ay Tithonus who was
of your race and like the deathless gods. And she went to ask the
dark-clouded Son of Cronos that he should be deathless and live
eternally; and Zeus bowed his head to her prayer and fulfilled her
desire. Too simply was queenly Eos: she thought not in her heart to ask
youth for him and to strip him of the slough of deadly age. So while
he enjoyed the sweet flower of life he lived rapturously with
golden-throned Eos, the early-born, by the streams of Ocean, at the ends
of the earth; but when the first grey hairs began to ripple from his
comely head and noble chin, queenly Eos kept away from his bed, though
she cherished him in her house and nourished him with food and ambrosia
and gave him rich clothing. But when loathsome old age pressed full upon
him, and he could not move nor lift his limbs, this seemed to her in her
heart the best counsel: she laid him in a room and put to the shining
doors. There he babbles endlessly, and no more has strength at all, such
as once he had in his supple limbs.

(ll. 239-246) 'I would not have you be deathless among the deathless
gods and live continually after such sort. Yet if you could live on such
as now you are in look and in form, and be called my husband, sorrow
would not then enfold my careful heart. But, as it is, harsh [2529] old
age will soon enshroud you--ruthless age which stands someday at the
side of every man, deadly, wearying, dreaded even by the gods.

(ll. 247-290) 'And now because of you I shall have great shame among
the deathless gods henceforth, continually. For until now they feared my
jibes and the wiles by which, or soon or late, I mated all the immortals
with mortal women, making them all subject to my will. But now my mouth
shall no more have this power among the gods; for very great has been my
madness, my miserable and dreadful madness, and I went astray out of
my mind who have gotten a child beneath my girdle, mating with a mortal
man. As for the child, as soon as he sees the light of the sun, the
deep-breasted mountain Nymphs who inhabit this great and holy mountain
shall bring him up. They rank neither with mortals nor with immortals:
long indeed do they live, eating heavenly food and treading the lovely
dance among the immortals, and with them the Sileni and the sharp-eyed
Slayer of Argus mate in the depths of pleasant caves; but at their birth
pines or high-topped oaks spring up with them upon the fruitful earth,
beautiful, flouris