road to the palace of heaven. The road, which any one may see in a
clear night, stretches across the face of the sky, and is called
the Milky Way. Along the road stand the palaces of the illustrious
gods; the common people of the skies live apart, on either side.
Jupiter addressed the assembly. He set forth the frightful
condition of things on the earth, and closed by announcing his
intention to destroy the whole of its inhabitants, and provide a
new race, unlike the first, who would be more worthy of life, and
much better worshippers of the gods. So saying he took a
thunderbolt, and was about to launch it at the world, and destroy
it by burning; but recollecting the danger that such a
conflagration might set heaven itself on fire, he changed his
plan, and resolved to drown it. The north wind, which scatters the
clouds, was chained up; the south was sent out, and soon covered
all the face of heaven with a cloak of pitchy darkness. The
clouds, driven together, resound with a crash; torrents of rain
fall; the crops are laid low; the year's labor of the husbandman
perishes in an hour. Jupiter, not satisfied with his own waters,
calls on his brother Neptune to aid him with his. He lets loose
the rivers, and pours them over the land. At the same time, he
heaves the land with an earthquake, and brings in the reflux of
the ocean over the shores. Flocks, herds, men, and houses are
swept away, and temples, with their sacred enclosures, profaned.
If any edifice remained standing, it was overwhelmed, and its
turrets lay hid beneath the waves. Now all was sea, sea without
shore. Here and there an individual remained on a projecting
hilltop, and a few, in boats, pulled the oar where they had lately
driven the plough. The fishes swim among the tree-tops; the anchor
is let down into a garden. Where the graceful lambs played but
now, unwieldy sea calves gambol. The wolf swims among the sheep,