R.

Straightway the crown slid off and smote on earth,
First fallen; and he, grasping his own hair, groaned
And cast his raiment round his face and fell.

SEMICHORUS.

Alas for visions that were,
And soothsayings spoken in sleep.

SECOND MESSENGER.

But the king twitched his reins in and leapt down
And caught him, crying out twice 'O child' and thrice,
So that men's eyelids thickened with their tears.

SEMICHORUS.

Lament with a long lamentation,
Cry, for an end is at hand.

SECOND MESSENGER.

O son, he said, son, lift thine eyes, draw breath,
Pity me; but Meleager with sharp lips
Gasped, and his face waxed like as sunburnt grass.

SEMICHORUS.

Cry aloud, O thou kingdom, O nation,
O stricken, a ruinous land.

SECOND MESSENGER.

Whereat king Oeneus, straightening feeble knees,
With feeble hands heaved up a lessening weight,
And laid him sadly in strange hands, and wept.

SEMICHORUS.

Thou art smitten, her lord, her desire,
Thy dear blood wasted as rain.

SECOND MESSENGER.

And they with tears and rendings of the beard
Bear hither a breathing body, wept upon
And lightening at each footfall, sick to death.

SEMICHORUS.

Thou madest thy sword as a fire,
With fire for a sword thou art slain.

SECOND MESSENGER.

And lo, the feast turned funeral, and the crowns
Fallen; and the huntress and the hunter trapped;
And weeping and changed faces and veiled hair.
MELEAGER.

Let your hands meet
Round the weight of my head,
Lift ye my feet
As the feet of the dead;
For the flesh of my body is molten,
the limbs of it molten as lead.

CHORUS.

O thy luminous face,
Thine imperious eyes!
O the grief, O the grace,
As of day when it dies!
Who is this bending over thee, lord,
with tears and suppression of sighs?

MELEAGER.

Is a bride so fair?
Is a maid so meek?
With unchapleted hair,
With unfilleted cheek,
Atalanta, the pure among women,
whose name is as blessing to speak.

ATALANTA.

I would that with feet
Unsandaled, unshod,
Overbold, overfleet,
I had swum not nor trod
From Arcadia to Calydon northward,
a blast of the envy of God.

MELEAGER.

Unto each man his fate;
Unto each as he saith
In