Page:Metamorphoses (Ovid, 1567).djvu/317

Howbee't as soone as she did touch his dumb and bloodlesse flesh,
And had embraast his loved limbes with winges made new and fresh,
And with her hardened neb had kist him coldly, though in vayne,
Folk dowt if Ceyx feeling it to rayse his head did strayne,
Or whither that the waves did lift it up. But surely hee
It felt: and through compassion of the Goddes both hee and shee
Were turnd to birdes. The love of them eeke subject to their fate,
Continued after: neyther did the faythfull bond abate
Of wedlocke in them beeing birdes: but standes in stedfast state.
They treade, and lay, and bring foorth yoong and now the Alcyon sitts
In wintertime uppon her nest, which on the water flitts
A sevennyght. During all which tyme the sea is calme and still,
And every man may to and fro sayle saufly at his will,
For Aeolus for his offsprings sake the windes at home dooth keepe,
And will not let them go abroade for troubling of the deepe.
An auncient father seeing them aabout the brode sea fly,
Did prayse theyr love for lasting to the end so stedfastly.
His neyghbour or the selfsame man made answer (such is chaunce):
Even this fowle also whom thou seest uppon the surges glaunce
With spindle shanks, (he poynted to the wydegoawld Cormorant)
Before that he became a bird, of royall race might vaunt.
And if thou covet lineally his pedegree to seeke,
His Auncetors were Ilus, and Assaracus, and eeke
Fayre Ganymed who Jupiter did ravish as his joy,
Laomedon and Priamus the last that reygnd in Troy.
Stout Hectors brother was this man. And had he not in pryme
Of lusty youth beene tane away, his deedes perchaunce in tyme
Had purchaast him as great a name as Hector, though that hee
Of Dymants daughter Hecuba had fortune borne to bee.
For Aesacus reported is begotten to have beene
By scape, in shady Ida on a mayden fayre and sheene
Whose name was Alyxothoe, a poore mans daughter that
With spade and mattocke for himselfe and his a living gat.
This Aesacus the Citie hates, and gorgious Court dooth shonne,
And in the unambicious feeldes and woods alone dooth wonne.
He seeldoom haunts the towne of Troy, yit having not a rude
And blockish wit, nor such a hart as could not be subdewd