ings, with you our sails we spread;
Now, if we pause to sum the account anew,
Hardly a third survives; the rest are dead.
May it please Heaven no further loss ensue!
But if you will pursue your quest, I dread
Lest not a fourth nor fifth will soon remain;
And wholly spent will be your wretched train.

LIV
"Orlando's absence so far aids, that where
Our troops are few, there haply none would be;
But not through this removed our perils are,
Though it prolongs our evil destiny.
Behold Rinaldo! whom his deeds declare
No less than bold Orlando; of his tree
There are the shoots; with paladin and peer,
Our baffled Saracens' eternal fear;

LV
"And the other Mars (albeit against my heart
It goes to waste my praise upon a foe);
I speak of the redoubted Brandimart,
Whose feats no less than fierce Orlando's show;
Whose mighty prowess I have proved in part,
In part, at others' cost I see and know.
Then many days Orlando has been gone;
Yet we have lost more fields than we have won.

LVI
"I fear, if heretofore our band has lost,
A heavier forfeit will henceforth be paid.
Blotted is Mandricardo from our host;
Martial Gradasso hath withdrawn his aid;
Marphisa, at our worst, has left her post;
So Argier's lord; of whom it may be said,
Where he as true as strong, we should not need
Gradasso and the Tartar king, to speed.

LVII
"While aids like these are lost to our array,
While on our side such slaughtered thousands lie,
Those looked-for are arrived, nor on her way
Is any vessel fraught with new supply --
Charles has been joined by four, that, as they say,
Might with Orlando or Rinaldo vie;
With reasons, for from hence to Bactrian shore,
Ill would you hope to find such other four.

LVIII
"I know not if you know who Guido are,
Sansonet, and the sons of Olivier.
For these I more respect, more fear I bear,
Than any warlike duke or cavalier,
Of Almayn's or of other lineage fair,
Who for the Roman empire rests the spear,
Though I misrate not those of newer stamp,
That, to our scathe, are gathered in their camp.

LIX
"As often as ye issue on the plain,
Worsted so oft, or broken, shall you be.
If oft united Africa and Spain
Were losers, when sixteen to eight were we,
What will ensue, when banded with Almayn
Are England, Scotland, France, and Italy?
When with our six twice six their weapons cross,
Wha