“Is Sparta blest, and these desiring eyes

View my friend’s son? (the king exalting cries;)

Son of my friend, by glorious toils approved,

Whose sword was sacred to the man he loved;

Mirror of constant faith, revered and mourn’d—

When Troy was ruin’d, had the chief return’d,

No Greek an equal space had ere possess’d,

Of dear affection, in my grateful breast.

I, to confirm the mutual joys we shared,

For his abode a capital prepared;

Argos, the seat of sovereign rule, I chose;

Fair in the plan the future palace rose,

Where my Ulysses and his race might reign,

And portion to his tribes the wide domain,

To them my vassals had resign’d a soil,

With teeming plenty to reward their toil.

There with commutual zeal we both had strove

In acts of dear benevolence and love:

Brothers in peace, not rivals in command,

And death alone dissolved the friendly band!

Some envious power the blissful scene destroys;

Vanish’d are all the visionary joys;

The soul of friendship to my hope is lost,

Fated to wander from his natal coast!”


He ceased; a gush of grief began to rise:

Fast streams a tide from beauteous Helen’s eyes;

Fast for the sire the filial sorrows flow;

The weeping monarch swells the mighty woe;

Thy cheeks, Pisistratus, the tears bedew,

While pictured so thy mind appear’d in view,

Thy martial brother; on the Phrygian plain

Extended pale, by swarthy Memnon slain!

But silence soon the son of Nestor broke,

And melting with fraternal pity, spoke:


“Frequent, O king, was Nestor wont to raise

And charm attention with thy copious praise;

To crowd thy various gifts, the sage assign’d

The glory of a firm capacious mind;

With that superior attribute control

This unavailing impotence of soul,

Let not your roof with echoing grief resound,

Now for the feast the friendly bowl is crown’d;

But when, from dewy shade emerging bright,

Aurora streaks the sky with orient light,