‘We strip our crown of its most precious gem,

Proffering to thee our child Argiope:

So let the Median Queen

Be the mild guardian of the Scythian river.’

212

Lifting his brow, replied Zariades;

‘Great rivers are the highways of the world;

The Tanais laves my shores;

For those who dwell upon my shores I claim it.

216

‘If pirates land on either side for prey,

My banks grow herdsmen who can guard their herds;

Take, in these words, reply

To all complaints that threaten Median subjects.

220

‘But for the gentler phrase wherewith your king

Stoops to a proffer, yet implies command,

I pray you, in return,

To give such thanks as soften most refusal.

224

‘Thanks are a language kings are born to hear,

But speak not glibly till they near their fall.

To guard his Scythian realm,

On the Mede’s throne the Scyth would place his daughter;

228

‘I should deceive him if I said “Agreed.”

No throne, methinks, hath room for more than one;

Where a Queen’s lips decide

Or peace or war, she slays the king her husband.

232

‘Thus thinking, did I wed this Schythian maid,

It were no marriage between Mede and Scyth;

Nor wrong I unseen charms;

Love, we are told, comes like the wind from heaven

236

‘Not at our bidding, but its own free will.

And so depart - and pardon my plain speech.

That which I think I say,

Offending Oft-times, but deceiving never.’

240

So he dismissed them, if with churlish words

With royal presents, and to festal pomps.

But one, by Median law

Nearest his throne, the chief priest of the Megi,

244