Vana, quae porta fugiens eburna Si quis infamem mihi nunc juvencum Impudens liqui patrios Penates: Impudens Orcum moror. O Deorum Si quis haec audis, utinam inter errem Nuda leones: Antequam turpis macies decentes Pascere tigres. 'Vilis Europe,' pater urget absens : 'Quid mori cessas? Potes hac ab orno Pendulum zona bene te secuta Laedere collum. Sive te rupes, et acuta leto Saxa delectant; age, te procellae Crede veloci, nisi herile mavis Carpere pensum, 224 For a barbarian mistress you prefer The wool to card.' As thus she wails, to her After enow of jeers, 'Abstain,' says she 'Thou know'st not thou art wife of conquering Jove, One commentator has satisfied himself that the Lyde of this Ode is the same, only with altered feelings towards the poet, as she of the tenth of the same Book, ubi quidem obstinata, hic amica et favens.' This of course is mere fancy; but the idea is not a bad one, and its adoption may lend some additional zest to verses in which, whoever the lady may have been, Horace is apparently inviting himself to sup with her. WHAT better upon Neptune's feast Can I do, Lyde? Be at once released Your hoarded Caecuban; and ply, With brisk assault, discretion's panoply. You see how fast declines mid-day, And yet, as though the fleeting hours would stay, You tarry from their bin for us To draw coy flasks of Consul Bibulus. Regius sanguis, dominaeque tradi Filius arcu. Mox ubi lusit satis; Abstineto, Dixit, irarum calidaeque rixae; Cum tibi invisus laceranda reddet Uxor invicti Jovis esse nescis? XXVIII. FESTO quid potius die Neptuni faciam? Prome reconditum Lyde strenua, Caecubum, Munitaeque adhibe vim sapientiae. Inclinare meridiem Sentis; ac, veluti stet volucris dies, Parcis deripere horreo Cessantem Bibuli consulis amphoram. Q Come, let us with alternate lays Neptune and verdant locks of Nereids praise. Latona, and swift Cynthia's arrows sing: Her requiem due shall Night obtain likewise. An invitation to Maecenas to visit Horace at his Sabine farm. In line 6 I have substituted 'Ut' for 'Ne,' in accordance with what Tate (Horatius Restitutus, p. 24) calls the 'noble emendation of Nicholas Hardinge, recommended by Markland, approved by Bentley, and applauded by Parr.' It seems indeed almost indispensable to make sense of the passage, if, as Tate argues, Maecenas could not see Tibur, Aesula, or the Tusculan hills from Rome, and could scarcely help seeing them from Digentia. By‘Molem' in line IO is to be understood the palace of Maecenas on the Esquiline. OFFSPRING of Tyrrhene kings, long time for thee Untilted yet, balm for thine hair expressed, And range of parricidal Telegon. Thine irksome grandeur, and the stately dome Forsake, and cease a little to admire The fume, the wealth, the din of prosperous Rome. Nos cantabimus in vicem Neptunum et virides Nereïdum comas: Tu curva recines lyra Latonam, et celeris spicula Cynthiae; Summo carmine, quae Cnidon Fulgentesque tenet Cycladas, et Paphon Junctis visit oloribus: Dicetur merita Nox quoque naenia. XXIX. AD MAECENATEM. TYRRHENA regum progenies, tibi Cum flore, Maecenas, rosarum, et Fastidiosam desere copiam, et Molem propinquam nubibus arduis: Omitte mirari beatae Fumum et opes strepitumque Romae. |