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The future games, the judges of the day
With instant care they mark a spacious round
And level for the dance the allotted ground:
The herald bears the lyre: intent to play,
The bard advancing meditates the lay.
Skill'd in the dance, tall youths, a blooming band,
Graceful before the heavenly minstrel stand:
Light bounding from the earth, at once they rise,
Their feet half-viewless quiver in the skies:
Ulysses gazed, astonish'd to survey
The glancing splendours as their sandals play.
Meantime the bard, alternate to the strings,
The loves of Mars and Cytherea sings:
How the stern god, enamour'd with her charms
Clasp'd the gay panting goddess in his arms,
By bribes seduced; and how the sun, whose eye
Views the broad heavens, disclosed the lawless joy.
Stung to the soul, indignant through the skies
To his black forge vindictive Vulcan flies:
Arrived, his sinewy arms incessant place
The eternal anvil on the massy base.
A wondrous net he labours, to betray
The wanton lovers, as entwined they lay,
Indissolubly strong; Then instant bears
To his immortal dome the finish'd snares:
Above, below, around, with art dispread,
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