<TEI xmlns="http://www.tei-c.org/ns/1.0" xmlns:py="http://codespeak.net/lxml/objectify/pytype" py:pytype="TREE"><text xml:lang="eng"><body><div type="translation" n="urn:cts:greekLit:tlg0062.tlg054.perseus-eng4" xml:lang="eng"><div type="textpart" subtype="section" xml:base="urn:cts:greekLit:tlg0062.tlg054.perseus-eng4:" n="6"><p>I have not seen a man in this condition, and I pray Heaven I never may behold such human sufferings; I am happy to say I have not set foot upon Libyan soil. But I have hatl an epitaph repeated to me, which a friend assured me he had read on the grave of a victim. My friend, going from Libya to Egypt, had taken the only practicable land route by the Great Syrtis. He there found a tomb on the beach at the sea’s very edge, with a pillar setting forth the manner of death. On it a man was carved in the attitude familiar in pictures of Tantalus, standing by a lake’s side scooping up water to drink; the dipsas was wound about his foot, in which its fangs were fastened, while a number of women with jars were pouring water over him. Hard by were lying eggs like those of the ostrich hunted, as I mentioned, by the Garamantians. And then

<pb n="v.4.p.29"/>

there was the epitaph, which it may be worth while to give you:
<l>See the envenom’d cravings Tantalus</l>
<l>Could find no thirst-assuaging charm to still,</l>

<l>The cask that daughter-brood of Danaus,</l>
<l>For ever filling, might not ever fill.</l>

There are four more lines about the eggs, and how he was bitten while taking them; but I forget how they go.

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