because they had fome favours to ask of him. Their fuppliant pofture fpoke for them. They appeared as fubmiffive as a mother at the foot of the altar, imploring the Gods to restore her only fon to health. All feemed pleased, and to love and admire Protefilaus, though they harboured in their hearts an implacable enmity against him.

At this very inftant Hegefippus enters, feizes Protefilaus's fword, and tells him that he was going by the king's command to carry him to the island of Samos. At thefe words all Protefilaus's arrogance fell like a loofened rock from the top of a steep mountain. Lo! he now throws himself quaking with fear at Hegefippus's feet, he weeps, he faulters, he ftammers, he trembles, he embraces the knees of a man whom an hour before he did not deign to honour with a look. All his flatterers feeing him ruined past redemption, changed their adulations into merciless infults.

Hegefippus would not allow him time either to take a laft farewel of his family, or to fetch fome private papers. Every thing was feized, and carried to the king. Timocrates being arrested at the fame time, was extremely furprised; for he imagined, as he had quarrelled with Protefilaus, that he could not be involved in his ruin. They depart in a bark which was got ready for them, and arrive at Samos, where Hegefippus leaves thefe two wretches; and to fill up the measure of their misfortunes, he leaves them together. Here they furiously reproach each other with the crimes they had committed, and which were the cause of their fall; defpairing of ever feeing Salentum again, and condemned to live far from their wives and their children; I do not fay far from their friends, for they had none. The very men who had spent fo many years in pomp and pleasure, being now left in an unknown country, where they had no means of getting their bread but by their labour, were, like two wild beasts, continually ready to tear each other in pieces.

Hegefippus in the mean time inquired in what part of the ifland Philocles lived, and was told that it was on a mountain at a good distance from the city,

where

grotte lui fervoit de maifon. Tout le monde lui parla avec admiration de cet étranger. Depuis qu'il eft dans cette ifle, lui difoit-on, il n'a offenfé perfonne. Chacun eft touché de fa patience, de fon travail & de fa tranquillité; n'ayant rien il paroît toujours content. Quoiqu'il foit ici loin des affaires, fans bien & fans autorité, il ne laisse pas d'obliger ceux qui le méritent, & il a mille industries pour faire plaifir à tous fes voifins,

Hégéfippe s'avance vers cette grotte, il la trouve vuide & ouverte; car la pauvreté & la fimplicité des mœurs de Philoclès faifoit qu'il n'avoit en fortant aucun befoin de fermer fa porte; une natte groffiere de jonc lui fervoit de lit. Rarement il allumoit du feu parce qu'il ne mangeoit rien de cuit. Il fe nourriffoit pendant l'été de fruits nouvellement cueillis, & en hiver de dattes & de figues féches. Une claire fontaine qui faifoit une nappe d'eau en tombant d'un rocher, le défaltéroit; il n'avoit dans fa grotte que les inftrumens néceffaires à la fculpture, & quelques livres qu'il lifoit à certaines heures, non pour orner fon efprit, ni pour contenter fa curiofité, mais pour s'inf truire en fe délaffant de fes travaux, & pour appren-. dre à être bon. Pour la fculpture, il ne s'y appliquoit que pour exercer fon corps, fuir l'oifiveté, & gagner fa vie, fans avoir besoin de perfonne.

Hégéfippe en entrant dans la grotte admira les ouvrages qui étoient commencés. Il remarqua_un Jupiter, dont le vifage ferein étoit fi plein de majesté, qu'on le reconnoifloit aifément pour le pere des Dieux & des hommes. D'un autre côté paroiffoit Mars avec une fierté rude & menaçante mais ce qui étoit de plus touchant, étoit une Minerve qui animoit les arts; fon vifage étoit noble & doux fa taille grande & libre; elle étoit dans une action fi vive, qu'on auroit pu croire qu'elle alloit marcher. Hégéfippe, ayant pris plaifir à voir les ftatues, fortit de la grotte, & vit de loin, fous un grand arbre, Philoclès qui lifoit fur le gazon; il va vers lui, & Philoclès qui l'apperçoit, ne fait que croire.

N'est-ce

where a cave served him to dwell in. Every body fpoke with admiration of this ftranger. Since he has been in this ifland, faid they, he has offended nobody. Every one admires his patience, his labour and tranquillity of mind. Though he has nothing, he always feems fatisfied; and though he lives here quite out of the way of business, deftitute of money and without authority, yet he obliges all who deferve it, and has a thousand ingenious ways of doing good offices to all his neighbours.

Hegefippus goes towards the cave, and finds it open and empty; for Philocles's poverty and fimplicity of inanners were fo great that he had no occafion to shut the door when he went out. A coarse bulrush mat ferved him for a bed. He feldom kindled a fire, because he eat nothing dressed; living all the fummer on fresh-gathered fruits, and on dates and dried figs in the winter; and flaking his thirst at a fountain which poured in cryftal sheets from a rock. He had nothing in his cave but carving tools, and a few books which he read at fet hours, not to embellish his wit or gratify his curio→ fity, but to inform his mind when he unbent it from labour, and to learn to be good. As for fculpture he applied himself to it only for the fake of exercife, to avoid idlenefs, and to get his bread without being obliged to any body.

Hegefippus, as he entered the cave, admired the ftatues which Philocles had begun; particularly a Jupiter, whofe ferene countenance was fo full of majefty, that he was eafily known to be the father of Gods and men. In another part was a Mars with a rugged, fierce and threatning afpect. But what was most striking, was a Minerva encouraging the arts; her countenance was foft and noble; her ftature tall and eafy, and her attitude fo lively, that one would have thought she was going to walk. Hegefippus having viewed the ftatues with pleasure, went out of the grotto, and at a distance, under a large tree, beheld Philocles reading on the grafs; he goes towards him; Philocles fees him, and knows not what

to

N'est-ce point là, dit-il en lui-même, Hégéfippe avec qui j'ai long-temps vécu en Crete? Mais quelle apparence qu'il vienne dans une ifle fi éloignée? Ne feroit-ce point fon ombre qui viendroit après fa mort des rives du Styx ?

Pendant qu'il étoit dans ce doute, Hégéfippe arriva fi proche de lui, qu'il ne pût s'empêcher de le reconnoître & de l'embraffer. Eft - ce donc vous dit-il, mon cher & ancien ami? Quel hafard, quelle tempête vous à jetté fur ce rivage? Pourquoi avezvous abandonné l'ifle de Crete ? Eft-ce une difgrace femblable à la mienne, qui vous arrache à notre patrie ?

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Hégéfippe lui répondit: Ce n'est point une difgrace; au contraire, c'eft la faveur des Dieux qui m'amene ici. Auffi-tôt il lui raconta la longue tyFannie de Protéfilas, fes intrigues avec Timocrate les malheurs où ils avoient précipité Idoménée chûte de ce prince, fa fuite fur les côtes de l'Hefpérie, la fondation de Salente, l'arrivée de Mentor & de Télémaque, les fages maximes dont Mentor avoit rempli l'efprit du roi, & la difgrace des deux traîtres il ajouta qu'il les avoit menés à Samos pour y fouffrir l'exil qu'ils avoient fait fouffrir à Philoclès, & il finit en lui difant qu'il avoit ordre de le condu're à Salente, où le roi qui connoifsoit fon innocence vouloit lui confier fes affaires, & le combler de biens.

Voyez-vous, lui répondit Philoclès, cette grotte plus propre à cacher des bêtes fauvages qu'à être habitée par des hommes ? J'y ai goûté depuis tant d'années plus de douceur & de repos, que dans les palais dores de l'ifle de Crete. Les hommes ne me trompent plus; car je ne vois plus les hommes, & je n'entends plus leurs difcours flatteurs & empoisonnés. Je n'ai plus befoin d'eux; mes mains, endurcies au travail, me donnent facilement la nourriture fimple, qui m'eft néceffaire: il ne me faut, comme vous voyez, qu'une légere étoffe pour me couvrir, n'ayant plus de befoin, jouiffant d'un calme profond & d'une douce liberté, dont la fagesse de mes livres m'apprend

to think. Is not that Hegefippus, faid he to himself, with whom I fo long lived in Crete? But what probability is there that he should come to fo remote an ifland? Or is it not rather his ghoft returned fince his death from the Stygian shore?

While he was thus doubting,, Hegefippus came fo near him, that he could not but know and embrace him. Is it then you, faid he, my dear old friend? What chance, what tempeft has thrown you on this shore? Why have you left the island of Crete ? Is it fuch a misfortune as mine, that tears you from our native country?

Hegefippus anfwered, It is not a misfortune, but on the contrary the goodness of the Gods which brings me hither. He then related to him Protefilaus's long tyranny, his intrigues with Timocrates the evils into which he had plunged Idomeneus, the fall of that prince, his flight to the coafts of Hefperia, the building of Salentum, the arrival of Mentor and Telemachus; the wife maxims which Mentor had instilled into the king's mind, and the difgrace of the two traitors: he added, that he had brought them to Samos to fuffer the banishment which they had caufed Philocles to fuffer; and concluded with faying, that he had orders to conduct him to Salentum, where the king, who was fenfible of his innocence would intruft him with his affairs, and load him with riches. :

Lo that cave, replied Philocles, properer to harbour wild beasts than to be inhabited by men. I have there for many years tafted more comfort and peace of mind, than I ever did in the gilded palaces of the ifland of Crete. Men no longer deceive me; for I neither fee them, nor hear their flattering and poifonous difcourfe. I have no further need of them; for my hands, hardened to labour, eafily furnish me with the fimple food which is neceffary for me. A flight cloth, as you fee, fuffices to cover me. Having now no wants and enjoying the utmost tranquillity and all the fweets of liberty, which my books teach me how to make a good use of, what should I go in quest TOM, IL

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