So she spoke: and Sleep beating his shady wing sent all breathing nature to rest ; but Cronion alone remained sleepless. Typhoeus stretched out his sluggish back and lay heavy upon his bed, covering his Mother Earth; she opened wide her bosom, and lurking lairs were hollowed out in a grinning chasm for the snaky heads which sank into the ground. Oceanos surrounds the circle of the world and its four divided parts, girdling the whole earth coronet-wise with encircling band ; as the monster spoke, that which answered the army of his voices, was not one concordant echo, but a babel of screaming sounds : when the monster arrayed him with all his manifold shapes, out rang the yowling of wolves, the roaring of lions, the grunting of boars, the lowing of cattle, the hissing of serpents, the bold yap of leopards, the jaws of rearing bears, the fury of dogs. Then with midmost man-shaped head the Giant yelled out threats against Zeus
Smash the house of Zeus, O my hands ! Shake the foundation of the universe, and the blessed ones be with it! Break the bar of Olympos, self-turning, divine! Drag down to earth the heavenly pillar, lot Atlas be shaken and flee away, let him throw down A the starry vault of Olympos and fear no more its circling course—for I will not permit a son of Earth to be bowed down with chafed shoulders, while he under, wops the revolving compulsion of the sky! No, let leave his endless burden to the other gods, and battle against the Blessed Ones! Let him break off rocks, and volley with those hard shots the starry “vault which he once carried Let the timid Seasons, the Sun’s handmaids, flee the heavens under the shower of mountains! Mix earth with sky, water with fire, sea with Olympos, in a litter of confusion!
I will compel the four winds also to labour as my slaves; I lash the North Wind, buffet the South, flog the East; I will thrash the West, with one hand I will mix night with day ; Oceanos my brother shall bring his water to Olympos aloft with many-fountained throat, and rising in the five parallel circles he shall inundate the stars; then let the thirsty Bear go wandering in the water with the Waggon’s pole submerged “Bellow, my bulls, shake the circle of the equator in the sky, break with your notched horns the horns of the fiery Bull, your own likeness! Let Selene’s cattle change their watery road, fearing the heavy-booming bellow of my heads! Let Typhaon’s bear open wide his grim gaping jaws, and worry the Bear of Olympos! Let my Lion face the heavenly Lion, and drive him reluctant from the path of the Zodiac! Let the Waggon’s snake shiver at my sents (Little do I care for Zeus,) with only a few lightnings to arm him! Ah, but my swords are the maddened waves of the sea, the tors of the land, the island glens ; my shields are the hills, the cliffs are my breastplates unbreakable, my halberts are the rocks, and the rivers which will quench the contemptible thunderbolt. I will keep the chains of Iapetos for Poseidon ; and soaring round Caucasos, another and better eagle shall tear the bleeding liver, for ever anew, of Hephaistos the fiery : since fire was that for which Prometheus has been suffering the ravages of his self-growing liver. I will take a shape the counterpart of the son of Iphimedeia will shut up the intriguing son of Maia in a brazen jar, prisoned with galling bonds, that people may say, ‘Hermes freed Ares from prison, and he was put in prison himself!” Let Artemis break the: untouched seal of her maidenhood, and become the: enforced consort of Orion; Leto shall spread her old bedding for Tityos, dragged to wedlock by force. I will strip murderous Ares of his ragged bucklers, I will bind the lord of battle, and carry him off, and make the Killer the Gentle ; I will carry off Pallas and join her to Ephialtes, married at last; that I may see Ares a slave, and Athena a mother,
Cronion also shall lift the spinning heavens of Atlas and bear the load on weary shoulders— there shall he stand, and hear the song at my wedding, and hide his jealousy when shall be Hera’s bridegroom. Torches shall not lack at my wedding. Bright lightning shall come of itself to be selfmade torch of the bride-chamber ; Phaethon himself instead of pine-brands, kindled at the light of his own flames, shall put his radiance at the service of Typhoeus the Bridegroom ; the stars shall sprinkle their bridal sparks over Olympos as lamps to my loves, the stars, lights of evening! My servant Selene, Endymion’s bed-fellow, along with Aphrodite the friend of marriage, shall lay my bed ; and if I want a bath, I will bathe in the waters of starry Eridanos.’ Come now, ye circling Seasons ! You prepared the bed of Zeus, build now the bower of love for Typhoeus; I you also, Leto, Athenaia, Paphian, Charis, Artemis, ! Hebe, bring up from Oceanos his kindred water for Typhon the Bridegroom! And at the banquet of my table, with bridal quill Apollo my menial shall celebrate Typhoeus instead of Zeus, I long for no stranger’s demesne ; for Uranos is my brother, a son of Earth like myself ; the star-dappled heaven which I shall rule, the heaven which I shall live in, comes to me through my mother. And cannibal Cronos I will drag up once more to the light, another brother, to help me in my task, out of the underground abyss ; I will break those constraining chains, and bring back the Titans to heaven, and settle under the same roof in the sky the Cyclopes, sons of Earth. I will make more weapons of fire; for need many thunderbolts, A] because I have two hundred hands to fight with, not only a pair like Cronides. I will forge a newer and) better brand of lightning, with more fire and flashes, I will build another heaven up aloft, the eighth, broader and higher than the rest, and furnish it with brighter stars ; for the vault which we see close beside us is not enough to cover the whole of Typhon. And after those girl children and the male progeny it of prolific Zeus, I will beget another multiparous generation of new Blessed Ones with multitudinous necks, I will not leave the company of the stars useless and unwedded, but I will join male to female, that the winged Virgin may sleep with the Oxherd and breed me slave-children,”
So he shouted ; Cronides heard, and laughed aloud. Then the din of battle resounded on both sides. Strife was Typhon’s escort in the mellay, Victory led Zeus into battle. No herds of gattle were the cause of that struggle, no flocks of sheep, this was no quarrel for a beautiful woman, no fray for a petty town : heaven itself was the stake in the fight, the sceptre and throne of Zeus lay on the knees of Victory as the prize of combat, Zeus flogging the clouds beat a thundering roar in the sky and trumpeted Enyo’s call, then fitted clouds upon his chest in a bunch as a protection against the Giant’s missiles. Nor was Typhoeus : silent: his bull-heads were selfsounding trumpets for him, sending forth a bellow which made Olympos rattle again: his serpents intermingled whistled for Ares” pipes. He fortified the ranks of his high- clambering limbs, shielding mighty rock with rock until the cliffs made an unbroken wall of battlements, as he set crag by crag uprooted in a long line. It looked like an army preparing for battle ; for side by side bluff pressed hard on bluff, tor upon tor, : ledge upon ledge, and high in the clouds one tortuous ridge pushed another; rugged hills were if Typhon’s helmets, and his heads were hidden in their beetling steeps. In that battle, the Giant had indeed one body, but many necks, but legions of arms innumerable, jaws with well-sharpened fangs, hair-bush of vipers mounting over the stars, Trees were doubled up by Typhaon’s hands and thrown against Cronides, and other fine leafy growths of earth, but all these Zeus unwilling burnt to dust with one spark of thunderbolt cast in a heavy throw, Many an elm was hurled against Zeus with firs coeval, and enormous planc-trees and volleys of hits poplar; many a pit was broken in earth’s.
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