ODE LIV.A METHINKS, the pictur'd bull we see ODE LV.3 WHILE we invoke the wreathed spring, Resplendent rose! to thee we'll sing :4 Whose breath perfumes th' Olympian bowers; scribed by Galen, as an excellent medicine for old men : "Quod frigidos et humoribus expletos calefaciat, &c. ;" but Nature was Anacreon's physician. There is a proverb in Eriphus, as quoted by Athenæus, which says, that wine makes an old man dance, whether he will or not." Λόγος εστ' αρχαίος, ου κακώς έχων, Οινον λέγουσι τους γέροντας, ω πατές, 1"This ode is written upon a picture which represented the rape of Europa."- Madame Dacier. It may probably have been a description of one of those coins, which the Sidonians struck off in honour of Europa, representing a woman carried across the sea by a bull. Thus Natalis Comes, lib. viii. cap. 23. "Sidonii numismata cum fæmina tauri dorso insidente ac mare transfretante cuderunt in ejus honorem " In the little treatise upon the goddess of Syria, attributed very falsely to Lucian, there is mention of this coin, and of a temple dedicated by the Sidonians to Astarté, whom some, it appears, confounded with Europa. The poet Moschus has left a very beautiful idyl on the story of Europa. 2 No: he descends from climes above, He looks the God, he breathes of Jove!] Thus Moschus: Κρύψε θεον και τρέψε δέμας και γινετο ταύρος. 3 This ode is a brilliant panegyric on the rose. "All antiquity (says Barnes) has produced nothing more beautiful." From the idea of peculiar excellence, which the ancients attached to this flower, arose a pretty proverbial expression, used by Aristophanes, according to Suidas, pede u' eignnas, "You have spoken roses," a phrase somewhat similar to the "dire des fleurettes" of the French. In the same idea of excellence originated, I doubt not, a very curious application of the word peber, for which the inquisitive reader may consult Gaulminus upon the epithalamium of our poet, where it is introduced in the romance of Theodorus. Muretus, in one of his elegies, calls his mistress his rose:Jam te igitur rursus teneo, formosula, jam te (Quid trepidas ?) teneo; jam, rosa, te teneo. Now I again may clasp thee, dearest, What is there now, on earth, thou fearest? Eleg. 8. Again these longing arms infold thee, This, like most of the terms of endearment in the modern Latin poets, is taken from Plautus; they were vulgar and colloquial in his time, but are among the elegancies of the modern Latinists. Passeratius alludes to the ode before us, in the beginning of his poem on the Rose: Carmine digna rosa est; vellem caneretur ut illam 4 Resplendent rose! to thee we'll sing;] I have passed over the line συν ἑταίρει αύξει μέλπην, which is corrupt in this original reading, and has been very little improved by the annotators. I should suppose it to be an interpolation, if it were not for a line which occurs afterwards: gigs on quƠIY λέγωμεν. 5 And Venus, in its fresh-blown leaves, &c.] Belleau, în a note upon an old French poet, quoting the original here acgodiσion & abugua, translates it, "comme les délices et mignardises de Venus." 6 Oft hath the poet's magic tongue The rose's fair luxuriance sung; &c.] The following is a fragment of the Lesbian poetess. It is cited in the romance of Achilles Tatius, who appears to have resolved the numbers into prose. Ει τοις ανθεσιν ήθελεν ὁ Ζευς επιθείναι βασιλέα, το ροδον αν των ανθέων εξασίλευε. γης εστι κόσμος, φυτων αγλαϊσμα, οφθαλμος ανθέων, λειμώνος ερυθημα, κάλλος αστραπτον. Έρωτος που, Αφροδίτην προξένει, εκείδεσι φύλλοις κομά, ευκίνητοις πεταλοις τρυφά, το πέταλον τῷ Ζεφυρῳ γελά. If Jove would give the leafy bowers And fresh inhale the spicy sighs That from the weeping buds arise. When revel reigns, when mirth is high, And Bacchus beams in every eye, Our rosy fillets scent exhale, And fill with balm the fainting gale. There's nought in nature bright or gay, Where roses do not shed their ray. When morning paints the orient skies, Her fingers burn with roseate dyes; 1 Young nymphs betray the rose's hue, O'er whitest arms it kindles through. In Cytherea's form it glows, And mingles with the living snows. The rose distils a healing balm, The beating pulse of pain to calm; Preserves the cold inurned clay,2 And mocks the vestige of decay: 3 And when at length, in pale decline, Its florid beauties fade and pine, Sweet as in youth, its balmy breath Diffuses odour even in death! 4 Oh! whence could such a plant have sprung? Listen,- for thus the tale is sung. 1 When morning paints the orient skies, Her fingers burn with roseate dyes; &c.] In the original here, he enumerates the many epithets of beauty, borrowed from roses, which were used by the poets, raça twv oopwv. We see that poets were dignified in Greece with the title of sages: even the careless Anacreon, who lived but for love and voluptuousness, was called by Plato the wise Anacreon"fuit hæc sapientia quondam." * Preserves the cold inurned clay, &c.] He here alludes to the use of the rose in embalming; and, perhaps (as Barnes thinks), to the rosy unguent with which Venus anointed the corpse of Hector. Homer's Iliad. It may likewise regard the ancient practice of putting garlands of roses on the dead, as in Statius, Theb. lib. x. 782. hi sertis, hi veris honore soluto Accumulant artus, patriâque in sede reponunt Where "veris honor," though it mean every kind of flowers, may seem more particularly to refer to the rose, which our poet in another ode calls έαρς μέλημα. We read, in the Hieroglyphics of Pierius, lib. Iv. that some of the ancients used to order in their wills, that roses should be annually scattered on their tombs, and Pierius has adduced some sepulchral inscriptions to this purpose. 3 And mocks the vestige of decay :] When he says that this flower prevails over time itself, he still alludes to its efficacy in embalment (tenerà poneret ossa rosâ. Propert. lib. i. eleg. 17.), or perhaps to the subsequent idea of its fragrance surviving its beauty; for he can scarcely mean to praise for duration the "nimium breves flores" of the rose. Philostratus compares this flower with love, and says, that they both defy the influence of time ; χρόνον δε ουτε Ερως, ουτε ρόδα οίδεν. Unfortunately the similitude lies not in their duration, but their transience. When, humid, from the silvery stream, ODE LVI.6 HE, who instructs the youthful crew To bathe them in the brimmer's dew, Ambrosium late rosa tunc quoque spargit odorem, When all its flushing beauties die; 5 With nectar drops, a ruby tide, The sweetly orient buds they dyed, &c.] The author of the "Pervigilium Veneris" (a poem attributed to Catullus, the style of which appears to me to have all the laboured luxuriance of a much later period) ascribes the tincture of the rose to the blood from the wound of Adonis rosa Fuse aprino de cruore — according to the emendation of Lipsius. In the following epigram this hue is differently accounted for: — Illa quidem studiosa suum defendere Adonim, On whom the jealous war-god rushes; And while the wound with crimson flows, The snowy flow'ret feels her blood, and blushes! 6" Compare with this elegant ode the verses of Uz, lib. i. 'die Weinlese."" - Degen. This appears to be one of the hymns which were sung at the anniversary festival of the vintage; one of the úvo, as our poet himself terms them in the fifty-ninth ode. We cannot help feeling a sort of reverence for these classic relics of the religion of antiquity. Horace may be supposed to have written the nineteenth ode of his second book, and Diffuses odour even in death!] Thus Casper Barlæus, in the twenty-fifth of the third, for some bacchanalian celehis Ritus Nuptiarum: 4 Sweet as in youth, its balmy breath bration of this kind. 1 Which, sparkling in the cup of mirth, Illuminate the sons of earth!] In the original rorov astovov xov. Madame Dacier thinks that the poet here had the nepenthe of Homer in his mind. Odyssey, lib. iv. This nepenthé was a something of exquisite charm, infused by Helen into the wine of her guests, which had the power of dispelling every anxiety. A French writer, De Meré, conjectures that this spell, which made the bowl so beguiling, was the charm of Helen's conversation. See Bayle, art. Helène. 2 This ode is a very animated description of a picture of Venus on a discus, which represented the goddess in her first emergence from the waves. About two centuries after our poet wrote, the pencil of the artist Apelles embellished this subject, in his famous painting of the Venus Anadyomené, the model of which, as Pliny informs us, was the beautiful Campaspe, given to him by Alexander; though, according to Natalis Comes, lib. vii. cap. 16., it was Phryne who sat to Apelles for the face and breast of this Venus. There are a few blemishes in the reading of the ode before us, which have influenced Faber, Heyne, Brunck, &c. to denounce the whole poem as spurious. But, "non ego paucis offendar maculis." I think it is quite beautiful enough to be authentic. 3 Whose was the artist hand that spread Upon this disk the ocean's bed?] The abruptness of aga τις τέρευσε ποντον is finely expressive of sudden admiration, and is one of those beauties which we cannot but admire in their source, though, by frequent imitation, they are now become familiar and unimpressive. And, in a flight of fancy, high In beauty's naked majesty! Oh! he hath given th' enamour'd sight Where, gleaming through the waters clear, Light as the leaf, that on the breeze, As some fair lily o'er a bed Beneath their queen's inspiring glance, And all that mystery loves to screen, Fancy, like Faith, adores unseen, &c.] The picture here has all the delicate character of the semi-reducta Venus, and affords a happy specimen of what the poetry of passion ought to be-glowing but through a veil, and stealing upon the heart from concealment. Few of the ancients have attained this modesty of description, which, like the golden cloud that hung over Jupiter and Juno, is impervious to every beam but that of fancy. Her bosom, like the dew-wash'd rose, &c.] "Podian (says an anonymous annotator) is a whimsical epithet for the bosom." Neither Catullus nor Gray have been of his opinion. The former has the expression, While, glittering through the silver waves, ODE LVIII.1 WHEN Gold, as fleet as zephyr's pinion, For who could court his direst foe? But scarcely has my heart been taught How little Gold deserves a thought, When, lo! the slave returns once more, And with him wafts delicious store Of racy wine, whose genial art From love and song, perhaps for ever! 1 I have followed Barnes's arrangement of this ode, which, though deviating somewhat from the Vatican MS., appears to me the more natural order. When Gold, as fleet as zephyr's pinion, Escapes like any faithless minion, &c.] In the original Ο δραπέτης ὁ χρυσος. There is a kind of pun in these words, as Madame Dacier has already remarked; for Chrysos, which signifies gold, was also a frequent name for a slave. In one of Lucian's dialogues, there is, I think, a similar play upon the word, where the followers of Chrysippus are called golden fishes. The puns of the ancients are, in general, even more vapid than our own; some of the best are those recorded of Diogenes. 3 And flies me (as he flies me ever,) &c.] Aud', ass res peuyu. This grace of iteration has already been taken notice of. Though sometimes merely a playful beauty, it is peculiarly expressive of impassioned sentiment, and we may easily believe that it was one of the many sources of that energetic sensibility which breathed through the style of Sappho. See Gyrald. Vet. Poet. Dial. 9. It will not be said that this is a mechanical ornament by any one who can feel its charm in those lines of Catullus, where he complains of the infidelity of his mistress, Lesbia: -- Cæli, Lesbia nostra, Lesbla illa, Plus quam se atque suos amavit omnes, Away, deceiver! why pursuing Ceaseless thus my heart's undoing? Sweet is the song of amorous fire, Sweet the sighs that thrill the lyre; Oh! sweeter far than all the gold Thy wings can waft, thy mines can hold. Well do I know thy arts, thy wiles They wither'd Love's young wreathed smiles; I thought its soul of song was filed! ODE LIX.5 RIPEN'D by the solar beam, Si sic omnia dixisset!-but the rest does not bear citation. 4 They dash'd the wine-cup, that, by him, Φιληματων δε κεδνων, Πεθων κυπελλα κίρνης. Horace has "Desiderique temperare poculum," not figuratively, however, like Anacreon, but importing the lovephiltres of the witches. By "cups of kisses" our poet may allude to a favourite gallantry among the ancients, of drinking when the lips of their mistresses had touched the brim : "Or leave a kiss within the cup, And I'll not ask for wine." As in Ben Jonson's translation from Philostratus; and Lucian has a conceit upon the same idea, "Ίνα και πίνης ἁμα xas Qians,"" that you may at once both drink and kiss." • The title Επιληνιος ύμνος, which Barnes has given to this ode, is by no means appropriate. We have already had one of those hymns (ode 56.), but this is a description of the vintage; and the title uso, which it bears in the Vatican MS., is more correct than any that have been suggested. Degen, in the true spirit of literary scepticism, doubts that this ode is genuine, without assigning any reason for such a suspicion;" non amo te, Sabidi, nec possum dicere quare." But this is far from being satisfactory criticism. Of rosy youths and virgins fair, When he, whose verging years decline Plays whispering through his silvery hair. ODE IX. 2 AWAKE to life, my sleeping shell, Which, tremblingly, my lips repeat, Muse of the Lyre! illume my dream, sing the love which Daphne twin'd But, pause, my soul, no more, no more- This sweetly-mad'ning dream of soul Those well acquainted with the original need hardly be reminded that, in these few concluding verses, I have thought right to give only the general meaning of my author, leaving the details untouched. 2 This hymn to Apollo is supposed not to have been written by Anacreon; and it is undoubtedly rather a sublimer flight than the Teian wing is accustomed to soar. But, in a poet of whose works so small a proportion has reached us, diversity of style is by no means a safe criterion. If we knew Horace but as a satirist, should we easily believe there could dwell such animation in his lyre? Suidas says that our poet wrote hymns, and this perhaps is one of them. We can perceive in what an altered and imperfect state his works are at Το μεν εκπεφευγε κέντρον, I find the word rev here has a double force, as it also signifies that" omnium parentem, quam sanctus Numa, &c. &c." (See Martial.) In order to confirm this import of the word here, those who are curious in new readings, may place the stop after quotas, thus: Το μεν εκπεφευγε κέντρον 4 Still be Anacreon, still inspire The descant of the Teian lyre:] The original is Toy Avaπρίοντα μιμού. I have translated it under the supposition that the hymn is by Anacreon; though, I fear, from this very present, when we find a scholiast upon Horace citing an ode line, that his claim to it can scarcely be supported. from the third book of Anacreon. 3 And how the tender, timid maid Flew trembling to the kindly shade, &c.] Original: Τον Ανακρέοντα μιμού, "Imitate Anacreon." Such is the lesson given us by the lyrist; and if, in poetry, a simple elegance of sentiment, enriched by the most playful felicities of |