cunctatur mea vota socer? quid iungere differt, quam pepigit, castasque preces implere recusat? non ego luxuriem regum moremque secutus quaesivi vultum tabulis[126] ut nuntia formae lena per innumeros iret pictura penates, 25 nec variis dubium thalamis lecturus[127] amorem ardua commisi falsae conubia cerae. non rapio praeceps alienae foedera taedae, sed quae sponsa mihi pridem patrisque relicta mandatis uno materni sanguinis ortu 30 communem partitur avum. fastidia supplex deposui gessique procum; de limine sacro oratum misi proceres, qui proxima nobis iura tenent. fateor, Stilicho, non parva poposci, sed certe mereor princeps, hoc principe natus 35 qui sibi te generum fraterna prole revinxit, cui Mariam debes. faenus mihi solve paternum, redde suos aulae. mater fortasse rogari mollior. o patrui germen, cui nominis heres successi, sublime decus torrentis Hiberi, 40 stirpe soror, pietate parens, tibi creditus infans inque tuo crevi gremio, partuque remoto tu potius Flaccilla mihi. quid dividis ergo [126] _tabulis_ vulg.; Birt reads _thalamis_ with the better MSS. [127] Birt reads _laturus_ with P; other MSS. _lecturus_. * * * * * Page 245 will honoured Stilicho forbear to grant my prayers? Why postpones he the union of those whose love he has approved? Why should he refuse to fulfil my chaste desires? I follow not the example of luxurious princes in seeking the beauties of a pictured countenance, whereby the pander canvass may pass from house to house to make known the charms demanded; nor yet have I sought to choose the uncertain object of my love from this house or from that, and thus entrusted to deceptive wax the difficult selection of a bride. I sever not in violence the bonds that unite a wedded woman to her lord; her I seek who hath long been betrothed to me, who by a father’s orders was left my affianced bride and who through her mother shares with me a common grandsire. A suppliant I have laid aside my rank and acted the suitor. Princes, second only to myself in rank, have I sent from my imperial palace to present my petition. ’Tis no small thing I ask, Stilicho; that I admit; yet surely to me, an emperor, son of that other emperor who, by giving thee his brother’s adopted daughter to wife, made thee his son-in-law,--to me thou dost owe Maria. Pay back to the son the interest due to his sire; restore to the palace those who are its own. Mayhap her mother[128] will be less inexorable. Daughter of mine uncle Honorius, whence I derive my name, chief glory of the land of swift-flowing Ebro, cousin by birth, by mother’s love a mother, to thy care was mine infancy entrusted, in thine arms I grew to boyhood; save for my birth thou, rather than Flacilla, art my mother.