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that was plighted to him." So saying, he sent her aboard his ship,
whither he followed her, touching nought that belonged to the Rhodians,
and suffering them to go their way. To have gotten so dear a prize made
him the happiest man in the world, but for a time 'twas all he could do
to assuage her grief: then, after taking counsel with his comrades, he
deemed it best not to return to Cyprus for the present: and so, by common
consent they shaped their course for Crete, where most of them, and
especially Cimon, had alliances of old or recent date, and friends not a
few, whereby they deemed that there they might tarry with Iphigenia in
security. But Fortune, that had accorded Cimon so gladsome a capture of
the lady, suddenly proved fickle, and converted the boundless joy of the
enamoured gallant into woeful and bitter lamentation. 'Twas not yet full
four hours since Cimon had parted from the Rhodians, when with the
approach of night, that night from which Cimon hoped such joyance as he
had never known, came weather most turbulent and tempestuous, which
wrapped the heavens in cloud, and swept the sea with scathing blasts;
whereby 'twas not possible for any to see how the ship was to be worked
or steered, or to steady himself so as to do any duty upon her deck.
Whereat what grief was Cimon's, it boots not to ask. Indeed it seemed to
him that the gods had granted his heart's desire only that it might be
harder for him to die, which had else been to him but a light matter. Not
less downcast were his comrades; but most of all Iphigenia, who, weeping
bitterly and shuddering at every wave that struck the ship, did cruelly
curse Cimon's love and censure his rashness, averring that this tempest
was come upon them for no other cause than that the gods had decreed,
that, as 'twas in despite of their will that he purposed to espouse her,
he should be frustrate of his presumptuous intent, and having lived to
see her expire, should then himself meet a woeful death.
While thus and yet more bitterly they bewailed them, and the mariners
were at their wits' end, as the gale grew hourly more violent, nor knew
they, nor might conjecture, whither they went, they drew nigh the island
of Rhodes, albeit that Rhodes it was they wist not, and set themselves,
as best and most skilfully they might, to run the ship aground. In which
enterprise Fortune favoured them, bringing them into a little bay, where,
shortly before them, was arrived the Rhodian ship that Cimon had let go.
Nor were they sooner ware that 'twas Rhodes they had made, than day
broke, and, the sky thus brightening a little, they saw that they were
about a bow-shot from the ship that they had released on the preceding
day. Whereupon Cimon, vexed beyond measure, being apprehensive of that
which in fact befell them, bade make every effort to win out of the bay,
and let Fortune carry them whither she would, for nowhere might they be
in worse plight than there. So might and main they strove to bring the
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