Chapter 1 No.1

Io triumphe! Lo, thy certain art,

My crafty sire, releases us at length!

False Minos now may knit his baffled brows,

And in the labyrinth by thee devised

His brutish horns in angry search may toss

The Minotaur,-but thou and I are free!

See where it lies, one dark spot on the breast

Of plains far-shining in the long-lost day,

Thy glory and our prison! Either hand

Crete, with her hoary mountains, olive-clad

In twinkling silver, 'twixt the vineyard rows,

Divides the glimmering seas. On Ida's top

The sun, discovering first an earthly throne,

Sits down in splendor: lucent vapors rise

From folded glens among the awaking hills,

Expand their hovering films, and touch, and spread

In airy planes beneath us, hearths of air

Whereon the morning burns her hundred fires.