1686Hum. O vita misero longa, foelici brevis!

1687 Eheu malorum fames extremum malum.

1688Long have I lived in this desart cave,

1689With eating hawes and miserable roots,

1690Devouring leaves and beastly excrements.

1691Caves were my beds, and stones my pillow-beres,

1692Fear was my sleep, and horrour was my dream;

1693For still me thought at every boisterous blast,

1694Now Locrine comes, now Humber thou must dye;

1695So that for fear and hunger, Humber's mind

1696Can never rest, but alwayes trembling stands.

1697O what Danubius now may quench my thirst?

1698What Euphrates, what light-foot Euripus

1699May now allay the fury of that heat,

1700Which raging in my entrails eats me up?

1701You ghastly devils of the ninefold Styx,

1702You damned ghosts of joyless Acheron,

1703You mournfull soules, vext in Abyssus vaults,

1704You coal-black devils of Avernus pond,

1705Come with your flesh-hooks, rend my famisht armes,

1706These armes that have sustain'd their masters life;

1707Come with your razours rip my bowels up,

1708With your sharp fire-forks crack my starved bones.

1709Use me as you will, so Humber may not live.

1710 Accursed gods that rule the starrie poles,

1711Accursed Jove king of the accursed gods,

1712Cast down your lightning on poor Humber's head,

1713That I may leave this deathfull like life of mine:

1714What hear you not, and shall not Humber dye?

1715Nay I will dye though all the gods say nay.

1716And gentle Aby take my troubled corps,

1717Take it and keep it from all mortal eyes,

1718That none may say when I have lost my breath,

1719The very flouds conspir'd 'gainst Humber's death.

1722En caedem sequitur, caedes in caede quiesco.

1723Humber is dead, joy heavens, leap earth, dance trees;

1724Now may'st thou reach thy apples Tantalus,

1725And withem feed thy hunger-bitten limmes:

1726Now Sysiphus leave the tumbling of thy rock,

1727And rest thy restless bones upon the same;

1728Unbind Ixion, cruel Rhadamanth,

1729And lay proud Humber on the whirling wheel.

1730Back will I post to hell mouth Taenarus,

1731And pass Cocytus, to the Elysian fields,