"Pur ho scacciate queste due formiche,
Che raspavano l' oro alla mia buca,
Or vadan pur, che Dio le malediche.

Cotal fortuna a casa li conduca,
Che lor fiacchi le gambe al primo passo,
E nel secondo l'osso della nuca.

Voi altri, che ascoltate giuso al basso,
Chiedete, se volete alcuna cosa,
Prima ch' io parta, perche mo vi lasso.

Benche abbia l'alma irata e disdegnosa,
Da ingiusti oltraggi combattuta e vinta,
A voi gia non l'avro tanto ritrosa.

In me non e pietade al tutto estinta
Faccia di voi la prova chi gli pare,
Sino alla corda, the mi trovo cinta;

Gli prestero, volendosi impiccare."

So! I've got rid of these two creeping things,
That fain would have scratched up my buried gold.
They're gone; and may the curse of God go with them!
May they reach home dust in good time enough
To break their legs at the first step in doors,
And necks i' the second!--And now then, as to you,
Good audience,--groundlings,--folks who love low places,
You too perhaps would fain get something of me,
Ere I take leave.--Well;--angered though I be,
Scornful and torn with rage at being ground
Into the dust with wrong, I'm not so lost
To all concern and charity for others
As not to be still kind enough to part
With something near to me-something that's wound
About my very self. Here, sirs; mark this;--
_[Untying the cord round his waist_.
Let any that would put me to the test,
Take it with all my heart, and hang themselves.

The comedy of _Timon_, which was chiefly taken from Lucian, and one,
if not more, of Boiardo's prose translations from other ancients, were
written at the request of Duke Ercole, who was a great lover of dramatic
versions of this kind, and built a theatre for their exhibition at an
enormous expense. These prose translations consist of Apuleius's
_Golden Ass_, Herodotus (the Duke's order), the _Golden Ass_ of Lucian,
Xenophon's _Cyropaedia_ (not printed), Emilius Probus (also not printed,
and supposed to be Cornelius Nepos), and Riccobaldo's credulous _Historia
Universalis_, with additions. It seems not improbable, that he also
translated Homer and Diodorus; and Doni the bookmaker asserts, that he
wrote a work called the _Testamento dell' Anima_ (the Soul's Testament)
but Mr. Panizzi calls Doni "a barefaced impostor;" and says, that as
the work is mentioned by nobody else, we may be "ce