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BALAUSTION'S ADVENTURE.
Than best? who controverts the claim?" quoth she:"What kind of creature should the woman proveThat has surpassed Alkestis?—surelier shownPreference for her husband to herselfThan by determining to die for him?But so much all our city knows indeed:Hear what she did indoors and wonder then!For, when she felt the crowning day was come,She washed with river-waters her white skin,And, taking from the cedar closets forthVesture and ornament, bedecked herselfNobly, and stood before the hearth, and prayed:'Mistress, because I now depart the world,Falling before thee the last time, I ask—Be mother to my orphans! wed the oneTo a kind wife, and make the other's mateSome princely person: nor, as I who boreMy children perish, suffer that they too
