With terrible pains, of filial zeal remiss,
Should pay the fine. The evil-minded Powers
Beneath the Earth[n23] would visit me in wrath,
A leprous tetter with corrosive tooth
Creep o’er my skin, and fasten on my flesh,
And with white scales the white hair grow, defacing
My bloom of health; and from my father’s tomb
Ripe with avenging ire the Erinnyes
Should ruthlessly invade me. Thus he spake,
And through the dark his prescient eyebrow arched.[n24]