Ride on the seas and fail to find a fleet.

Urged by his sire's unconquerable will
And mindful of his rights, mine heir shall rouse

All nations to the conflict. One alone,
(Should he contend for freedom) may ye serve;

Cato, none else!' Thus have I kept the faith;
Thy plot (3) prevailed upon me, and I lived

Thy mandate to discharge. Now through the void
Of space, and shades of Hell, if such there be,

I follow; yet how distant be my doom
I know not: first my spirit must endure

The punishment of life, which saw thine end
And could survive it; sighs shall break my heart,

Tears shall dissolve it: sword nor noose I need
Nor headlongplunge. 'Twere shameful since thy death,

Were aught but grief required to cause my own."
She seeks the cabin, veiled, in funeral garb,

In tears to find her solace, and to love
Grief in her husband's room; no prayers were hers

For life, as were the sailors'; nor their shout
Roused by the height of peril, moved her soul,

Nor angered waves: but sorrowing there she lay,
Resigned to death and welcoming the storm.

First reached they Cyprus on the foamy brine;
Then as the eastern breeze more gently held

The favouring deep, they touched the Libyan shore
Where stood the camp of Cato. Sad as one

Who deep in fear presages ills to come,
Cnaeus beheld his brother and his band

Of patriot comrades. Swift into the wave
He leaps and cries, "Where, brother, is our sire?

Still stands our country mistress of the world,
Or are we fallen, Rome with Magnus' death

Rapt to the shades?" Thus he: but Sextus said
"Oh happy thou who by report alone

Hear'st of the deed that chanced on yonder shore!
These eyes that saw, my brother, share the guilt.

Not Caesar wrought the murder of our sire,
Nor any captain worthy in the fray.

He fell beneath the orders of a king
Shameful and base, while trusting to the gods

Who shield the guest; a king who in that land
By his concession ruled: (this the reward

For favours erst bestowed). Within my sight
Pierced through with wounds our noble father fell:

Yet deeming not the petty prince of Nile
So fell a deed would dare, to Egypt's strand

I thought great Caesar come. But worse than all,
Worse than the wounds which gaped upon his frame

Struck me with horror to the inmost heart,
Our murdered father's head, shorn from the trunk

And borne aloft on javelin; this sight,
As rumour said, the cruel victor asked

To feast his eyes, and prove the bloody deed.
For whether ravenous birds and Pharian dogs

Have torn his corse asunder, or a fire
Consumed it, which with stealthy flame arose

Upon the shore, I know not. For the parts
Devoured by destiny I only blame

The gods: I weep the part preserved by men."
Thus Sextus spake: and Cnaeus at the words

Flamed into fury for his father's shame.
"Sailors, launch forth our navies, by your oars

Forced through the deep though wind and sea oppose:
Captains, lead on: for civil strife ne'er gave

So great a prize; to lay in earth the limbs
Of Magnus, and avenge him with the blood

Of that unmanly tyrant. Shall I spare
Great Alexander's fort, nor sack the shrine

And plunge his body in the tideless marsh?
Nor drag Amasis from the Pyramids,

And all their ancient Kings, to swim the Nile?
Torn from his tomb, that god of all mankind

Isis, unburied, shall avenge thy shade;
And veiled Osiris shall I hurl abroad

In mutilated fragments; and the form
Of sacred Apis; (4) and with these their gods

Shall light a furnace, that shall burn the head
They held in insult. Thus their land shall pay

The fullest penalty for the shameful deed.
No husbandman shall live to till the fields

Nor reap the benefit of brimming Nile.
Thou only, Father, gods and men alike

Fallen and perished, shalt possess the land."
Such were the words he spake; and soon the fleet

Had dared the angry deep: but Cato's voice
While praising, calmed the youthful chieftain's rage.

Meanwhile, when Magnus' fate was known, the air
Sounded with lamentations which the shore

Re-echoed; never through the ages past,
By history recorded, was it known

That thus a people mourned their ruler's death.
Yet more when worn with tears, her pallid cheek

Veiled by her loosened tresses, from the ship
Cornelia came, they wept and beat the breast.

The friendly land once gained, her husband's garb,
His arms and spoils, embroidered deep in gold,

Thrice worn of old upon the sacred hill (5)
She placed upon the flame. Such were for her

The ashes of her spouse: and such the love
Which glowed in every heart, that soon the shore

Blazed with his obsequies. Thus at winter-tide
By frequent fires th' Apulian herdsman seeks

To render to the fields their verdant growth;
Till blaze Garganus' uplands and the meads

Of Vultur, and the pasture of the herds
By warm Matinum.

Yet Pompeius' shade
Nought else so gratified, not all the blame

The people dared to heap upon the gods,
For him their hero slain, as these few words

From Cato's noble breast instinct with truth:
"Gone is a citizen who though no peer (6)

Of those who disciplined the state of yore
In due submission to the bounds of right,

Yet in this age irreverent of law
Has played a noble part. Great was his power,

But freedom safe: when all the plebs was prone
To be his slaves, he chose the private gown;

So that the Senate ruled the Roman state,
The Senate's ruler: nought by right of arms

He e'er demanded: willing took he gifts
Yet from a willing giver: wealth was his

Vast, yet the coffers of the State he filled
Beyond his own. He seized upon the sword,

Knew when to sheath it; war did he prefer
To arts of peace, yet armed loved peace the more.