Page:Stories from Old English Poetry-1899.djvu/283

Rh fell into a stupor from which she could not be recovered, and breathed out her life on the bosom of her faithful servant, her nurse Lychorida. Pericles would have awaited the subsiding of the storm to put into the nearest port and give her queenly burial rites, but the superstition of the sailors had been aroused by the terrific storm. They insisted that the corpse of Thaisa should be thrown overboard, declaring that the storm would never abate while it was in the vessel. Pericles was obliged to yield to their clamors, and a chest was prepared for the body of the poor queen. Within this he spread the costliest stuffs the ship afforded,cloths of gold and silver, rare spices, and choicest perfumes; then decorating her form with jewels, and shrouding it in satin, he placed Thaisa in the chest, and threw it into the sea.

Behold the wretched Pericles left upon his battered ship, with the poor babe in his arms, who smiled at him with the unconscious tranquillity of infancy. His heart was so torn with the loss of his queen, that he could find no comfort in the blessed gift of this little daughter. He looked on each tender feature, and found in the eye, the chin, the forehead, some trace of his dear wife. But this likeness only made his anguish more keen. Rousing himself at length from the apathy of grief in which he was plunged,