! said I?--How? To wretched me,
"Still more are left, than joyful thou canst boast:
"Superior I 'midst all this loss remain."

She spoke;--the twanging bowstring sounded loud!
Terrific noise,--save Niobe, to all:
She stood audacious, callous in her crime.
In mourning vesture clad, with tresses loose,
Around the funeral couches of the slain,
The weeping sisters stood. One strives to pluck
The deep-stuck arrow from her bowels,--falls,
And fainting dies; her brother's clay-cold corse,
Prest with her lips. Another's soothing words
Her hapless parent strive to cheer,--struck dumb,
She bends beneath an unseen wound; her words
Reach not her parent, till her life is fled.
This, vainly flying, falls: that drops in death
Upon her sister's body. One to hide
Attempts: another pale and trembling dies.
Six now lie breathless, each by vary'd wounds;
One sole remaining, whom the mother shields,
Wrapt in her vest; her body o'er her flung,
Exclaiming,--"leave me this, my youngest,--last,
"Least of my mighty numbers,--one alone!"
But while she prays, the damsel pray'd for dies.

Of all depriv'd, the solitary dame,
Amid the lifeless bodies of her sons,
Her daughters, and her spouse, by sorrows steel'd,
Sits harden'd: no light gale her tresses moves;
No blood her redden'd cheeks contain; her eyes
Motionless glare upon her mournful face;
Life quits the statue: even her tongue congeals,
Within her stony palate; vital floods
Cease in her veins to flow; her neck to bow
Resists; her arms to move in graceful guise;
Her feet to step; and even to stone are turn'd
Her inmost bowels. Still to weep she seems.
Wrapt in a furious whirlwind, distant far
Her natal soil receives her. There fixt high
On a hill's utmost summit, still she melts;
Still does the rigid marble flow in tears.

Now every Theban, male and female, all,
Dread the fierce anger of the powers of heaven;
And with redoubled fervor lowly bend,
And own the twin-producing goddess' power.
Then, as oft seen, they ancient tales recount,
Reminded by events of recent date.
Thus one relates.--"Long since some clowns, who till'd
"The fertile fields of Lycia, felt the ire
"Of this high goddess, whom they durst despise.
"Obscure the fact itself, for low the race
"Who suffer'd; yet most wonderous was the deed.
"Myself have seen the marsh; the lake have seen
"Fam'd for the prod