who, raised from off the around, inhabit wicker dwellings on
well-wheeled cars, equipped with distant-shooting bows; to whom thou
must not draw near, but pass on out of their land, bringing thy feet to
approach the rugged roaring shores. And on thy left hand dwell the
Chalybes, workers of iron, of whom thou must needs beware, for they are
barbarous, and not accessible to strangers. And thou wilt come to the
river Hybristes,[56] not falsely so called, which do not thou cross, for
it is not easy to ford, until thou shalt have come to Caucasus itself,
loftiest of mountains, where from its very brow the river spouts forth
its might. And surmounting its peaks that neighbor on the stars, thou
must go into a southward track, where thou wilt come to the
man-detesting host of Amazons, who hereafter shall make a settlement,
Themiscyra, on the banks of Thermodon, where lies the rugged
Salmydessian sea-gorge, a host by mariners hated, a step-dame to ships;
and they will conduct thee on thy way, and that right willingly. Thou
shalt come too to the Cimmerian isthmus, hard by the very portals of a
lake, with narrow passage, which thou undauntedly must leave, and cross
the Maeotic frith; and there shall exist for evermore among mortals a
famous legend concerning thy passage, and after thy name it shall be
called the Bosphorus; and after having quitted European ground, thou
shalt come to the Asiatic continent. Does not then the sovereign of the
gods seem to you to be violent alike toward all things? for he a god
lusting to enjoy the charms of this mortal fair one, hath cast upon her
these wanderings. And a bitter wooer, maiden, hast thou found for thy
hand; for think that the words which thou hast now heard are not even
for a prelude.

IO. Woe is me! ah! ah!

PR. Thou too in thy turn[57] art crying out and moaning: what wilt thou
do then, when thou learnest the residue of thy ills?

CH. What! hast thou aught of suffering left to tell to her?

PR. Ay, a tempestuous sea of baleful calamities.

IO. What gain then is it for me to live? but why did I not quickly fling
myself from this rough precipice, that dashing on the plain I had rid
myself of all my pangs? for better is it once to die, than all one's
days to suffer ill.

PR. Verily thou wouldst hardly bear the agonies of me to whom it is not
doomed to die. For this would be an escape from sufferings. But now
there is no limit set to my hardships, until Jove shall have been
depose