Dim through the eclipse of fate, the rays divine

Of sovereign state with faded splendour shine.

If monarchs by the gods are plunged in woe,

To what abyss are we foredoom’d to go!”

Then affable he thus the chief address’d,

Whilst with pathetic warmth his hand he press’d:


“Stranger, may fate a milder aspect show,

And spin thy future with a whiter clue!

O Jove! for ever deaf to human cries;

The tyrant, not the father of the skies!

Unpiteous of the race thy will began!

The fool of fate, thy manufacture, man,

With penury, contempt, repulse, and care,

The galling load of life is doom’d to bear.

Ulysses from his state a wanderer still,

Upbraids thy power, thy wisdom, or thy will!

O monarch ever dear!-O man of woe!

Fresh flow my tears, and shall for ever flow!

Like thee, poor stranger guest, denied his home,

Like thee: in rags obscene decreed to roam!

Or, haply perish’d on some distant coast,

In stygian gloom he glides, a pensive ghost!

Oh, grateful for the good his bounty gave,

I’ll grieve, till sorrow sink me to the grave!

His kind protecting hand my youth preferr’d,

The regent of his Cephalenian herd;

With vast increase beneath my care it spreads:

A stately breed! and blackens far the meads.

Constrain’d, the choicest beeves I thence import,

To cram these cormorants that crowd his court:

Who in partition seek his realm to share;

Nor human right nor wrath divine revere,

Since here resolved oppressive these reside,

Contending doubts my anxious heart divide:

Now to some foreign clime inclined to fly,

And with the royal herd protection buy;

Then, happier thoughts return the nodding scale,

Light mounts despair, alternate hopes prevail:

In opening prospects of ideal joy,

My king returns; the proud usurpers die.”


To whom the chief: “In thy capacious mind

Since daring zeal with cool debate is join’d,

Attend a deed already ripe in fate:

Attest, O Jove! the truth I now relate!