NEMEAN ODES: 1. THE INFANT HERACLES by PINDAR

BUT fast in heart I hold the lofty fame
Of greatly-labouring Heracles, and sing
A tale of olden time; for once, men say,
That son of Zeus with his twin brother came
Straight from his mother's womb of suffering
Into the wonder of the radiant day,
And, while his limbs were swathed in crocus-hued array,

Great Hera saw him from her throne of gold,
And straightly, in the fury of her wrath,
The Queen of gods two serpents thither sent,
Which, when the doors were opened, took their path
To the wide inner chamber, fiercely bent
The children to enfold,
And with quick-darting fangs to strike them dead.
But Heracles, on his first field of fight,
Undaunted stood, and held his head upright,
And forth his two avoidless hands outspread,

And grappled by their necks the serpents twain;
And so it was that all their life was shed
By strangling moments from their dreadful hearts,
While those who stood about Alcmene's bed
Were stricken through their women's souls by darts
Of irresistless pain,
For even the mother from her couch uprose,
Leapt to her feet, all robeless as she lay,
And fain would set herself to drive away
The shameless outrage of those brutish foes.

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