O'er the wide plain there rose a fhady wood Of aged trees; in its dark bofom stood
A bushy thicket, pathless and unworn,
O'er-run with brambles, and perplex'd with thorn:
Amidft the brake a hollow den was found,
With rocks and shelving arches vaulted round.
Deep in the dreary den, conceal'd from day,
Sacred to Mars, a mighty dragon lay,
Bloated with poison to a monstrous fize;
Fire broke in flashes when he glanc'd his eyes:
His tow'ring creft was glorious to behold,
His fhoulders and his fides were fcal'd with gold;
Three tongues he brandish'd when he charg'd his foes:
His teeth ftood jaggy in three dreadful rows.
The Tyrians in the den for water fought,
And with their urns explor'd the hollow vault:
From fide to fide their empty urns rebound,
And roufe the fleepy ferpent with the found.
Straight he beftirs him, and is feen to rife;
And now with dreadful hiffings fills the skies,
And darts his forky tongues, and rolls his glaring eyes.
The Tyrians drop their veffels in the fright,
All palé and trembling at the hideous fight.
Spire above fpire uprear'd in air he stood,
And gazing round him, over-look'd the wood:
Then floating on the ground, in circles roll'd;
Then leap'd upon them in a mighty fold.
Of such a bulk, and such a monftrous fize,
The ferpent in the polar circle lies,
That ftretches over half the northern skies.
In vain the Tyrians on their arms rely,
In vain attempt to fight, in vain to fly:
All their endeavours and their hopes are vain;
Some die entangled in the winding train;
Some are devour'd; or feel a loathsom death,
Swoln up with blafts of peftilential breath.
And now the scorching fun was mounted high,
In all its luftre, to the noon-day sky;
When, anxious for his friends, and fill'd with cares,
To fearch the woods th' impatient chief prepares.
Á lion's hide around his loins he wore,
The well-pois'd javelin to the field he bore
Inur'd to blood; the far-deftroying dart,
And, the best weapon, an undaunted heart.
Soon as the youth approach'd the fatal place,
He saw his fervants breathless on the grass;
The scaly foe amid their corps he view'd,
Basking at eafe, and feasting on their blood.
"Such friends, he cries, deferv'd a longer date:
"But Cadmus will revenge, or share their fate."
Then heav'd a ftone, and rifing to the throw,
He fent it in a whirlwind at the foe:
A tower, affaulted by so rude a stroke,
With all its lofty battlements had shook;
But nothing here th' unwieldy rock avails,
Rebounding harmlefs from the plaited scales,
That, firmly join'd, preferv'd him from a wound,
With native armour crufted i around.
With more fuccefs the dart unerring flew,
Which at his back the raging warrior threw ;
Amid the plaited fcales it took its course,
And in the spinal marrow spent its force.
The monster hifs'd aloud, and rag'd in vain,
And writh'd his body to and fro with pain;
And bit the fpear, and wrench'd the wood
The point still buried in the marrow lay.
And now his rage, increasing with his pain,
Reddens his eyes, and beats in every vein,
Churn'd in his teeth the foamy venom rofe,
Whilft from his mouth a blast of vapours flows,
Such as th' infernal Stygian waters cait;
The plants around him wither in the blast.
Now in a maze of rings he lies enroll'd,
Now all unravel'd, and without a fold;
Now, like a torrent, with a mighty force
Bears down the foreft in his boift'rous course.
Cadmus gave back, and on the lion's spoil
Suftain'd the shock, then forc'd him to recoil;
The pointed jav'lin warded off his rage:
Mad with his pains, and furious to engage,
The ferpent champs the steel, and bites the spear,
'Till blood and venom all the point befmear.
But ftill the hurt he yet receiv'd was flight;
For, whilst the champion with redoubled might
Strikes home the jav'lin, his retiring foe
Shrinks from the wound, and disappoints the blow.
The dauntless hero ftill pursues his stroke,
And preffes forward, 'till a knotty oak
Retards his fee, and stops him in the rear;
Full in his throat he plung'd the fatal fpear,
That in th' extended neck a paffage found,
And pierc'd the folid timber through the wound.
Fix'd to the reeling trunk, with many a stroke
Of his huge tail, he lash'd the sturdy oak;
"Till spent with toil, and labouring hard for breath,
He now lay twisting in the pangs of death.
Cadmus beheld him wallow in a flood
Of swimming poifon, intermix'd with blood;
When fuddenly a speech was heard from high,
(The fpeech was heard, nor was the speaker nigh)
"Why doft thou thus with fecret pleasure fee,
"Infulting man! what thou thyfelf fhalt be?"
Aftonish'd at the voice, he ftood amaz'd,
And all around with inward horror gaz'd:
When Pallas fwift defcending from the skies,
Pallas, the guardian of the bold and wise,
Bids him plow up the field, and scatter round
The dragon's teeth o'er all the furrow'd ground;
Then tells the youth how to his wondring eyes
Embattled armies from the field fhould rife.
He fows the teeth at Pallas's command,
And flings the future people from his hand.
The clods grow warm, and crumble where he fows:
And now the pointed spears advance in rows;
Now nodding plumes appear, and fhining crefts,
Now the broad fhoulders and the rifing breasts:
O'er all the field the breathing harvest swarms,
A growing hoft, a crop of men and arms.
So through the parting stage a figure rears
Its body up, and limb by limb appears
By juft degrees; 'till all the man arise,
And in his full proportion ftrikes the eyes.
Cadmus furpris'd, and startled at the fight
Of his new foes, prepar'd himself for fight:
When one cry'd out, "Forbear, fond man, forbear
"To mingle in a blind promiscuous war.”
This, faid, he truck his brother to the ground,
Himfelf expiring by another's wound;
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