33

when the Neptunian admiral, driven from the sea, and his navy burned, fled, after having menaced those chains to Rome, which, like a friend, he had taken off from perfidious slaves.31 The Roman soldiers (alas! ye, our posterity, will deny the fact), enslaved to a woman, carry palisadoes and arms, and can be subservient to haggard eunuchs; and among the military standards, oh shame! the sun beholds an [Egyptian] canopy.** Indignant at this, the Gauls turned two thousand of their cavalry, proclaiming Cæsar: and the ships of the hostile navy, going off to the left, lie by in port. Hail, god of triumph! Dost thou delay the golden chariots and untouched heifers? Hail, god of triumph! You neither brought back a general equal [to Cæsar], from the Jugurthine war; nor from the African [war, him], whose valor raised him a monument over Carthage. Our enemy, overthrown both by land and sea, has changed his purple vestments for mourning. He either seeks Crete, famous for her hundred cities, ready to sail with unfavorable winds; or the Syries harassed by the south; or else is driven by the uncertain sea. Bring hither, boy, larger bowls, and the Chian or Lesbian wine; or, what may correct this rising qualm of mine, fill me out the Cæcuban. It is my pleasure to dissipate care and anxiety for Cæsar's danger with delicious wine.

ODE X.

AGAINST MÆVIUS.

THE Vessel, that carries the loathsome Mævius, makes her departure under an unlucky omen. Be mindful, O south wind, that you buffet it about with horrible billows. May the gloomy_east, turning up the sea, disperse its cables and broken oars. Let the north arise as mighty as when he rives the

91 Servis amicus perfidis. Pompey received all the slaves who would enter into his service, and the desertion was so great through Italy, that the vestals offered sacrifices and prayers to prevent the continuance of it. SAN.

32 The derivation of "canopium" is amusing, from driving away gnats, κúvшπаç. Cf. Orelli.

33 But Orelli reads "at hoc," with Fea.

quivering oaks on the lofty mountains; nor let a friendly star appear through the murky night, in which the baleful Orion sets: nor let him be conveyed in a calmer sea, than was the Grecian band of conquerors, when Pallas turned her rage from burned Troy to the ship of impious Ajax. Oh what a sweat is coming upon your sailors, and what a sallow paleness upon you, and that effeminate wailing, and those prayers to unregarding Jupiter; when the Ionian bay, roaring with the tempestuous south-west, shall break your keel! But if, ex

tended along the winding shore, you shall delight the cormorants as a dainty prey, a lascivious he-goat and an ewe-lamb shall be sacrificed to the Tempests.

ODE XI.

TO PECTIUS.

Ir by no means, O Pectius, delights me as heretofore to write Lyric verses, being smitten with cruel love: with love, who takes pleasure to inflame me beyond others, either youths or maidens. This is the third December that has shaken the [leafy] honors from the woods, since I ceased to be mad for Inachia. Ah me! (for I am ashamed of so great a misfortune) what a subject of talk was I throughout the city! I repent too of the entertainments, at which both a languishing and silence and sighs, heaved from the bottom of my breast, discovered the lover. As soon as the indelicate god [Bacchus] by the glowing wine had removed, as I grew warm, the secrets of [my heart] from their repository, I made my complaints, lamenting to you, "Has the fairest genius of a poor man no weight against wealthy lucre? Wherefore, if a generous indignation boil in my breast, insomuch as to disperse to the winds these disagreeable applications, that give no ease to the desperate wound; the shame [of being overcome] ending, shall cease to contest with rivals of such a sort."34 When I, with great gravity, had applauded these resolutions in your presence, being ordered to go home, I was carried with a wandering foot to posts, alas! to me not

34 6 Imparibus, qui inferiores quam ego sunt." ORELLL

friendly, and alas! obdurate gates, against which I bruised my loins and side. Now my affections for the delicate Lyciscus engross all my time: from them neither the unreserved admonitions, nor the serious reprehensions of other friends, can recall me [to my former taste for poetry]; but, perhaps, either a new flame for some fair damsel, or for some graceful youth who binds his long hair in a knot, [may do sc

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ODE XII.

TO A WOMAN WHOSE CHARMS WERE OVER

WHAT Would you be at, you woman fitter for the swarthy monsters? Why do you send tokens, why billet-doux to me, and not to some vigorous youth, and of a taste not nice? For I am one who discerns a polypus or fetid ramminess, however concealed, more quickly than the keenest dog the covert of the boar. What sweatiness, and how rank an odor every where rises from her withered limbs! when she strives to lay her furious rage with impossibilities; now she has no longer the advantage of moist cosmetics, and her color appears as if stained with crocodile's ordure; and now, in wild impetuosity, she tears her bed, bedding, and all she has. She attacks even my loathings in the most angry terms:-"You are always less dull with Inachia than me: in her company you are threefold complaisance; but you are ever unprepared to oblige me in a single instance. Lesbia, who first recommended you-so unfit a help in time of need-may she come to an ill end! when Coan Amyntas paid me his addresses; who is ever as constant in his fair-one's service, as the young tree to the hill it grows on. For whom were labored the fleeces of the richest Tyrian dye? For you? Even so that there was not one in company, among gentlemen of your own rank, whom his own wife admired preferably to you: oh, unhappy me, whom you fly, as the lamb dreads tho fierce wolves, or the she-goats the lions!"

35 See Orelli. Others interpret, "with loose curls."

36 i. e. elephants. According to Isidorus, Orig. 12, 2, 14, the Indians call an elephant "barrus," its cry or voice "barritus." ORELLL

of

ODE XIII.

TO A FRIEND.

A HORRIBLE tempest has condensed the sky, and showers and snows bring down the atmosphere: now the sea, now the woods bellow with the Thracian north wind. Let us, my friends, take occasion from the day; and, while our knees are vigorous, and it becomes us, let old age with his contracted forehead become smooth. Do you produce the wine, that was pressed in the consulship of my Torquatus. Forbear to talk any other matters. The deity, perhaps, will reduce these [present evils] to your former [happy] state by a propitious change. Now it is fitting both to be bedewed with Persian perfume, and to relieve our breasts of dire vexations by the lyre, sacred to Mercury. Like as the noble Centaur, [Chiron,] sung to his mighty pupil: "Invincible mortal, son of the goddess Thetis, the land of Assaracus awaits you, which the cold currents of little Scamander and swift-gliding Simoïs divide whence the fatal sisters have broken off your return, by a thread that can not be altered: nor shall your azure mother convey you back to your home. There [then] by wine and music, sweet consolations," drive away every symptom of hideous melancholy."

ODE XIV.

TO MECENAS.

You kill me, my courteous Mæcenas, by frequently inquiring, why a soothing indolence has diffused as great a degree of forgetfulness on my inmost senses, as if I had imbibed with a thirsty throat the cups that bring on Lethean slumbers. For the god, the god prohibits me from bringing to a conclusion the verses I promised [you, namely those] iambics which I

"Orelli has completely established this meaning of " alloquiis," from Varro L. L. 6, § 57; Catull. 5; Ovid. Trist. i. 8, 17.

had begun. In the same manner they report that Anacreon of Teios burned for the Samian Bathyllus; who often lamented his love to an inaccurate measure on a hollow lyre. You are violently in love yourself; but if a fairer flame did not burn besieged Troy, rejoice in your lot. Phryne, a freed-woman, and not content with a single admirer, consumes me.

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ODE XV.

TO NEÆRA.

Ir was night, and the moon shone in a serene sky among the lesser stars; when you, about to violate the divinity of the great gods, swore [to be true] to my requests, embracing me with your pliant arms more closely than the lofty oak is clasped by the ivy; that while the wolf should remain an enemy to the flock, and Orion, unpropitious to the sailors, should trouble the wintery sea, and while the air should fan the unshorn locks of Apollo, [so long you vowed] that this love should be mutual. Neæra, who shall one day greatly grieve on account of my merit: for, if there is any thing of manhood in Horace, he will not endure that you should dedicate your nights continually to another, whom you prefer; and exasperated, he will look out for one who will return his love: and, though an unfeigned sorrow should take possession of you, yet my firmness shall not give way to that beauty which has once given me disgust. But as for you, whoever you be who are more successful [than me], and now strut proud of my misfortune; though you be rich in flocks and abundance of land, and Pactolus flow for you, nor the mysteries of Py

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89

38 Dum pecori lupus. This was probably the form of the oath which Horace dictated to Neæra, and by which he would insinuate that earth, air, and skies should be avengers of her perjury, as they were witnesses of her oath. TORR.

3 Semel offense. The ancient commentator justly remarks, that this epithet offense is a passive, with an active signification. Offensa forma therefore signifies forma, quæ me offendit. ED. DUBL.

40 A river in Lydia. It rises in Mount Tmolus, runs into the Hermus, and flows along with it to the gean Sea, not far from Smyrna. In the time of Croesus, this river rolled from the mountains a kind of goldsand, which was the chief cause of that king's immense riches. WATSON