[XIV].--THE LION GROWN OLD.[[21]]
A lion, mourning, in his age, the wane
Of might once dreaded through his wild domain,
Was mock'd, at last, upon his throne,
By subjects of his own,
Strong through his weakness grown.
The horse his head saluted with a kick;
The wolf snapp'd at his royal hide;
The ox, too, gored him in the side;
The unhappy lion, sad and sick,
Could hardly growl, he was so weak.
In uncomplaining, stoic pride,
He waited for the hour of fate,
Until the ass approach'd his gate;
Whereat, 'This is too much,' he saith;
'I willingly would yield my breath;
But, ah! thy kick is double death!'
[[21]] Phaedrus, I. 21.
[XV].--PHILOMEL AND PROGNE.[[22]]
From home and city spires, one day,
The swallow Progne flew away,
And sought the bosky dell
Where sang poor Philomel.[[23]]
'My sister,' Progne said, 'how do you do?
'Tis now a thousand years since you
Have been conceal'd from human view;
I'm sure I have not seen your face
Once since the times of Thrace.
Pray, will you never quit this dull retreat?'
'Where could I find,' said Philomel, 'so sweet?'
'What! sweet?' cried Progne--'sweet to waste
Such tones on beasts devoid of taste,
Or on some rustic, at the most!
Should you by deserts be engross'd?
Come, be the city's pride and boast.
Besides, the woods remind of harms
That Tereus in them did your charms.'
'Alas!' replied the bird of song,
'The thought of that so cruel wrong
Makes me, from age to age,
Prefer this hermitage;
For nothing like the sight of men
Can call up what I suffer'd then.'
[[22]] Aesop.
[[23]] Progne and Philomel.--Progne and Philomela, sisters, in mythology. Progne was Queen of Thrace, and was changed into a swallow. Her sister was changed into a nightingale; vide Ovid, Metamorphoses.
[XVI].--THE WOMAN DROWNED.[[24]]
I hate that saying, old and savage,
"'Tis nothing but a woman drowning."
That's much, I say. What grief more keen should have edge
Than loss of her, of all our joys the crowning?
Thus much suggests the fable I am borrowing.
A woman perish'd in the water,
Where, anxiously, and sorrowing,
Her husband sought her,
To ease the grief he could not cure,
By honour'd rites of sepulture.
It chanced that near the fatal spot,
Along the stream which had
Produced a death so sad,
There walk'd some men that knew it not.
The husband ask'd if they had seen
His wife, or aught that hers had been.
One promptly answer'd, 'No!
But search the stream below:
It must nave borne her in its flow.'
'No,' said another; 'search above.
In that direction
She would have floated, by the love
Of contradiction.'
This joke was truly out of season;--
I don't propose to weigh its reason.
But whether such propensity
The sex's fault may be,
Or not, one thing is very sure,
Its own propensities endure.
Up to the end they'll have their will,
And, if it could be, further still.
[[24]] Verdizotti.