ANOTHER age in civil wars will soon be spent and worn,
And by her native strength our Rome be wrecked and
That Rome, the Marsians could not crush, who border on
Nor the shock of threatening Porsena with his Etruscan bands, Nor Capua's strength that rivalled ours, nor Spartacus the stern,
Nor the faithless Allobrogian, who still for change doth yearn. Ay, what Germania's blue-eyed youth quelled not with ruth
Nor Hannibal by our great sires detested and abhorred,
We shall destroy with impious hands imbrued in brother's
And wild beasts of the wood shall range our native land once
A foreign foe, alas! shall tread The City's ashes down,
And his horse's ringing hoofs shall smite her places of renown,
And the bones of great Quirinus, now religiously enshrined,
Shall be flung by sacrilegious hands to the sunshine and the
wind.
And if ye all from ills so dire ask, how yourselves to free,
Or such at least as would not hold your lives unworthily,
No better counsel can I urge, than that which erst inspired
The stout Phocæans when from their doomed city they retired,
Their fields, their household gods, their shrines surrendering
as a prey
To the wild boar and the ravening wolf; so we, in our dismay,
Where'er our wandering steps may chance to carry us should
Or wheresoe'er across the seas the fitful winds may blow. How think ye then? If better course none offer, why should we Not seize the happy auspices, and boldly put to sea?
But let us swear this oath;-"Whene'er, if e'er shall come
Rocks upwards from the deep shall float, return shall not be crime;
Nor we be loath to back our sails, the ports of home to seek,
When the waters of the Po shall lave Matinum's rifted peak,
Or skyey Apenninus down into the sea be rolled,
Or wild unnatural desires such monstrous revel hold,
That in the stag's endearments the tigress shall delight,
And the turtle-dove adulterate with the falcon and the kite,
That unsuspicious herds no more shall tawny lions fear,
And the he-goat, smoothly sleek of skin, through the briny
deep career!"
This having sworn, and what beside may our returning stay,
Straight let us all, this City's doomed inhabitants, away,
Or those that rise above the herd, the few of nobler soul; The craven and the hopeless here on their ill-starred beds may loll.
Ye who can feel and act like men, this woman's wail give o'er,
And fly to regions far away beyond the Etruscan shore !
The circling ocean waits us; then away, where nature smiles,
To those fair lands, those blissful lands, the rich and happy
Where Ceres year by year crowns all the untilled land with sheaves,
And the vine with purple clusters droops, unpruned of all her leaves;
Where the olive buds and burgeons, to its promise ne'er
And the russet fig adorns the tree, that graffshoot never knew;
Where honey from the hollow oaks doth ooze, and crystal rills Come dancing down with tinkling feet from the sky-dividing
There to the pails the she-goats come, without a master's word, And home with udders brimming broad returns the friendly herd;
There round the fold no surly bear its midnight prowl doth make,
Nor teems the rank and heaving soil with the adder and the snake;
There no contagion smites the flocks, nor blight of any star
With fury of remorseless heat the sweltering herds doth mar.
Nor this the only bliss that waits us there, where drenching
rains
By watery Eurus swept along ne'er devastate the plains,
Nor are the swelling seeds burnt up within the thirsty clods,
So kindly blends the seasons there the King of all the Gods.
That shore the Argonautic bark's stout rowers never gained,
Nor the wily she of Colchis with step unchaste profaned,
The sails of Sidon's galleys ne'er were wafted to that strand,
Nor ever rested on its slopes Ulysses' toilworn band:
For Jupiter, when he with brass the Golden Age alloyed,
That blissful region set apart by the good to be enjoyed;
With brass and then with iron he the ages seared, but ye,
Good men and true, to that bright home arise and follow me!
HORACE'S RECANTATION TO CANIDIA.
HERE at thy feet behold me now
Thine all-subduing skill avow,
And beg of thee on suppliant knee,
By realms of dark Persephone,
By Dian's awful might, and by
Thy books of charms which from the sky Can drag the stars, Canidia,
To put thy magic sleights away,
Reverse thy whirling wheel amain,
And loose the spell that binds my brain ! Even Telephus to pity won
The ocean-cradled Thetis' son,
'Gainst whom his Mysian hosts he led,
And his sharp-pointed arrow sped.
The man-destroying Hector, doomed
By kites and dogs to be consumed,
Was natheless by the dames of Troy
Embalmed, when, mourning for his boy,
King Priam left his city's wall,
At stern Achilles' feet to fall.
Ulysses' stalwart rowers, too,
Away their hide of bristles threw
At Circe's word, and donned again
The shape, the voice, the soul of men.
Enough of punishment, I'm sure,
Thou hast compelled me to endure,
Enough and more, thou being dear
To pedlar and to marinere !
EPODE XVII.] Horace's Recantation to Canidia.
My youth has fled, my rosy hue
Turned to a wan and livid blue;
Blanched by thy mixtures is my hair r;
No respite have I from despair.
The days and nights, they wax and wane,
But bring me no release from pain;
Nor can I ease, howe'er I gasp,
The spasm which holds me in its grasp.
So am I vanquished, so recant,
Unlucky wretch! my creed, and grant,
That Sabine spells can vex the wit,
And heads by Marsic charms be split.
What wouldst thou more? O earth! O sea!
Nor even Alcides burned like me,
With Nessus' venomed gore imbued,
Nor Ætna in its fiercest mood;
For till my flesh, to dust calcined,
Be scattered by the scornful wind,
Thou glowest a very furnace fire,
Distilling Colchian poisons dire!
When will this end? Or what may be
The ransom, that shall set me free?
Speak! Let the fine be what it may,
That fine most rigidly I'll pay.
Demand a hundred steers, with these
Thy wrath I'm ready to appease !
Or wouldst thou rather so desire
The praise of the inventive lyre,
Thou, chaste and good, shalt range afar
The spheres, thyself a golden star!
Castor, with wrath indignant stung,
And Castor's brother, by the tongue,
That slandered Helena the fair,
Yet listened to the slanderer's prayer,
Forgave the bard the savage slight,
Forgave him, and restored his sight.
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