This was written after the German victories celebrated in odes and 14, and was perhaps sent to Augustus in Gaul, whence he did not return to Rome until two years after setting out on his expedition against the Sicambri. Possibly he may have delayed designedly, because it was his policy to make his absence felt; and it may be that Horace's language represented the sentiments of large numbers at Rome who felt the want of that presiding genius which had brought the city through its long troubles, and given it comparative peace.

BEST guardian of the Romulèan race,

Born under gods propitious, from our midst
Absent already for too lengthened space-
Thou to the Senate's sacred council didst
Swift return promise. Now thy course retrace.

Light to thy country, virtuous chief, restore;
For when, like that of spring, thy countenance
Hath shone upon the citizens, with more
Of gracious influence doth the day advance,
A richer brilliance do the sunbeams pour.

As on a stripling, whom the adverse blast
Of the south wind, beyond the watery plain
Of the Carpathian, tarrying there, holds fast,
Nor his loved home permits him to regain
Till more than a full year is overpast—

V. AD AUGUSTUM.

DIVIS orte bonis, optime Romulae Custos gentis, abes jam nimium diu: Maturum reditum pollicitus patrum Sancto concilio, redi.

Lucem redde tuae, dux bone, patriae; Instar veris enim vultus ubi tuus

Affulsit populo, gratior it dies,

Et soles melius nitent.

Ut mater juvenem, quem Notus invido. Flatu Carpathii trans maris aequora Cunctantem spatio longius annuo

Dulci distinet a domo,

His mother calls with many a prayer and vow
And many an omen, from the curved sea-strand
Withdrawing not her gaze-even so now,
Smitten with loyal longing, fatherland
Bids Caesar here again his presence show.

For the ox safely rambles through the mead:
Ceres and bountiful Prosperity

Are nourishing the land: with winged speed
Mariners skim the pirate-cleansed sea:
Fidelity holds censure's voice in dread.

Adultery ceases the pure home to stain:
Custom and law's enactment have subdued
That foul offence: child-bearing women gain
Applause for babes of right similitude:
Crime and its punishment are co-mates twain.

While Caesar is preserved to us, who fears
The Parthian? or who the shaggy swarm
Of sons that teeming Germany uprears?
Whom does the ice-bound Scythian alarm?
Who heeds that savage Spain in arms appears?

Amid his own familiar hills, each one

In wedlock with the widowed trees unites

The vine; and joying o'er the day's work done,
Returns thence to his wine, and thee invites,
His second course, as deity, to crown.

Votis, ominibusque, et precibus vocat,

Curvo nec faciem litore demovet :

Sic desideriis icta fidelibus

Quaerit patria Caesarem.

Tutus bos etenim rura perambulat :
Nutrit rura Ceres, almaque Faustitas:
Pacatum volitant per mare navitae:
Culpari metuit Fides:

Nullis polluitur casta domus stupris:

Mos et lex maculosum edomuit nefas:
Laudantur simili prole puerperae:

Culpam poena premit comes.

Quis Parthum paveat? quis gelidum Scythen?
Quis, Germania quos horrida parturit
Fetus, incolumi Caesare? quis ferae
Bellum curet Hiberiae?

Condit quisque diem collibus in suis,
Et vitem viduas ducit ad arbores:
Hinc ad vina redit laetus, et alteris

Te mensis adhibet deum;

Thee, with abundance of entreaties, he
Pursues, and with libation of pure wine:
And, 'mid his Lares, thy divinity
Places, as mighty Hercules, in line
With Castor, ranks in Grecian memory.

Ah wouldest thou, good chief, on Italy
A long-enduring festal time bestow!
Dry, with the day before us, so say we
When early morning dawns: well-moistened, so
Say, when the sun is underneath the sea.

This reads like a sort of preface to the Secular Ode. Horace begins with thanksgiving to Apollo for having slain Achilles and preserved Aeneas, the originator of the Roman state, and then turns to the chorus and gives them some directions. I hope no critic will be very hard upon me for having, in my desperate need of a dissyllable, devised Teucrum as another name for Troy.

GOD, who wert found by Niobean offspring
Scourge of presumptuous tongues, and by the lustful
Tityus, and him, of Troy almost subduer,

Phthian Achilles :

Soldier, 'mid others best, to thee unequal,
Albeit, born of the sea-goddess Thetis ;
He, with redoubted spear assaulting, shivered
Dardan defences.

He as pine-tree stricken by biting hatchet
Or as proud cypress by the east wind levelled,