301Earth had said this: for she could not bear the heat any longer, nor say more: and she drew her face back into herself and into the caves nearer the shades below. 304But the almighty father, calling the gods above to witness, and the very one who had given the chariot, that unless he brings help everything will perish by a grievous fate, climbs high to the topmost citadel, from where he is wont to spread clouds over the wide lands, from where he sets the thunder rolling and hurls his brandished thunderbolts. 309But at that time he had neither clouds that he could spread over the lands nor rain that he could send down from the sky.
311He thunders, and, poising a thunderbolt by his right ear, he hurled it at the charioteer, and drove him at once from life and from the chariot, and checked fire with savage fire. 314The horses are thrown into panic, and, leaping in opposite directions, they tear their necks from the yoke and leave the broken reins behind. 316There lie the bridles, there the axle torn from the pole, in this place the spokes of the broken wheels, and the remnants of the shattered chariot are scattered far and wide. 319But Phaethon, the flame ravaging his ruddy hair, rolls headlong and is carried through the air in a long trail, as sometimes a star from a clear sky, though it has not fallen, could seem to have fallen.
323Far from his homeland, in a different part of the world, the mighty Eridanus receives him and washes his smoking face. 325The Hesperian Naiads commit his body, smoking from the three-forked flame, to a tomb, and also mark the stone with a verse: HERE LIES PHAETHON, CHARIOTEER OF HIS FATHER'S CAR: IF HE DID NOT MASTER IT, YET HE FELL IN GREAT DARING. 329For his father, pitiable in sick grief, had covered and hidden his face: and, if only we believe it, they say that one day went by without the sun: the fires gave light, and there was some use in that disaster. 333But Clymene, when she had said whatever was to be said in such great woes, mourning and frantic and with her robe torn at the breast, travelled over the whole world, seeking first his lifeless limbs, then his bones, and found them (his bones, though, buried on a foreign bank!), and she lay upon the place, and bathed with tears the name she read on the marble and warmed it with her bared breast.
340No less do the Heliades mourn, and give tears, an empty offering, to death, and beating their breasts with their palms they call night and day on Phaethon, who will not hear their wretched laments, and lie prostrate on his tomb. 344Four times the moon had joined her horns and filled her orb: they, after their custom (for habit had made it a custom), had made their lament. 346Of them Phaethusa, the eldest of the sisters, when she wished to throw herself on the ground, complained that her feet had grown stiff. 348When fair Lampetie tried to come to her, she was held back by a sudden root. 350A third, when she was preparing to tear her hair with her hands, tears out leaves; 351this one grieves that her legs are held fast by a trunk, that one that her arms are becoming long branches.
353And while they marvel at this, bark encloses their loins and by degrees surrounds belly and breast and shoulders and hands, and only their mouths remained, calling on their mother. 356What is their mother to do, except go this way and that, wherever her impulse draws her, and join kisses with them while she may? 358It is not enough; 358she tries to tear their bodies from the trunks, and breaks off slender branches with her hands; 359but from there drops of blood flow, as if from a wound. 361'Spare me, mother, I beg you,' cries each one as she is wounded, 'spare me, I beg you: it is our body that is being torn in the tree.
363And now farewell' — the bark closed over her last words. 364From there tears flow, and, dripping from the new branches, amber hardens in the sun; the clear river receives it and sends it to be worn by the brides of Latium. 367Present at this marvel was Cycnus, son of Sthenelus, who, though related to you, Phaethon, by his mother's blood, was closer to you in mind. 369He had left his kingdom (for he had ruled the peoples of the Ligurians and great cities) and had filled the green banks and the river Eridanus and the wood, increased by the sisters, with his laments, when the man's voice grew thin, and white feathers hide his hair, and his neck stretches far out from his breast, and a web joins his reddening toes, plumage covers his sides, and a blunt beak holds his mouth.
377Cycnus becomes a new bird, and does not trust himself to the sky and to Jupiter, as if remembering the fire unjustly sent by him: he seeks pools and open lakes, and, hating fire, he has chosen rivers to dwell in, the opposite of flames. 381Meanwhile Phaethon's father, unkempt and himself without his splendour, as he usually is when he fails the world in eclipse, hates the light and himself and the day, and gives his mind up to grief; 384and to his grief he adds anger, and refuses his service to the world. 385'Enough,' he says, 'my lot has been restless from the beginning of time, and I am weary of labours done without end and without honour.
388Let anyone else drive the chariot that carries the light! 389If there is no one, and all the gods confess they cannot, let him drive it himself, so that at least, while he tries my reins, he may for once lay aside the thunderbolts that bereave fathers. 392Then, having experienced the strength of the fire-footed horses, he will know that he who did not guide them well did not deserve death.' 394As he says such things, all the deities stand around the Sun and beg him in suppliant voices not to choose to bring darkness over the world: Jupiter too excuses the fires he hurled, and to his prayers adds threats, like a king.
398Phoebus gathers his horses, still frantic and trembling with terror, and in his pain rages at them with goad and whip: he rages indeed, and reproaches them with his son and lays his death to their charge.