0 D

D E VII.

TO AS TERIE.
He consoles ber in ber sorrow for her absent bustand, and ad.
monishes ber to preserve the faith she had plighted to bim.
ASTERIE, why do you

bewail
Him, whom the zephyrs shall restore
Which fill with vernal breath the sail,

Wafting Bithynian wealth on shore,
The happy Gyges, whose fair truth is known,
And constancy has made so much your own?
He, driv'n by that autumnal * goat

And southern winds, is forc'd away,
His meditations to devote

On fair Asterie night and day,
And joyless, Deepless, spends the year,
With many a melancholy tear.
And

yec

the busy footman speeds
And many a subtle art he tries,

how Chloe burns and bleeds,
And how she pines, and how she dies:
And, anxious to receive him to her bed,
Has many such like stories in her head,
“ How a false woman could persuade

King Prætus, credulous too much,
" With false pretences that she made

“ To murder him, who fhunn'd the touch
“ Of all impurity and shame,
6. The chalte Bellerophon by name.

* When the constellation of the goat fets at the close of autumn, it generally stirs up flowers and storms.

S 2

• How

To urge

Narrat pæne

datum Pelea tartaro
Magneffam Hippolytem dum fugit abstinens :
Et peccare docentes,

Fallax hiftorias monet :
Fruftra, nam fcopulis surdior Icari
Voces audit adhuc integer. At, tibi
Ne vicinus Enipeus

Plus justo placeat, cave :
Quamvis non alius flectere equum sciens
Æque conspicitur gramine Martio :
Nec quisquam citus æque

Tusco denatat alveo.
Prima nocte domum claude : neque in vias
Sub cantum querulæ defpice tibiæ :
Et te fæpe vocanti

Duram, difficilis mane.

PROSE INTERPRETATION. Bellerophon: he relates how near Peleus was to have been given up to the infernal regions, while, continent, he shuns the Magnesian Hippolyte : and the diffembler remonstrates to him histories teaching to fin, to no purpose, however - for sound as yet he hears his words deafer than the rocks of Icarus--but you, by the by, beware, left your neighbour Enipeus please you more than is allowable : though no other person equally dextrous to manage the steed is seen upon the Martial turf: nor does any one equally brisk swim down the Tuscan channel. At the first hour of night shut up your house, nor look down into the streets at the playing of the complaining pipe; and persist difficult of access to him frequently calling you hard-hearted.

" How Paleas was condemn'd almost

“ To hell, in that he had abstain'd, “ And wary 'scap'd the am'rous poft

“ Where fair Hippolyte remain'd,"
And mentions many a novel tale,
That teaches mortals to be frail.
In vain - for deafer than the rocks

Of Icarus he hears the lure,
And as temptation's voice he mocks,

Asterie, thou art still secure -
" And yet - Enipeus - give me leave
Do not with so much joy receive.
Tho' (to be fair) no man can ride

Upon the Martian plain so well :
A goodly sight, of gallant pride,

And skill equestrian to excel ;
Nor any active man alike
Can through the yielding Tibur strike.
Soon as the day begins to close,

Shut up the doors, shut up the gate,
Nor in the street yourself expose,

Nor for the scurvy minstrels wait The more they call you hard and hard, The more your doors and ears be barr'd.

ADMÆCENAT E M.
Quum uxorem non habeat, nihilominus Kalëndas Martias,

cur celebret, Mæcenas mirari non debet.
MARTis celebs quid agam Kalendis,
Quid velint flores, & acerra thuris
Plena, miraris, positusque carbo in

Cespite vivo,
Docte sermones utriusque linguæ.
Voveram dulces epulas & album
Libero caprum, prope funeratus

Arboris ictu.
Hic dies, anno redeunte feftus,
Corticem aftrictum pice dimovebit
Amphoræ fumum bibere institutæ

Confule Tullo.
Sume, Mæcenas, cyathos amici
Sospitis centum: & vigiles lucernas
Profer in lucem : procul omnis efto

Clamor & ira.

PROSE INTERPRETATION. O Mæcenas ! an adept in both languages, you admire what I, a batchelor, am doing on the calends of March; what the flowers, and the cenier full of frankincense, and the coals placed upon the live turf, mean! I had vowed, you must know, a delicious banquet and white goat to Bacchus, well nigh brought to my grave by a blow from a falling tree. This day, on the return of the year, a festival shall remove the cork secured with pitch from that jar which was put to imbibe the smoke, Tullus being the consul. Take, Mæcenas,

an

Mecenas is not to wonder why Horace celebrates the calends

of March, notwithstanding he has no wife.
Why, on the * first of March, so clean,

Free from the matrimonial god,
Why flow'rs and frankincense are seen,
And what these heaps of fewel mean

Upon the living fod,
Friend, is from your discernment hid,

Tho' Greek and Latin are your own.
Know then I vow'd a feast and kid
To + him, who did my death forbid,

When down the tree was blown,
This day, the chief of all by far,

A special festival denotes,
And shall remove from out the jar
The cork smok'd down with pitch and tar,

When Tullus had the votes.
Take, for the safety of thy friend,

An hundred bumpers at the least;
On high the wakeful lamps suspend,
Let wrath and clamour have an end,

Nor interrupt our feasts.
* The calends of March were sacred to Juno, and particularly cele-
brated by married men and their wives. t Bacchus,

PROSE INTERPRETATION. an hundred cups to the memory of your friend's escape, and prolong the watchful lamps till day-break; all noise and wrath be far away. Omit your political anxiety concerning S 4

the