For every good man yields a just return:

So civil rights demand; and who begins

The track of friendship, not pursuing, sins.

But tell me, stranger, be the truth confess’d,

What years have circled since thou saw’st that guest?

That hapless guest, alas! for ever gone!

Wretch that he was! and that I am! my son!

If ever man to misery was born,

’Twas his to suffer, and ’tis mine to mourn!

Far from his friends, and from his native reign,

He lies a prey to monsters of the main;

Or savage beasts his mangled relics tear,

Or screaming vultures scatter through the air:

Nor could his mother funeral unguents shed;

Nor wail’d his father o’er the untimely dead:

Nor his sad consort, on the mournful bier,

Seal’d his cold eyes, or dropp’d a tender tear!


“But, tell me who thou art? and what thy race?

Thy town, thy parents, and thy native place?

Or, if a merchant in pursuit of gain,

What port received thy vessel from the main?

Or comest thou single, or attend thy train?”


Then thus the son: “From Alybas I came,

My palace there; Eperitus my name

Not vulgar born: from Aphidas, the king

Of Polyphemon’s royal line, I spring.

Some adverse demon from Sicania bore

Our wandering course, and drove us on your shore;

Far from the town, an unfrequented bay

Relieved our wearied vessel from the sea.

Five years have circled since these eyes pursued

Ulysses parting through the sable flood:

Prosperous he sail’d, with dexter auguries,

And all the wing’d good omens of the skies.

Well hoped we then to meet on this fair shore,

Whom Heaven, alas! decreed to meet no more.”


Quick through the father’s heart these accents ran;

Grief seized at once, and wrapp’d up all the man:

Deep from his soul he sigh’d, and sorrowing spread

A cloud of ashes on his hoary head.

Trembling with agonies of strong delight

Stood the great son, heart-wounded with the sight:

He ran, he seized him with a strict embrace,