Page:Metamorphoses (Ovid, 1567).djvu/342

Is sound. But myne is gasht and hakt and stricken thurrough quyght
A thousand tymes, with bearing blowes. And therfore myne must walk
And put another in his stead. But what needes all this talk?
Lets now bee seene another whyle what eche of us can doo.
The thickest of our armed foes this armour throwe into,
And bid us fetch the same fro thence. And which of us dooth fetch
The same away, reward yee him therewith. Thus farre did stretch
The woordes of Aiax. At the ende whereof there did ensew
A muttring of the souldiers, till Laertis sonne the prew
Stood up, and raysed soberly his eyliddes from the ground
(On which he had a little whyle them pitched in a stound)
And looking on the noblemen who longd his woordes to heere
He thus began with comly grace and sober pleasant cheere:
    My Lordes, if my desyre and yours myght erst have taken place,
    It should not at this present tyme have beene a dowtfull cace,
What person hath most ryght to this great pryse for which wee stryve.
Achilles should his armour have, and wee still him alyve.
Whom sith that cruell destinie to both of us denyes,
(With that same woord as though he wept, he wypte his watry eyes)
What wyght of reason rather ought to bee Achilles heyre,
Than he through whom to this your camp Achilles did repayre?
Alonly let it not avayle sir Aiax heere, that hee
Is such a dolt and grossehead, as he shewes himself to bee
Ne let my wit (which ay hath done you good, O Greekes) hurt mee.
But suffer this mine eloquence (such as it is) which now
Dooth for his mayster speake, and oft ere this hath spoke for yow,
Bee undisdeynd. Let none refuse his owne good gifts he brings.
For as for stocke and auncetors, and other such like things
Wherof our selves no fownders are, I scarcely dare them graunt
To bee our owne. But forasmuch as Aiax makes his vaunt
To bee the fowrth from Ioue: even Ioue the founder is also
Of my house: and than fowre descents I am from him no mo.
Laërtes is my father, and Arcesius his, and hee
Begotten was of Iupiter. And in this pedegree
Is neyther any damned soule, nor outlaw as yee see.
Moreover by my moothers syde I come of Mercuree,
Another honor to my house. Thus both by fathers syde