With pliant limbs the tender maid
Now joys to learn the shameless trade
Of wanton dancing, and improves
The pleasures of licentious loves;
Then soon amid the bridal feast
Boldly she courts her husband's guest;
Her love no nice distinction knows,
But round the wandering pleasure throws,
Careless to hide the bold delight

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In darkness, and the shades of night.

Nor does she need the thin disguise,
The conscious husband bids her rise,

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When some rich factor courts her charms,
And calls the wanton to his arms,

Then, prodigal of wealth and fame,
Profusely buys the costly shame.

Not such the youth, of such a strain,
Who died with Punic gore the main;
Who Pyrrhus' flying war pursued,
Antiochus the great subdued,
And taught that terror of the field,
The cruel Hannibal, to yield:
But a rough race, inured to toil,
With heavy spade to turn the soil,
And, by a mother's will severe,
To fell the wood, and homeward bear
The ponderous load, even when the sun
His downward course of light had run,
And from the western mountain's head
His changing shadows lengthening spread,
Unyoked the team, with toil oppress'd,
And gave the friendly hour of rest.

What feels not time's consuming rage?
More vicious than their fathers' age
Our sires begot the present race,

Of manners impious, bold, and base;
And yet, with crimes to us unknown,

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Our sons shall mark the coming age their own.

ODE VII.-TO ASTERIE.

HORACE Comforts Asterie, troubled for the absence of her hus band, and exhorts her to persevere in her fidelity to him.

Ан! why does Asterie thus weep for the youth
Of constancy faithful, of honour and truth,

Whom the first kindly zephyrs, that breathe o'er the spring,

Enrich'd with the wares of Bithynia shall bring? Driven back from his course by the tempests, that rise

When stars of mad lustre rule over the skies,
At Oricum now poor Gyges must stay,
Where sleepless he weeps the cold winter away;
While his landlady Chloe, in sorrow of heart,
Bids her envoy of love exert all his art,

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16

Who tells him how Chloe, unhappy the dame!
Deep sighs for your lover, and burns in your flame.
He tells him how Protus, deceived by his wife,
Attempted, ah, dreadful! Bellerophon's life,
And urged by false crimes, how he sought to destroy
The youth for refusing, too chastely, the joy:
How Peleus was almost despatch'd to the dead,
While the lovely Magnesian abstemious he fled.
Then he turns every tale, and applies it with art,
To melt down his virtue, and soften his heart;
But constant and heart-whole young Gyges appears,
And deafer than rocks the tale-teller hears.
Then, fair one, take heed, lest Enipeus should prove
A little too pleasing, and tempt thee to love;
And though without rival he shine in the course, 25
To rein the fierce steed though unequal his force,

20

13 Homer calls this wife of Prætus, Antæa, and by the tragic poets she is called Sthenobæa. Her story is related at length in the sixth book of the Iliad.-Cruq.

Though matchless the swiftness, with which he divides,

In crossing the Tiber, the rough-swelling tides,
Yet shut the fond door at evening's first shade,
Nor look down to the street at the soft serenade, 3C
Or if cruel he call thee in love-sighing strain,
Yet more and more cruel be sure to remain.

ODE VIII. TO MÆCENAS.

HORACE invites Mæcenas to a domestic entertainment, which he was resolved to celebrate joyously.

THE Greek and Roman languages are thine,
Their hallow'd customs, and their rites divine,
And well you might the flowery wreath admire,
The fragrant incense, and the sacred fire,
Raised on the living turf to hail the day,
To which the married world their homage pay.
When on my head a tree devoted fell,
And almost crush'd me to the shades of hell,
Grateful I vow'd to him, who rules the vine,
A joyous banquet, while beneath his shrine

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A snow-white goat should bleed, and when the year
Revolving bids this festal morn appear,
We'll pierce a cask with mellow juice replete,
Mellow'd with smoke, since Tullus ruled the state.

5 A festival was observed by the Roman ladies with much religious pomp, on the first of March, in memory of the day when the Sabine women, having reconciled their husbands with their fathers, dedicated a temple to Juno. In this temple they offered sacrifices and flowers to the goddess, and waited at home the rest of the day to receive the presents which their friends and husbands made them, as if to thank them for that happy mediation.

11 The ancients usually sacrificed to the gods the beasts which they hated. Thus a goat is sacrificed to Bacchus, because it destroyed the vine. The victims of the celestial gods were white; those of the infernal deities were black.-Cruq.

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Come, then, Mæcenas, and for friendship's sake, 15 A friend preserved, a hundred bumpers take. Come drink the watchful tapers up to-day, While noise and quarrels shall be far away. No more let Rome your anxious thoughts engage, The Dacian falls beneath the victors' rage, The Medes in civil wars their arms employ, Inglorious wars! each other to destroy; Our ancient foes, the haughty sons of Spain, At length, indignant, feel the Roman chain; With bows unbent the hardy Scythians yield, Resolved to quit the long-disputed field. No more the public claims thy pious fears, Be not too anxious then with private cares, But seize the gifts the present moment brings, Those fleeting gifts, and leave severer things.

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19 Augustus was not yet returned from his eastern expedition; and when Agrippa went to Spain, Pannonia, and Syria, Mæcenas possessed alone the government of Rome and Italy, until September, 738, when he resigned it to Statilius Taurus, that he might follow Augustus into Gaul.-Torr. San.

25 It was the custom of all the northern nations to hold their bows unstrung, when they offered proposals of peace or truce, and when they retired off the field of battle.

ODE IX.-TO LYDIA.*

A DIALOGUE between Horace and Lydia.

Horace. WHILE I was pleasing to your arms Nor any youth of happier charms

Thy snowy bosom blissful press'd,

Not Persia's king like me was bless'd.

Lydia. While for no other fair you burn'd, 5

Nor Lydia was for Chloe scorn'd,

What maid was then so bless'd as thine?

Not Ilia's fame could equal mine.

+ Horace in this ode hath found an art of joining the polite ness of courts to the simplicity of the country.-Torr.

H. Now Chloe reigns; her voice and lyre

Melt down the soul to soft desire,

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Nor will I fear e'en death, to save
Her dearer beauties from the grave.

L. My heart young Calaïs inspires,
Whose bosom glows with mutual fires,
For whom I twice would die with joy,
If death would spare the charming boy.

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H. Yet what if love, whose bands we broke,
Again should tame us to the yoke;
Should I shake off bright Chloe's chain,
And take my Lydia home again?

L. Though he exceed in beauty far
The rising lustre of a star;

Though light as cork thy fancy strays,
Thy passions wild as angry seas,

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When vex'd with storms; yet gladly I

With thee would live, with thee would die.

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11 According to the superstition of the ancients, who believed that the death of one person might be prevented by that of an other. From hence came the custom of those devotements, made for the lives of princes.

20 Horace was willing to try whether Lydia would consent to a reconciliation; but, to avoid a refusal, he leaves the sense unfinished, and rather insinuates than expresses his own incli nation; or perhaps the break is owing to the warmth of Lydia, who interrupts him, and prevents what he is going to say.

ODE X.-TO LYCE.

HORACE implores Lyce to take pity on him.

THOUGH you drank the deep stream of Tanais icy, The wife of some barbarous blockhead, oh, Lyce, Yet your heart might relent to expose me reclined At your cruel shut door to the rage of the wind. Hark! your gate-how it creaks! how the grove, planted round

Yon beautiful villa, rebellows the sound!

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