With pleasure Argus the musician heeds, But wonders much at those new vocal reeds. “And whosoe’er thou art, my friend,” said he, “Up hither drive thy goats, and play by me; This hill has browse for them and shade for thee.” The god, who was with ease induced to climb, Began discourse to pass away the time; And still, betwixt, his tuneful pipe he plies, And watch’d his hour, to close the keeper’s eyes. With much ado, he partly kept awake, Not suffering all his eyes repose to take; And ask’d the stranger who did reeds invent; And whence began so rare an instrument?

Then Hermes thus: “A nymph of late there was, Whose heavenly form her fellows did surpass; The pride and joy of fair Arcadia’s plains; Beloved by deities, adored by swains; Syrinx her name; by sylvans oft pursued, As oft she did the lustful gods delude; The rural and the woodland powers disdain’d; With Cynthia hunted, and her rites maintain’d; Like Phoebe clad, even Phoebe’s self she seems, So tall, so straight, such well-proportion’d limbs: The nicest eye did no distinction know, But that the goddess bore a golden bow: Distinguish’d thus, the sight she cheated too. Descending from Lycaeus, Pan admires The matchless nymph, and burns with new desires. A crown of pine upon his head he wore; And thus began her pity to implore:⁠— But ere he thus began, she took her flight, So swift, she was already out of sight; Nor stay’d to hear the courtship of the god; But bent her course to Ladon’s gentle flood; There by the river stopp’d, and, tired before, Relief from water-nymphs her prayers implore.

“Now while the amorous god, with speedy pace, Just thought to strain her in a strict embrace, He fills his arms with reeds, new rising on the place: And while he sighs, his ill success to find, The tender canes were shaken by the wind, And breathed a mournful air, unheard before, That, much surprising Pan, yet pleased him more. Admiring this new music⁠—‘Thou,’ he said, ‘Who canst not be the partner of my bed, At least shall be the consort of my mind, And often, often to my lips be join’d.’ He form’d the reeds, proportion’d as they are, Unequal in their length, and wax’d with care: They still retain the name of his ungrateful fair.”

While Hermes piped, and sung, and told his tale, The keeper’s winking eyes began to fail, And drowsy slumber on the lids to creep, Till all the watchman was at length asleep. Then soon the god his voice and song suppress’d, And with his powerful rod confirm’d his rest; Without delay his crooked falchion drew, And at one fatal stroke the keeper slew. Down from the rock fell the dissever’d head, Opening its eyes in death, and falling, bled, And mark’d the passage with a crimson trail: Thus Argus lies in pieces, cold and pale, And all his hundred eyes, with all their light, Are closed at once in one perpetual night. These Juno takes, that they no more way fail, And spreads them in her peacock’s gaudy tail.

The rugged hair began to fall away; The sweetness of her eyes did only stay; Though not so large: her crooked horns decrease; The wideness of her jaws and nostrils cease; Her hoofs to hands return, in little space; The five long taper fingers take their place; And nothing of the heifer now is seen, Beside the native whiteness of the skin. Erected on her feet she walks again; And two the duty of the four sustain. She tries her tongue; her silence softly breaks, And fears her former lowings when she speaks: A goddess now, through all the Egyptian state, And served by priests, who in white linen wait.