The Beginning of the Story - Page 24 of 25

369   I have been roaming many a year,
My place – mountains, woodlands drear,
Reaching this place, your fate to steer
From the foul lust of this brute here.

370   Here ceased discourse, for came straightway
Florante, Aladdin, who when they
Heard the dear voices drift their way,
Could scarce their hearts' excitement stay.

371   What tongue can spell the gladness rare
Each loving couple found to share?
Unto the earth sunk shamed Despair,
Its spent, dulled arrows burying there.

372   To what high heaven did joy raise
Our own Florante, now his gaze
Could contemplate the happy face
Of Laura, dream of all his days?

373   Forsooth, those woods once full of sighs
Came to be such a paradise,
Three times they failed to realize
Their breath could snap off in a thrice.

374   Then when their joy had quite abated,
Laura unto the rest related
Her life back in Albania, dated
Since her love left. Thus she narrated:

375   'Twas not long after you had gone
From our Albania, dearest one,
Vague rumblings rose and swept upon
The state, and reached the throne anon.

376   But none there was could reason quite
Why such reports, or whom to cite –
Like ills which doctors erudite
Could never diagnose aright.

377   Then swiftly mobs, and troops as well,
Beseiged the palace – mad, pell-mell.
O day of fears too grim to tell,
Whereon God's wrathful curses fell!

378   Their clamor rose, a deaf'ning thing;
'Death, Death to him, Linceus the king!
Who would to us starvation bring,
The granary's closure ordering!'

379   All this... Adolphus was behind,
Inciting thus the masses blind;
Proclaimed, as though the king had signed,
This mandate he had mean designed.

380   They seized the king, my sire, that day,
To execute him right away.
Reason could not dissuade them – nay,
Now false of heart and wild were they.

381   That same day, they beheaded too
His staff whose loyalty they knew,
Nor stopped the traitor's blade to hew
As long as good men were in view.

382   The tyrant Count rose to the throne,
And spoke to me in threatening tone,
That if his love I would disown,
To me would lowly death be shown.

383   Desiring vengeance soon or late,
To call you from Aetolia's state,
I taught my heart to simulate,
Not show him my disgust and hate.

384   I asked for five months' time, no more,
Ere yielding to his love, but swore
Suicide unto my bosom's core
If you should fail to come before.