able that he drowned himself for
some reason which tradition failed to hand down to posterity.

BOOK THE FOURTEENTH.

FABLE I. [XIV.1-74]

Circe becomes enamoured of Glaucus, who complains to her of his
repulse by Scylla. She endeavours, without success, to make him
desert Scylla for herself. In revenge, she poisons the fountain
where the Nymph is wont to bathe, and communicates to her a hideous
form; which is so insupportable to Scylla, that she throws herself
into the sea, and is transformed into a rock.

And now {Glaucus}, the Euboean plougher of the swelling waves, had left
behind AEtna, placed upon the jaws of the Giant, and the fields of the
Cyclops, that had never experienced the harrow or the use of the plough,
and that were never indebted to the yoked oxen; he had left Zancle, too,
behind, and the opposite walls of Rhegium,[1] and the sea, abundant
cause of shipwreck, which, confined by the two shores, bounds the
Ausonian and the Sicilian lands. Thence, swimming with his huge hands
through the Etrurian seas, Glaucus arrived at the grass-clad hills, and
the halls of Circe, the daughter of the Sun, filled with various wild
beasts. Soon as he beheld her, after salutations were given and
received, he said, "Do thou, a Goddess, have compassion on me a God; for
thou alone (should I only seem deserving of it,) art able to relieve
this passion {of mine}. Daughter of Titan, by none is it better known
how great is the power of herbs, than by me, who have been transformed
by their agency; and, that the cause of my passion may not be unknown to
thee, Scylla has been beheld by me on the Italian shores, opposite the
Messenian walls. I am ashamed to recount my promises, my entreaties, my
caresses, and my rejected suit. But, do thou, if there is any power in
incantations, utter the incantation with thy holy lips; or, if {any}
herb is more efficacious, make use of the proved virtues of powerful
herbs. But I do not request thee to cure me, and to heal these wounds;
and there is no necessity for an end {to them; but} let her share in the
flame." But Circe, (for no one has a temper more susceptible of such a
passion, whether it is that the cause of it originates in herself, or
whether it is that Venus, offended[2] by her father's discovery, causes
this,) utters such words as these:--

"Thou wilt more successfully court her who is willing, and who
entertains similar desires, and who is captivated with an