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African storms, to have recourse to piteous prayers, and to make a bargain with my vows, that my Cyprian and Syrian merchandise may not make an addition to the wealth of the insatiable sea. Then the fanning gale and the twin Pollux shall carry me safe, in the protection of a skiff with two oars, through the tumultuous Egean sea.

ODE XXX.

He promises himself an immortality of fame from his poetical writings.

I HAVE executed a monument more lasting than brass, and more sublime than the regal elevation of pyramids, which the wasting rain, the unavailing north wind, or an innumerable succession of years, and the flight of seasons, shall not be able to demolish. I shall not wholly die, but a great part of me shall escape Libitina.* I shall continually be renewed in the praises of posterity, as long as the priest shall ascend the Capitol with the silent vestal virgin. Where the rapid Aufidus shall murmur, and where Daunus, poorly supplied with water, ruled over a rustic people, I, exalted from a low degree, shall be acknowledged as having originally adapted the Æolic verse to Italian measures. -Melpomene, assume that pride which your merits have acquired, and willingly crown my hair with the Delphic laurel.

* Goddess of Death.

Q. HORATII FLACCI

CARMINUM

LIBER IV.

CARMEN I.

AD VENEREM.

Se jam eâ ætate esse, ut à rebus Venereis alieno animo esse debeat.'

INTERMISSA, Venus, diu

Rursus bella moves? parce, precor, precor.

Non sum qualis eram bonæ

Sub regno Cynara: desine, dulcium

Mater sæva Cupidinum,

Circa lustra decem flectere mollibus

Jam durum imperiis: abi,

Quò blandæ juvenum te revocant preces.

Tempestiviùs in domo

5

THE

FOURTH BOOK

OF THE

ODES OF HORACE.

ODE I.

TO VENUS.

He was now arrived at such an age, that he ought no longer to think of love affairs.

AFTER a long cessation, O Venus, again are you stirring up tumult? Spare me, I beseech you, I beseech you. I am not the man I was under the dominion of good-natured Cynara. Forbear, thou cruel mother of soft desires, to bend one bordering upon fifty, now too hardened for your soft commands; go whither the soothing prayers of youth invoke thee. More seasonably may you revel in the house of Paulus Maximus, flying thither with

Pauli, purpureis ales oloribus, Commessabere Maximi;

Si torrere jecur quæris idoneum: Namque et nobilis, et decens,

Et pro solicitis non tacitus reis, Et centum puer artium,

Latè signa feret militiæ tuæ: Et, quandoque potentior

Largis muneribus riserit æmuli,

Albanos prope te lacus

Ponet marmoream sub trabe citreâ. Illie plurima naribus

Duces thura; lyræque et Berecynthia Delectabere tibiæ

Mistis carminibus, non sinè fistulâ.

Illic bis pueri die

Numen cum teneris virginibus tuum Laudantes, pede candido

In morem Salium ter quatient humum.

Me nec fœmina, nec puer

ᏗᎾ

15

20

25

Jam, nec spes animi credula mutui,

30

Nec certare juvat mero,

Nec vincire novis tempora floribus.

Sed cur, heu! Ligurine, cur

Manat rara meas lachryma per genas ?

35

Cur facunda parùm decoro

Inter verba cadit lingua silentio ?

Nocturnis te ego somniis

Jam captum teneo, jam volucrem sequor

Te per gramina Martii

Campi, te per aquas, dure, volubiles.

*Lyrâque et Berecynthiâ-tibiâ.

40

your splendid swans, if you seek to inflame a suitable breast; for he is both noble and graceful, and by no means silent in the cause of distressed defendants, and a youth of an hundred accomplishments; he shall bear the ensigns of your warfare far and wide; and whenever more prevailing than the ample presents of a rival, he shall laugh at his expense, he shall erect thee in marble, under a citron dome, near the Alban lake. There you shall smell abundant frankincense, and shall be charmed with the mixed music of the lyre and Berecynthian pipe, not without the flageolet. There the youths, together with the tender maidens, twice a-day celebrating your divinity, shall, Salian-like,* with snow-white foot, thrice shake the ground. As for me, neither woman nor youth, nor the fond hope of a mutual inclination, nor to contend in wine, nor to bind my temples with fresh flowers, delight me any longer. But why, ah! why, O Ligurinus, does the tear every now and then trickle down my cheeks? why does my fluent tongue falter between my words with an ill-becoming silence? Thee in my dreams by night I clasp, caught in my arms; thee, flying across the turf of the Campus Martius, thee I pursue, O cruel one, through the rolling

waters.

Priests of Mars.

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