damask petals of the rose,
With greenest myrtles twined, a vermeil band
To bind the pallor of her brow's repose;
While to her loving palm yet clings the prize
Pluck'd in proud Ida's orchard parasitise.
The prize awarded in the lists of love,
A red-gold apple, ripened to the core
By sunny looks, that, coming from above,
Lived in the thoughts of Paris evermore,
Visions prefiguring with carnal joy
His dream of bliss, the nightmare of old Troy.
Close to her dimpled feet the ringdoves press,
Her feet like ivory flushed'd with shadowed pink;
Full in the splendour of her loveliness
Bask the twin swans that from her goblet drink;
And sparrows, dear as that which Lesbia mourned,
Whose lowly tomb Catullus' lays adorned.
Flit in gyrations of congenial glee,
O'er the blithe Queen of laughter, from whose smile,
Rays forth the happiness that fitfully,
With jocund mines dejected hours beguile;
So to the Paphian dame flock Cyprian girls,
With haggard cheeks and gay disorder'd curls.
So with half sad and half exultant air,
Pandemus twangs his silken-bridle bow,
Driving his poison'd shafts now here now there;
Piercing the bosoms of the high, the low,
The greybeard peasant, and the child-like prince,
Who, thrilling, sigh, and—sighing—thrilling wince.
Love tempering thus, like acids in the plum,
The gladness and the grief that beauty wears,
When youth, with sudden rapture stricken dumb,
Fier fleshly form with fancied shapes compares—
Though high o'er Venus Cupid reigns above,
Beauty's the mother of celestial love!"