3 2                                Lorenzo Da Ponte
 

Having you, I did not expect greater gifts from
heaven; having you, I did not envy kings their
riches and their thrones.

When the sun scorched the fields I would find in
you, in a cool meadow, sweet comfort and
charm.

When the evil wrath of winter had killed the grass
and the flowers, through you Fayonius' would
smile in my cell.

From you my soul learnt Piety and Charity, through
you how to forget the insults of ingratitude.

Reading through the night I drank the nectar of the
gods; often dreaming of you my dreams were
joys.

Alas, fate takes from me my only treasure! Death
would have been less bitter than this last fare¬
well.

"In the year 1831 T had on the shelves of my private library 3000 selected
volumes [ — ] which contained the most beautiful pages of our literature. I sold
2000 of them [at] auction to procure the funds necess[ary] to settle the drama,
of which the [pains] and expenses were left to me with volumes of nebulous
pr[omises] and merchant-like generosity."

■■■ The west wind.