shaft. Of Alcides also will I tell, and of the boys of Leda, the one renowned for overcoming with the steed, the other with the fist; and when once upon the mariner has glittered their fair star, down from the rocks the troubled water flows, the winds drop down, and the clouds flee away, and the threatening wave reposes on the deep, for they have willed it so.

I doubt whether after these to tell of Romulus first, or the peaceful reign of Pompilius, or Tarquin's haughty fasces, or Cato's glorious death. Regulus, and the Scauri, and Paullus that flung away his noble soul when the Carthaginian was prevailing, I will gratefully record in an illustrious strain, and Fabricius too. Him, and Curius with the unkempt locks, a soldier good in war, and Camillus, stern penury produced, and an ancestral farm with fitting home.

As a tree by growth unmarked, increases the fame of Marcellus; shines among all the Julian star, like the moon among the lesser fires.

Father and guardian of the human race, thou child of Saturn, to thee by fate is given the charge of mighty Cæsar; mayest thou reign, with Cæsar thy second in power! He, whether it be that he drive along in proper triumph the Parthians subdued, who now hover over Latium, or the Seres and Indians, who dwell close by the confine of the East, inferior to thee shall rule with equity the wide world; thou with thy ponderous car shalt shake the sky, thou on the sacrilegious groves shalt send thy vengeful bolts.

XIII.

To Lydia. The jealous lover. The praise of constancy. Lydia, when you extol the rosy neck of Telephus, the waxen arms of Telephus, alas, my glowing liver swells with labouring bile. Then neither my feelings nor my colour abide in settled state, and down my cheeks the secret tear-drop flows, that tells with what long-lingering fires I waste at heart. I feel the flame, whether it chance that brawls distempered by wine have marred the whiteness of your shoulders, or the frantic boy has with his tooth printed on your lips a recording mark. You would not, if you duly listen to me, hope that he will be constant, who barbarously hurts the sweet mouth, whose kisses Venus has imbued with the quintessence of her own nectar.

Thrice happy, and more than thrice are they, whom a link unbroken binds, and whose love, not torn apart by evil rancours, will not loose them sooner than their latest day.

XIV.

To the ship of the state.

Ship, shall new billows bear you back to sea? Alas, what mean you? With vigour press into the haven. See you not how your side is stripped of its oarage, and your mast is wounded by the swooping Africus, and how your sailyards are groaning, and how your hull, not bound with cables, can scarce endure a too tyrannous deep?

You have not sails unrent, you have not gods to call upon, when crushed again with woe. Albeit a Pontic pine, the forest's highborn daughter, you may boast your lineage, and your title, an idle thing. In painted poops the trembling sailor puts no trust. Unless you owe the winds a laughing-stock, be you circumspect.

You that were late my sickening weariness, my yearning now, and care that is not light, shun you the seas that flow between the sparkling Cyclades.

XV.

The prophecy of Nereus.

While in Idæan ships across the deep the shepherd was treacherously bearing away his hostess Helen, Ñereus with rest unwelcome whelmed the winds, that he might chant the dreadful destinies :

"With an evil omen are you leading home her, whom Greece with many a soldier will require, confederate to destroy your marriage-tie, and Priam's ancient realm.

"Alas, how steeds, how warriors sweat with toil! Carnage how great are you waking for the Dardan race! Even now Pallas is making ready her helmet and ægis and car and wrath. Vainly bold in the protection of Venus will you comb your tresses, and on the unwarlike lyre accompany your songs, the delight of women: vainly in your bridal-chamber will you shun the ponderous spears, and the point of the Cretan wand, and the din, and Ajax swift to pursue; still, alas, you will, though late, besmear with dust your adulterous locks,

"Observe you not Laertes' son, the bane of your race? Observe you not Pylian Nestor? Dauntlessly press you Teucer of Salamis, and Sthenelus skilful in the fight, or if there be need to govern the steeds, no slothful charioteer: Merion also you will learn to know. Lo, the son of Tydeus, that excels his sire, furiously rages to find you; from him you, like a roe, that, forgetful of his pasture, flees from a wolf which he has seen on the valley's farther side, will flee in your cowardice with deep-drawn panting, though 'twas not this you promised to your love.

"Achilles' angry fleet shall stay the hour of Ilium and the matrons of Phrygia: when the predestined winters are past, Achæan fire shall burn the dwellings of Ïlium."

XVI.

An apology. Description of the madness of anger; its origin, and

fatal effects.

O daughter fairer than a mother fair, assign to my slanderous iambics whatever end you choose; whether it please you to destroy them by fire, or by the Adrian sea,

Not Dindymene, nor the Pythian god who dwells within his sanctuary, nor Liber, stir so violently the soul of their ministers; the Corybantes clash not so furiously their ringing cymbals, as fits

of direful anger: them neither Noric sword can cow, nor wrecking sea, nor fierce flame, nor Jove's self sweeping down with dreadful crash.

Tradition tells that Prometheus was constrained to add to the elemental mud a particle severed from every creature, and that he attached to our stomach the fury of a raging lion.

'Twas anger that in crushing ruin laid Thyestes low, and has proved for lofty cities the consummating cause, why it was that they perished utterly, and that the foe's insulting army printed their walls with the hostile plough.

Hush your passion; myself too the fire within the breast stung in my pleasant youth, and sent me frantic to the iambic's rush: now I would fain exchange my wrath for kindness, if only you will become my friend, when my taunts are retracted, and give me back your heart.

XVII.

The poet invites Tyndaris to his Sabine villa near mount Lucretilis.

Oft for the pleasant Lucretilis fleet Faunus exchanges Lycæus, and ever from my she-goats keeps away the fiery summer and the rainy blasts.

Unharmed amid the safety of the grove, the mates of the noisome lord roam in search of lurking arbute trees and beds of thyme, and fear not green adders, nor the wolves of Mars which haunt Hædilia; whene'er, my Tyndaris, low Ustica's vales and polished rocks have echoed with the tuneful flute.

Me Heaven protects; to Heaven my piety and Muse are dear. Here plenty, rich in the glories of the country, shall flow to the full for you from bounteous horn.

Here in a secluded dell you shall shun the heat of the dog-star, and sing with the Teian lute of those who were love-sick for one, Penelope and Circe crystal-fair: here beneath the shade you shall quaff cups of harmless Lesbian; and Thyoneus child of Semele shall not mingle the fray with Mars, nor shall you dread the suspicion of headstrong Cyrus, lest he cast his intemperate hands on one too weak to encounter him, and rend the garland fastened to your hair, and your guiltless dress.

XVIII.

The praise of wine. The pernicious effects of intemperance.

My Varus, plant no tree before the hallowed vine, round Tibur's kindly soil and Catilus' walls. For to them that drink not Heaven has presented all things as difficulties; and gnawing anxieties thus only flee away. Who croaks of irksome warfare, or of penury, after wine? Who sings not rather of thee, O father Bacchus, and of thee, fair Venus?

But that no man may o'erpass what temperate Liber gives, the

brawl of Centaurs with Lapithæ, fought to the death over their wine, gives us warning, Evius warns us, no gentle Power to the Thracians, when in ravenous frenzy they separate right and wrong by passion's narrow line.

I would not wake thee, if thou will it not, bright Bassareus, nor drag beneath the open sky what is wrapt in varied foliage. Restrain the terrific cymbals, and the Berecynthian horn withal; for blinded Self-love follows close upon them, and Boast, that lifts too high his empty head, and an Honour who flings abroad his secret, and becomes more transparent than glass.

XIX.

The poet's love for Glycera. He designs a propitiatory sacrifice to Venus.

The Loves' cruel mother, and Theban Semele's boy, and frolic Freedom, bid me give back my heart to the passions that were ended.

'Tis Glycera's radiance that fires me, she who gleams fairer than the Parian marble; her charming perversity fires me, and her face, too dazzling-dangerous to behold.

Venus, with all her power rushing on me, has forsaken Cyprus, and suffers me not to sing of the Scythians, and the Parthian, whose courage lies in his retreating steeds, and of themes that are irrelevant.

Here place living turf, here place vervain, ye boys, and incense with a bowl of two-years' wine; her approach will be gentler when a victim has been slain.

XX.

An invitation to Mæcenas.

You'll drink in modest bowls poor Sabine wine, which in a Grecian jar my own hands stored and sealed, when in the theatre such applause was given you, dear knight Mæcenas, that all at once the banks of your ancestral river, and the sportive echo of the Vatican hill sounded back your praises.

Cæcuban you may drink, and the grape the press of Cales has subdued; my cups the vines of Falerii mix not, nor the hills of Formiæ.

XXI.

Hymn to Diana and Apollo.

Sing of Diana, blooming maidens; boys, sing of Cynthius with the unshorn locks, and of Latona deeply loved by sovereign Jove.

Extol ye her who delights in streams and the foliage of the groves, whatever the leafage be that stands forth either on cool Algidus, or on the dark forests of Erymanth, or of Cragus green;

O youths, extol ye, with not fewer praises, Delos, the native island of Apollo, and himself, with shoulder adorned with the quiver,

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and the lyre, his brother's gift. 'Tis he who will drive away tearful war, he will drive away woeful dearth and plague, from the people, and from Cæsar our prince, against the Parthians and Britons, prevailed upon by your prayer.

XXII.

To Aristius Fuscus. The good man, wherever he be, is safe from

harm.

The man of faultless life, and clear from crime, my Fuscus, needs not the Moorish javelins, nor bow, nor quiver with its brood of poisoned shafts;

Whether o'er the burning Syrtes he choose to make his way, or o'er inhospitable Caucasus, or the regions which Hydaspes washes, the river of romance.

For in the Sabine wood, while I sing of my Lalage, and wander o'er the bound with troubles cleared away, a wolf fled from me though unarmed; such a monster as Daunias, home of warriors, rears not in her spacious groves of oak, nor Juba's land begets, the lions' parching nurse.

Set me amid the plains of lethargy, where not one tree is fanned by summer gale, that quarter of the world which fogs oppress, and the malice of the sky;

Set me beneath the sun's too neighbouring car, in a land where dwellings may not be: I'll love my sweetly smiling, sweetly speaking Lalage.

XXIII.
To Chloe.

You shun me, Chloe, like a fawn, that seeks o'er pathless hills his timorous dam, with vague alarm at gales and rustling wood.

For whether the approach of Spring chance to quiver on the dancing leaves, or the green lizards brush through the brake, he quakes in heart and knees at once.

But I pursue you not to mangle you, like savage tiger or Gætulian lion: cease to follow your mother at last, since now you are ripe for a lover.

XXIV.

To Virgil. A lament for the death of Quinctilius.

What shame or bound can there be to our regret for a life so loved? Prompt the mournful strains, Melpomene, thou to whom the Sire has given with the harp a voice crystal-clear.

Does then an endless sleep o'erwhelm Quinctilius? When shall Reverence, and the sister of Justice, untainted Honour, and naked Truth, ever find one to be his peer?

He fell bewept by many a good man; wept for by no one, Virgil, more than you; you vainly pious, alas! require Quinctilius of the gods, entrusted not to them for such an end.

But if more winningly than Thracian Orpheus you played a lyre to which the trees would listen, blood would return not to the