tinue to live in such a manner, even if presently fortune shall flow upon you in a river of gold: either because money cannot change the natural disposition, or because

is your opinion that all things are inferior to virtue alone. Can we wonder, that cattle feed upon the mead>ws and corn-fields of Democritus, while his active soul 13 abroad [travelling] without his body? When you, amidst such great impurity and infection of profit, have no taste for any thing trivial, but still mind [only] sub. li ie things; what causes restrain the sea, what rules the year, whether the stars spontaneously or by direction wander about and are erratic, what throws obscurity on the moon, and what brings out her orb,what is the intention and power of the jarring harmony of things, whether Empedocles or the clever Stertinius be in the wrong?

However, whether you murder fishes, or onions and garlic, receive Pompeius Grosphus; and, if he asks any favour, grant it him frankly: Grosphus will desire nothing but what is right and just. The proceeds of friendship are cheap, when good men want any thing.

But that you may not be ignorant in what situation the Roman affairs are; the Cantabrians have fallen by the valour of Agrippa, the Armenians by that of Claudius Nero: Phraates has, suppliant on his knees, admitted the laws and power of Cæsar. Golden plenty has poured out the fruits of Italy from a full horn.

EPISTLE XIII.

TO VINNIUS ASINA.

Horace cautions him to present his poems to Augustus at a proper oppor. tunity, and with due decorum.

As on your setting out I frequently and fully gave you instructions, Vinnius, that you would present these vol umes to Augustus sealed up if he shall be in health, if in spirits, finally, if he shall ask for them: do not offend out of zeal to me, and industriously bring an odium upon my books [by being] an agent of violent officiousness. I haply the heavy load of my paper should gall you cast it from you, rather than throw down your pack in a rough

manner where you are directed to carry it, and turn your paternal name of Asina into a jest, and make yourself a common story. Make use of your vigour over the hills, the rivers, and the fens. As soon as you have achieved your enterprise, and arrived there, you must keep your burden in this position; lest you happen to carry my bundle of books under your arm, as a clown does a lamb or as drunken Pyrrhia [in the play does] the balls of pil fered wool, or as a tribe-guest his slippers with his fuddling-cap. You must not tell publicly, how you sweated with carrying those verses, which may detain the eyes and ears of Cæsar. Solicited with much entreaty, do your best. Finally, get you gone, farewell; take care you do not stumble, and break my orders.

EPISTLE XIV.

TO HIS STEWARD.

He upbraids his levity for contemning a country life, which had been his choice, and being eager to return to Rome.

Steward of my woodlands and little farm that restores me to myself, which you despise, [though formerly] inhabited by five families, and wont to send five good senators to Varia: let us try, whether I with more fortitude pluck the thorns out of my mind, or you out of my ground: and whether Horace or his estate be in a better condition.

Though my affection and solicitude for Lamia, mourning for his brother, lamenting inconsolably for his brother's loss, detain me; nevertheless my heart and soul carry me thither, and long to break through those barriers that obstruct my way. I pronounce him the happy man who dwells in the country, you him [who lives] in the city. He to whom his neighbour's lot is agreeable, must of consequence dislike his own. Each of us is a fool for unjustly blaming the innocent place. The mind is in fault, which never escapes from itself. When you were a drudge at every one's beck, you tacitly prayed for the country and now, [being appointed] my steward, you wish for the city, the shows, and the baths. You know I am consistent with myself, and loth to go, whenever dis

agreeable business drags me to Rome. We are not ad mirers of the same things: hence you and I disagree. For what you reckon desert and inhospitable wilds, he who is of my way of thinking calls delightful places; and dislikes what you esteem pleasant. The bagnio, I perceive, and the greasy tavern raise your inclination for the city and this, because my little spot will sooner yield frankincense and pepper than grapes; nor is there a tav ern near, which can supply you with wine; nor a minstre hariot, to whose thrumming you may dance, cumbersome to the ground: and yet you exercise with plough-shares the fallows that have been a long while untouched, you take due care of the ox when unyoked, and give him his fill with leaves stripped [from the boughs]. The sluice gives an additional trouble to an idle fellow, which, if a shower fall, must be taught by many a mound to spare the sunny meadow.

Come now, attend to what hinders our agreeing. [Me,] whom fine garments and dressed locks adorned, whom you know to have pleased venal Cynara without a present, whom [you have seen] quaff flowing Falernian from noon -a short supper [now] delights, and a nap upon the green turf by the stream side: nor is it a shame to have been gay, but not to break off that gaiety. There is no one who reduces my possessions with envious eye, nor poisons them with obscure malice and biting slander; the neighbours smile at me removing clods and stones. You had rather be munching your daily allowance with the slaves in town; you earnestly pray to be of the number of these: [while my] cunning foot-boy envies you the use of the firing, the flocks, and the garden. The lazy ox wishes for the horse's trappings: the horse wishes to go to 'plough. But I shall be of opinion, that each of them ought contentedly to exercise that art which he understands.

EPISTLE XV.

TO C. NUMONIUS VALA.

Preparing to go to the baths either at Velia or Salernum, he inquires after the healthfulness and agreeableness of the places.

It is your part, Vala, to write to me (and mine to give credit to your information) what sort of a winter it is at

Velia, what the air at Salernum, what kind of inhabitants the country consists of, and how the road is (for Antonias Musa [pronounces] Baiæ to be of no service to me; yet makes me obnoxious to the place, when I am bathed in cold water even in the midst of the frost [by his prescription]. In truth, the village murmurs at their myrtle groves being deserted, and the sulphureous waters, said to expel lingering disorders from the nerves, despised envying those invalids, who have the courage to expose their head and breast to the Calusian springs, and retire to Gabii and [such] cold countries. My course must be altered, and my horse driven beyond his accust omed stages. Whither are you going? will the angry rider say, pulling in the left-hand rein, I am not bound for Cumæ or Baiæ:-but the horses ear is in the bit). [You must inform me likewise,] which of the two people is supported by the greatest abundance of corn; whether they drink rain-water collected [in reservoirs], or from perennial wells of never-failing water (for as to the wine of that part I give myself no trouble; at my countryseat I can dispense and bear with any thing: but when I have arrived at a sea-port, I insist upon that which is generous and mellow, such as may drive away my cares, such as may flow into my veins and animal spirits with a rich supply of hope, such as may supply me with words, such as may make me appear young to my Lucanian mistress). Which tract of land produces most hares, which boars: which seas harbour the most fishes and seaurchins, that I may be able to return home thence in good case, and like a Phæacian.

When Mænius, having bravely made away with his paternal and maternal estates, began to be accounted a merry fellow-a vagabond droll, who had no certain place of living; who, when dinnerless, could not distinguish a fellow-citizen from an enemy; unmerciful in forging any scandal against any person, the pest, and hurricane, and gulf of the market; whatever he could get, he gave to his greedy gut. This fellow, when he had extorted little or nothing from the favourers of his iniquity, or those that dreaded it, would eat up whole dishes of coarse tripe and lamb's entrails; as much as would have sufficed three bears; then truly, [like] reformer Bestius, would he say,

that the bellies of extravagant fellows ought to be branded with a red-hot iron. The same man [however], when he had reduced to smoke and ashes whatever more considerable booty he had gotten; 'Faith, said he, I do not wonder if some persons eat up their estates; since nothing is better than a fat thrush, nothing finer than a large sow's paunch. In fact, I am just such another my. self; for, when matters are a little deficient, I commend the snug and homely fare, of sufficient resolution amidst mean provisions; but, if any thing be offered better and more delicate, I, the same individual, cry out, that ye are wise and alone live well, whose wealth and estate are conspicuous from the elegance of your villas.

EPISTLE XVI.

TO QUINCTIUS.

He describes to Quinctius the form, situation, and advantages of his country-house: then declares that probity consists in the consciousness of good works; liberty in probity.

Ask me not, my best Quinctius, whether my farm maintains its master with corn-fields, or enriches him with olives, or with fruits, or meadow-land, or the elm-tree clothed with vines: the shape and situation of my ground shall be described to you at large.

You

There is a continued 1ange of mountains, except where they are separated by a shadowy vale; but in such a man · ner, that the approaching sun views it on the right side, and departing in his flying car warms the left. would commend its temperature. What? If my [very] briers produce in abundance the ruddy cornels and damsens? If my oak and holm-tree accommodate my cattle with plenty of acorns, and their master with a copious shad? You would say that Tarentum, brought nearer [to Rome], shone in its verdant beauty. A fountain, too, deserving to give name to a river, insomuch that Hebrus does not surround Thrace more cool or more limpid,