, I will offer oblations nightly to thee." And then
and there did Pericles, with the consent of Thaisa, solemnly affiance
their daughter, the virtuous Marina, to the well-deserving Lysimachus
in marriage.

Thus have we seen in Pericles, his queen, and daughter, a famous
example of virtue assailed by calamity (through the sufferance of
Heaven, to teach patience and constancy to men), under the same
guidance becoming finally successful, and triumphing over chance and
change. In Hellicanus we have beheld a notable pattern of truth, of
faith, and loyalty, who, when he might have succeeded to a throne,
chose rather to recall the rightful owner to his possession, than to
become great by another's wrong. In the worthy Cerimon, who restored
Thaisa to life, we are instructed how goodness directed by knowledge,
in bestowing benefits upon mankind, approaches to the nature of the
gods. It only remains to be told, that Dionysia, the wicked wife of
Cleon, met with an end proportionable to her deserts; the inhabitants
of Tharsus, when her cruel attempt upon Marina was known, rising
in a body to revenge the daughter of their benefactor, and setting
fire to the palace of Cleon, burnt both him and her, and their whole
household: the gods seeming well pleased, that so foul a murder,
though but intentional, and never carried into act, should be punished
in a way befitting its enormity.

THE ADVENTURES OF ULYSSES

(_By Charles Lamb. Written 1807-8. 1st Edition, 1808. Text of 2nd
Edition, 1819_)

PREFACE

This work is designed as a supplement to the Adventures of Telemachus.
It treats of the conduct and sufferings of Ulysses, the father of
Telemachus. The picture which it exhibits is that of a brave man
struggling with adversity; by a wise use of events, and with an
inimitable presence of mind under difficulties, forcing out a way
for himself through the severest trials to which human life can be
exposed; with enemies natural and preternatural surrounding him on all
sides. The agents in this tale, besides men and women, are giants,
enchanters, sirens: things which denote external force or internal
temptations, the twofold danger which a wise fortitude must expect to
encounter in its course through this world. The fictions contained in
it will be found to comprehend some of the most admired inventions of
Grecian mythology.

The ground-work of the story is as old as the Odyssey, but the moral
and the colouring are compar