XVI.

O MATRE pulchra filia pulchrior,
Quem criminosis cunque voles modum.
Pones iambis; sive flamma,

Sive mari libet Hadriano.

Non Dindymene, non adytis quatit
Mentem sacerdotum incola Pythius,
Non Liber aeque; non acuta
Sic geminant Corybantes aera,
Tristes ut irae; quas neque Noricus
Deterret ensis, nec mare naufragum,
Nec saevus ignis, nec tremendo
Juppiter ipse ruens tumultu.

Fertur Prometheus addere principi
Limo coactus particulam undique
Desectam, et insani leonis

Vim stomacho apposuisse nostro.

Irae Thyesten exitio gravi
Stravere; et altis urbibus ultimae
Stetere causae, cur perirent
Funditus, imprimeretque muris
Hostile aratrum exercitus insolens.
Compesce mentem: me quoque pectoris
Tentavit in dulci juventâ

Fervor, et in celeres iambos

Sending me furious: but my aim is now

To change to sweet from bitter, so that thou,
Grown friendly as before,

Past gibes recant, and former love restore.

A treatise was once written to prove that the Tyndaris of this Ode was a freedwoman of Rhaetemalces, king of Thrace, and also identical with the person whom Horace elsewhere calls Cressa Chloë, Sidonia Chloë, and Venus Marina. This, however, need not prevent the judicious reader from painting a portrait of Tyndaris according to his own taste and fancy,

FLEET Faunus will often Lyaeus desert

For pleasant Lucretilis changing; and there
My flock of she-goats he protects against hurt,
From the rain-laden blast and from summer's hot glare.

The wandering wives of a foul-smelling mate,
For arbute and thyme hidden deep in the brake
Go seeking, secure and unharmed—nor in wait
Is there savage wolf lurking, or green-armoured snake,

For their kidlings to fear. There is safety around,
Wheresoe'er with the melody, Tyndaris mine,
Of pipings Pandean the valleys resound,

And the rocks of Ustica's smooth shelving incline.

The gods are my patrons; the gods have regard
To my Muse and my piety. Here will you see
A rich cornucopia of gifts for the bard
Outpouring its rural abundance for thee.

Misit furentem: nunc ego mitibus
Mutare quaero tristia, dum mihi

Fias recantatis amica

Opprobriis, animumque reddas.

XVII. AD TYNDARIDEM.

VELOX amoenum saepe Lucretilem
Mutat Lycaeo Faunus, et igneam
Defendit aestatem capellis

Usque meis, pluviosque ventos.

Impune tutum per nemus arbutos
Quaerunt latentes et thyma deviae
Olentis uxores mariti:

Nec virides metuunt colubras,

Nec martiales haeduleae lupos;
Utcunque dulci, Tyndari, fistula
Valles, et Usticae cubantis

Laevia personuere saxa.

Dî me tuentur: dîs pietas mea
Et Musa cordi est. Hic tibi copia
Manabit ad plenum benigno

Ruris honorum opulenta cornu.

Here shunning Canicular heat, and reclining
In valley secluded, you'll sing to the lyre

That in Teos was strung, how with Circe the shining, Penelope strove in one love-kindled fire.

Here goblets of innocent Lesbian quaffing,

You'll fear not, while chatting with me in the shade, That Bacchus and Mars may mix battling with laughing, Nor be of that passionate Cyrus afraid,

Lest, mad with suspicion, in conflict uneven,

He tear from your ringlets their coronal crest;

Or lay--as though it, too, offence could have givenUnmerited violent hands on your vest.

This is almost certainly a close adaptation of a poem of Alcaeus, one line of which has been preserved by Athenaeus, and is a nearly literal translation of the first of the following lines.

ON Tibur's mellow soil, and where Catilian ramparts shine,
No tree do thou, O Varus, plant before the sacred vine;
For to the abstinent all things are hard by Jove's decree,
Nor save by other way than theirs do gnawing troubles flee.
Who, after wine, at penury or rough campaigning rails?
Nor rather, father Bacchus, thee; thee, comely Venus, hails?
But that by more than temperate draughts of grape-juice
none transgress,

Centaurean fray, with Lapithae fought out in drink's excess,
Warns, as withal Sithonians (nor gently) Evius
Warns, of the bounds 'twixt right and wrong almost
oblivious

Hic in reducta valle Caniculae
Vitabis aestus, et fide Teïa
Dices laborantes in uno

Penelopen vitreamque Circen.

Hic innocentis pocula Lesbi
Duces sub umbra: nec Semeleïus
Cum Marte confundet Thyoneus
Proelia nec metues protervum
Suspecta Cyrum, ne male dispari
Incontinentes injiciat manus,

Et scindat haerentem coronam
Crinibus, immeritamque vestem.

XVIII. AD VARUM.

NULLAM, Vare, sacra vite prius severis arborem

Circa mite solum Tiburis et moenia Catili.
Siccis omnia nam dura deus proposuit: neque

Mordaces aliter diffugiunt sollicitudines.

Quis post vina gravem militiam aut pauperiem crepat? Quis non te potius, Bacche pater, teque, decens Venus?

At ne quis modici transiliat munera Liberi,

Centaurea monet cum Lapithis rixa super mero
Debellata monet Sithoniis non levis Euius,

Cum fas atque nefas exiguo fine libidinum