infect with fear a mind that had not prevented it with the power of reason. “But the princes, using the passions of fearing evil, and desiring to escape only to serve the rule of virtue, not to abandon one’s self, leaped to a rib of the ship, which broken from his fellows, floated with more likelihood to do service than any other limb of that ruinous body; upon which they had gotten already two brethren {161} well known servants of theirs; and straight they four were carried out of sight, in that huge rising of the sea, from the rest of the ship. But the piece they were on sinking by little and little under them, not able to support the weight of so many, the brethren, the elder whereof was Leucippus, the younger Nelsus, showed themselves right faithful and grateful servants unto them: grateful, I say, for this cause: those two gentlemen had been taken prisoners in the great war the king of Phrygia made upon Thessalia, in the time of Musidorus’s infancy, and having been sold into another country, though peace fell after between those realms, could not be delivered because of their valour known, but for a far greater sum than either all their friends were able, or the dowager willing to make, in respect of the great expenses herself and people had been put to in those wars, and so had they remained in prison about thirteen years, when the two young princes, hearing speeches of their good deserts, found means both by selling all the jewels they had of a great price, and by giving under their hands great estates when they should come to be kings, which promises their virtue promised for them should be kept, to get so much treasure as redeemed them from captivity. This remembered, and kindly remembered by those two brothers, perchance helped by a natural duty to their princes’ blood, they willingly left hold of the board, committing themselves to the sea’s rage, and even when they meant to die, themselves praying for the princes’ lives. It is true, that neither the pain nor danger, so moved the princes’ hearts as the tenderness of that loving part, far from glory, having so few lookers on; far from hope of reward, since themselves were sure to perish.