Transformation of the Theban Matrons
The companions of Ino, lamenting the fate of their unhappy mistress, excite the displeasure of Juno, who transforms them into stones and birds.
The Theban matrons their loved queen pursued, And tracing to the rock, her footsteps view’d. Too certain of her fate, they rend the skies With piteous shrieks, and lamentable cries; All beat their breasts, and Juno all upbraid, Who still remember’d a deluded maid, Who, still revengeful for one stolen embrace, Thus wreak’d her hate on the Cadmean race. This Juno heard: “And shall such elfs,” she cried “Dispute my justice, or my power deride? You too shall feel my wrath not idly spent; A goddess never for insults was meant.”
She who loved most, and who most loved had been, Said: “Not the waves shall part me from my queen.” She strove to plunge into the roaring flood, Fix’d to the stone, a stone herself she stood; This, on her breast would fain her blows repeat; Her stiffen’d hands refused her breast to beat; That stretch’d her arms unto the seas, in vain Her arms she labour’d to unstretch again. To tear her comely locks another tried; Both comely locks and fingers petrified. Part thus; but Juno, with a softer mind, Part doom’d to mix among the feather’d kind. Transform’d, the name of Theban birds they keep, And skim the surface of that fatal deep.