perjur'd harlot draws back: Friends, treacherous in their promifes to bear equally the burden of adverfity, when cafks are exhaufted, very dregs. and all, fly off. Preferve thou Cæfar, who is meditating an expedition against the Britains, the fartheft people in the world, and alfo the new levy of youths to be dreaded by the eastern regions, and the Red-fea. Alas! I am afhamed of the wounds and wickednefs of the public, and brethren flain by brethren. What have we, a hardened age, abhorred? What have we in our impiety lef unviolated? From what has our youth restrained their hands out of reverence to the gods? What altars have they fpared? O may you forge anew our blunted fwords on a different anvil agaft the Meffagetæ and Arabians. ODE XXXVI. He congratulates Plotius Numido upon his happy return from Spain. TH HIS is a joyful occafion to facrifice with incense and mufic, and the votive blood of a heifer to the Gods, the guardians of Numida; who, now returning in fafety from the extremeft part of Spain, imparts many embraces to his beloved companions, but to none more than his dear Lamia, mindful of his childhood spent under one and the H 2 fame Mutatæque fimul toge. Creffa ne careat pulchra dies nota: Neu promptæ modus amphora, Neu morem in Salium fit requies pedum : Neu multi Damalis meri Baffum Threicia vincat amyftide: Neu defint epulis rofæ, Neu vivax apium, neu breve lilium. Omnes in Damalin putres Deponent oculos: nec Damalis novo Divelletur adultero, Lafcivis ederis ambitiofior. CARMEN XXXVII, AD SODALES. Ob Cleopatræ mortem lætandum effe. TUNC eft bibendum, nunc pede libero NUN Ornare pulvinar deorum Tempus erat dapibus, fodales. Antehac nefas depromere Cæcubum Regina dementes ruinas, Funus et imperio parabat, Conta * fame governor, and of the gown, which they changed at the fame time. Let not this joyful day be without a Cretan mark of diftinction; let us not fpare the jar at hand; nor, Salian-like, let there be any ceffation of feet; nor let the toping Damalis conquer Baffus in the Thracian & Amyftis; nor let there be rofes wanting to the banquet, nor the ever-green parfley, nor fhort-liv'd lily. All the company will fix their diffolving eyes on Damalis; but fhe, more luxuriant than the wanton ivy, will not be feparated from her lover. ODE XXXVII. To his COMPANIONS. That they ought to make a rejoicing on account of Cleopatra's death. NOW, W, my companions, is the time to caroufe, now to beat the ground with a light foot: now is the time that was to deck the couch of the Gods with fumptuous Salian dainties. Before this, it was impious to produce the old Cæcuban ftored up by our ancestors; while the queen, with a contaminated H 3 At the beginning of the feventeenth year, the Roman youth changed the prætexta, or boy's gown, for the toga virilis, or man's gown. The Cretans mark'd their lucky days with white, and the reverfe with black, Salii; priests of Mars, who made dancing a principal part of their religious worship. $ Amyfiis, a large Thracian cup, which to exhaust at a breath, was cfteemed a piece of dranken bravery. Contaminato cum grege turpium Ebria. Sed minuit furorem Cæfar, ab Italia volantem Molles columbas, aut leporem cit Emoniæ), daret ut catenis * Fatale monftrum: quæ generofius Deliberata morte ferocior: Non humilis mulier triumpho. 10 15 20 25 39 Penetravit oras. Bentl. Aufa et tacentem. CARMEN taminated gang of creatures, noifome through diftemper, was preparing giddy deftruction for the capitol and the fubverfion of the empire, being weak enough to hope for any thing, and intoxicated with the favours of fortune. But fcarcely a fingle fhip preferved from the flames, abated her fury; and Cæfar reduced her mind, inflamed with Egyptian wine, to real fears, clofe pursuing her, in her flight from Italy, with his gallies, (as the hawk purfues the tender doves, or the nimble hunter the hare in the plains of fnowy Emon,) that he might throw into chains this deftructive monster of a woman, who, feeking more generous death, neither had an effeminate dread of the fword, nor repair'd with her fwift fhip to hidden fhores. She was able alfo to look upon her palace, lying in ruins, with a countenance unmov'd, and courageous enough to handle exafperated afps*, that the might imbibe into her body the deadly poifon, being more refolved by having premeditated her death: for fhe was a woman of fuch greatnefs of foul, as to fcorn to be carried off in haughty triumph, like a private perfon, by rough Liburnian tars. Plutarch fays it was that kind of ferpent called an afp. a ODE |