Kitap 9
The Pharian beam proclaimed Egyptian shores.
1
But day arose, and veiled the nightly lamp
Ere rode his barks on waters safe from storm.
Then Caesar saw that tumult held the shore,
And mingled voices of uncertain sound
Struck on his ear: and trusting not himself
To doubtful kingdoms, of uncertain troth,
He kept his ships from land. But from the king
Came his vile minion forth upon the wave,
Bearing his dreadful gift, Pompeius' head,
Wrapped in a covering of Pharian wool.
First took he speech and thus in shameless words
Commends the murder: ' Conqueror of the world,
First of the Roman race, and, what as yet
Thou dost not know, safe by thy kinsman slain;
This gift receive from the Pellaean king,
Sole trophy absent from the Thracian field,
'To crown thy toils on land and on the deep.
Here in thine absence have we placed for thee
'An end upon the war. Here Magnus came
To mend his fallen fortunes; on our swords
'Here met his death. With such a pledge of faith
Here have we bought thee, Caesar; with his blood
Seal we this treaty. Take the Pharian realm
Sought by no bloodshed, take the rule of Nile,
Take all that thou wouldst give for Magnus' life:
And hold him vassal worthy of thy camp
'To whom the fates against thy son-in-law
'Such power entrusted; nor hold thou the deed
'Lightly accomplished by the swordsman's stroke,
And so the merit. Guest ancestral he
Who was its victim; who, his sire expelled,
' Gave back to him the sceptre. For a deed
' So great, thou'lt find a name-or ask the world.
' If 'twas a crime, thou must confess the debt
'To us the greater, for that from thy hand
Unveiled the head. Now had the hand of death
Passed with its changing touch upon the face:
