prodigal of his great soul, when Carthage conquered, and also Fabricius. Severe poverty, and an hereditary farm, with a dwelling adapted to it, formed this hero, useful in war, as it did also Curius, with his rough locks, and Camillus. The fame of Marcellus increases, as a tree does in the insensible progress of time. But the Julian constellation shines amidst them all, as the moon amongst the lesser stars. O thou son of Saturn, the author and preserver of the human race; the protection of Cæsar is committed to thy charge by the fates: thou shalt reign supreme, with Cæsar for thy second. Whether he shall subdue with a just victory the Parthians making inroads upon Italy, or shall render subject the Seres and Indians on the eastern coasts; he shall rule the wide world with equity, in subordination only to thee: thou shalt shake Olympus with thy tremendous car; thou shalt hurl thy hostile thunderbolts against the polluted groves. ODE XIII. TO LYDIA. Horace describes his own jealousy. O LYDIA, when you commend Telephus's rosy neck, and the waxen arms of Telephus; alas! my inflamed liver swells with bitter choler. At that time, neither is my mind firm, nor does my colour maintain a certain situation ;* and the involuntary * That is, my reason is confused, and my colour comes and goes. tears glide on my cheek, demonstrating with what lingering flames I am inwardly consumed. I am on fire, whether excessive quarrels in your cups have stained your fair shoulders; or whether the youth, in his fury, has impressed with his teeth a memorial of himself on your lips. If you will give due attention to my advice, never expect that he will be constant, who inhumanly wounds those sweet kisses, which Venus has steeped in the quintessence of her own nectar. O more than thrice happy are those whom an indissoluble connection binds together; and whose love, undivided by impious complainings, does not separate them sooner than the day of death. ODE XIV. The poet dissuades the Romans from reviving the civil The Republic is represented under the allegory war. of a ship. O SHIP, shall new waves bear thee back to sea again? O what are you doing! Bravely seize the port. Do you not perceive, that your sides are destitute of oars, and your mast wounded by the violent south, and your main-yards groan, and your keel can scarce support the impetuosity of the waves, without the help of cordage? Your sails are not entire; neither have you Gods,* whom you may again invoke in your distress; notwithstanding you are made of the pines of Pontus, and, being the daughter of an illustrious wood, you * The statues of the Gods on the poop are broken off. boast of your race, and a fame now of no service to you. The timorous sailor has no dependence on a painted stern. Look to yourself, unless you are destined to be the sport of the winds. O thou, that wast lately my trouble and fatigue, but who now createst in me tenderness and solicitude, mayest thou escape those dangerous seas, which flow among the shining Cyclades. Nereus's prophecy of the destruction of Troy. WHEN the perfidious shepherd (Paris) carried off by sea in Trojan ships his hostess Helen, Nereus suppressed the swift winds in an unpleasing calm, that he might sing to them their dire fates. With unlucky omens do you convey home that woman, whom Greece shall demand back again with a numerous army, having entered into a confederacy to dissolve your nuptials, and the ancient kingdom of Priam. Alas! what sweat to horses, what to men, is just at hand! What a destruction are you preparing for the Trojan nation! Even now Pallas is fitting her helmet and her shield, and her chariot and her fury. In vain, looking fierce through the patronage of Venus, will you comb your hair, and run divisions upon the effeminate harp, with songs pleasing only to women. In vain will you escape the spears that disturb the nuptial bed, and the poignance of the Cretan dart, and the din of battle, and Ajax swift in pursuit. Nevertheless, alas! the time will come, though late, when you shall be smear your adulterous hairs in the dust. Do you not see the son of Laërtes, fatal to your nation, and the Pylian Nestor? Salaminian Teucer, and Sthenelus skilled in fight, or, if there be occasion to manage horses, an expert charioteer, pursue you with intrepidity. Meriones also shall you experience. Behold! the gallant son of Tydeus, even a better man than his father, glows to find you out him, as a stag flies a wolf, which he has seen on the opposite side of the vale, unmindful of his pasture, shall you effeminate fly, grievously panting: not such the promises you made your mistress. The fleet of the enraged Achilles shall defer for a time that day, which is to be fatal to Troy and the Trojan matrons: but after a certain number of years, Grecian fire shall consume the Trojan palaces. ODE XVI. Horace had lampooned Gratidia, the mother of Tyn daris. He attempts to appease her offended daughter, chiefly by alleging the ungovernableness of passion. O DAUGHTER, more charming than thy charming mother, put what end you please to those injurious iambics; either in the flames, or, if you choose it, in the Adriatic sea. Neither Cybele, nor Apollo, the possessor of the priests, so shakes the breast in his inmost shrines; Bacchus does not do it equally, nor do the Corybantes so redouble their strokes on their sharp-sounding cymbals, as direful anger; which neither the Noric sword can deter, nor the shipwrecking sea, nor dreadful fire, nor Jupiter himself rushing from above in the tremendous tumult of his thunder. It is reported that Prometheus was obliged to add to that original clay, with which he formed mankind, some ingredient taken from every animal, and that he applied the vehemence of the raging lion to the human breast. It was rage that destroyed Thyestes with a horrible perdition; and has been the final cause, that lofty cities have been entirely demolished, and that an insolent army has drove the hostile ploughshare over their walls. Compose your mind. An ardour of soul attacked me also in blooming youth, and drove me in a rage to the writing of swiftfooted iambics. But now I am desirous of exchanging severity for good nature, provided you will become my friend, after my having recanted my ill language and restore me your affections. ODE XVII. TO TYNDARIS. Horace invites Tyndaris to a safe retreat from the audaciousness of Cyrus in his Sabine villa. THE nimble Faunus often exchanges the Lycæan mountain for the pleasant Lucretilis, and always defends my she-goats from the scorching summer, and the rainy winds. The wandering wives* of the unsavoury husband seek the hidden strawberry trees and thyme with security through the dangerless grove: nor do the kids dread the green lizards, or the martial wolves; whenever, * She-goats. |