But say, mayhap she listens to thy prayer-
Then will remorse be thine, and endless care!
No sleep to thee-no liberty allow'd,
She knows, none better, how to tame the proud.
How oft to me, an outcast, wilt thou go,
To sob thy tale in broken words of woe!
How often wilt thou shudder midst thy tears!
How oft with blanching cheek betray thy fears!
Then will thy faltering tongue refuse its part,
Nor wilt thou know thy name, or whence thou art.
Then all stern Cynthia's whims wilt thou deplore,
Returning home an outcast from her door!
Then wilt thou mock no more these looks of mine-
Pale cheeks and shrunken limbs will both be thine.
Think not thy noble birth will profit thee,
Love laughs to scorn the claims of ancestry.
Give but the smallest clue to thy sad fate,
Then wilt thou, fallen from thy high estate,
A byword be: then o'er thy sorrows moan-
Ask help in vain; I cannot cure my own.
Till we, poor lovers, sympathetic grow,
And weep together o'er our mutual woe.
Then, Gallus, cease to tempt my Cynthia's sway;
Or, gain her once-and thou wilt rue the day!
thee o'er Adria's waters would I roam, Or spread my sails across th' Ægean foam.
which Propertius possessed, seems in him to rise more to the level of intense and ideal love.
Independently of this, I cannot but think that at least by the higher classes in our schools (into whose "curriculum " Ovid, strangely enough, is admitted), the works of Propertius might be read with great profit, both for the interesting archæological details scattered through his pages, and the complete mastery displayed by him over the Elegiac metre, where, without any sacrifice of harmony, an energy and a pathos is preserved which we too often miss in the more monotonous distich of other writers. If the following translations should by chance turn the attention of any to the study of a poet to whose merits posterity seems to do but tardy justice, my object will be accomplished.
It remains for me to add that I have in all cases adopted the text and the explanations of Mr. Paley (to whose book I cannot sufficiently say how I am indebted), because his edition is most amenable to English students, and I conceived the uniform adoption of one to be necessary, should any feel disposed to use the following as some slight help in elucidating the meaning of the text.
'TWAS Cynthia's glance my heart first captive
By tender thoughts of love untouch'd before;
"Twas she first broke my look's unbending pride,
And taught love's yoke upon my neck to ride;
Till all too soon I learn'd to hate a prude,
So stern my teacher, and so wild my mood.
A year's long course has run since first I loved,
Yet still the Fates have all relentless proved.
Milanion play'd, they say, so stout a part,
He crush'd the pride of Atalanta's heart.
Frenzied with love he ranged th' Arcadian wood,
And roam'd with savage beasts in solitude;
Or struck anon by Hylas, at the blow
To all the country side he wail'd his woe.
Yet the swift maid at length he woo'd and won, Such power have prayers, so much has kindness done.
But the slow God with me no art displays,
Nor treads the path he trod in former days.
With thee, my Tullus, would I dare to go
O'er Libya's sand, or climb the steppes of snow ;
But Cynthia holds me close, and bids me stay,
With blanching cheek, and words that win their way;
Protests her love, through all the livelong night,
And swears the Gods are nought to spare my flight!
Says that she's mine no more-my heart upbraids
With all the threats e'er used by angry maids.
Soon tears like these my yielding heart must move;
I like not him who's lukewarm in his love.
Talk not of Athens! dear would be the cost-
Dear all the wealth that Asia's cities boast,
If Cynthia's curses waft me from the land
The while she tears her cheek with frenzied hand,
And vows a kiss to all the winds that blow
To stop the wretch that scorns a maiden's woe!
Do thou abroad thy kinsman's fame prolong,
And wake the justice that has slept too long;
For Love's soft yoke thou never stoop'st to feel:
Thy care has ever been a nation's weal.
Ah! may the cruel God I know so well
Spare thee the pangs my mournful numbers tell!
But suffer me, struck low by Fortune's blast,
In this fond, foolish dream to breathe my last.
Many have lived and loved their life away :-
Oh! may I live and love, then die as they!
Too weak for fame, too slight for war's stern rule,
Fate bids me learn alone in Love's soft school.
Roam as thou wilt, then, o'er Ionia's lands;
Or where Pactolus rolls his golden sands;
Tread, if thou wilt, the earth, or cleave the main,
Thrice-welcome delegate of Cæsar's reign;
But oh! if e'er thy thoughts revert to me,
Be sure that mine's a life of misery.
'HILE Cadmus' walls, my friend, thy Muse
With all the fatal wars that brothers wage,
Soon wilt thou rival the Mæonian bard,
If to thy numbers fate be not too hard.
I all the while still prate my tale of love,
And seek some charm hard Cynthia's heart to
My numbers breathe of no poetic fire,
I do but mourn, and grief attunes the lyre.
Such is my life! and all the fame I ask-
That love should consecrate my tuneful task.
'Twas I alone could please let this be said-
Or serve in fear an all-accomplish'd maid.
Read me, ye lovers all! then cease to pine,
And heal your sorrows by the tale of mine.
But oh! if e'er the love-god for his prey
Should mark thee too-kind Heaven avert the
Then wilt thou mourn thy melancholy plight,
While camps and chieftains rest in endless night.
Then wilt thou strike in vain the melting lyre,
Love, learnt too late, oft dulls the Muses' fire!
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