Some disorder had surely crept into the course of the elements, destroying their benignant influence. The wind, prince of air, raged through his kingdom, lashing the sea into fury, and subduing the rebel earth into some sort of obedience.

The God sends down his angry plagues from high, Famine and pestilence in heaps they die. Again in vengeance of his wrath he falls On their great hosts, and breaks their tottering walls; Arrests their navies on the ocean’s plain, And whelms their strength with mountains of the main.[6]

Their deadly power shook the flourishing countries of the south, and during winter, even,