Page:History of the seven wise masters, of Rome (1).pdf/22

 which the knight said, Ah, how sweet a song is this, could any person but interpret it! to which the youth answered, that he would undertake it, if he would not be displeased; but father commanded him to interpret it. Then said the youth, the bird in her song, expressed that I would be great Lord, and that my father would hold the water, and my mother a towel to wash my hands. Whereupon the father growing angry, took him up and running to the sea, cast him in, where he swam to an uninhabited island, and stayed there three or four days, till a ship passing, took him up, and sold him to a duke in Egypt, who finding him wise, made him ruler of his house. It happened the King of that country was troubled with the cry of three ravens, and demanded of the wise men the cause, but they could not resolve, him, therefore, he proclaimed that if any could tell the meaning, or cause the noise to cease, he should have his daughter to wife, and the kingdom after his decease. Upon this, Alexander (the youth's name) went to the King, saying that the ravens were the two old ones and their young one, which the male declared was his right, seeing he had fed him in the time of a famine, when the female flew unto far country to shift for herself, and left him to perish: when on the other side, the female alledged, she had taken pains is laying the egg and brooding it, wherefore the young one appertained to her. And now O king, said