Greek Texts & Translations

23.26 And lo! now I bid this thy door farewell or ever I go. I know what is to be. The rose is fair and Time withers it, the violet is fair in the year’s spring and it quickly growth old; the lily is white, – it fades when its flowering’s done; and white the snow, – it melts all away when the wind blows warm: and even so, the beauty of a child is beautiful indeed, but it liveth not for long. The day will come when you shall love like me, when your heart shall burn like mine, and your eyes weep brinish tears. So I pray you, child, do me this one last courtesy: when you shall come and find a poor man hanging at your door, pass him not by; but stay you first and weep awhile for a libation upon him, and then loosing him from the rope, put about him some covering from your own shoulders; and give him one last kiss, for your lips will be welcome even to the dead. And never fear me; I cannot do thee any mischief; thou shalt kiss and there an end. Then pray thee make a hole in some earthy bank for to hide all my love of thee; and ere thou turn thee to go thy ways, cry over me three times ‘Rest, my friend,’ and if it seem thee good cry also ‘My fair companion’s dead.’ And for epitaph write the words I here inscribe upon thy wall: Here’s one that died of love; good wayfarer, stay thee and say: his was a cruel fere.”

23.49 This said, he took a stone and set it up, that dreadful stone, against the wall in the midst of the doorway; then tied that slender string unto the porch above, put the noose about his neck, rolled that footing from beneath his feet, and lo! he hung a corpse.

23.53 Soon that other, he opened the door and espied the dead hanging to his own doorway; and his stubborn heart was not bended. The new-done murder moved him not unto tears, nor would he be defiling all his young lad’s garments with a dead corpse; but went his ways to the wrestling-bouts and betook himself light of heart to his beloved bath. And so came he unto the god he had slighted. For there stood an image of him upon the margin looking towards the water. And lo! even the graven image leapt down upon him and slew that wicked lad; and the water went all red, and on the water floated the voice of a child saying “Rejoice ye that love, for he that did hate is slain; and love ye that hate, for the god knoweth how to judge.”