The nymphs of Latium erect a monument to the memory of Phaeton, whose sisters are changed into poplars while bewailing their brother’s untimely fate.
The Latian nymphs came round him, and amazed, On the dead youth, transfix’d with thunder, gazed, And, while yet smoking from the bolt he lay, His shatter’d body to a tomb convey; And o’er the tomb an epitaph devise: “Here he who drove the sun’s bright chariot lies; His father’s fiery steeds he could not guide, But in the glorious enterprise he died.”
Apollo hid his face, and pined for grief, And, if the story may deserve belief, The space of one whole day is said to run, From morn to wonted ev’n, without a sun; The burning ruins, with a fainter ray, Supply the sun, and counterfeit a day, A day that still did Nature’s face disclose, This comfort from the mighty mischief rose.