TRANSLATIONS

RETROSPECTIVE TRANSLATIONS

I*

2

HORACE, Odes I xxiii

VITAS inuleo me similis, Chloe,
quaerenti pauidam montibus auiis
matrem non sine uano

aurarum et siluae metu.

nam, seu mobilibus uepris inhorruit
ad uentos foliis seu uirides rubum
dimouere lacertae,

et corde et genibus tremit.
atqui non ego te, tigris ut aspera
Gaetulusue leo, frangere persequor.
tandem desine matrem

tempestiua sequi uiro.

HORACE, Odes II xiv

EHEV, fugaces, Postume, Postume,
labuntur anni; nec pietas moram
rugis et instanti senectae
adferet indomitaeque morti.

non, si trecenis quotquot eunt dies,
amice, places inlacrimabilem
Plutona tauris qui ter amplum
Geryonen Tityonque tristi

compescit unda, scilicet omnibus
quicumque terrae munere uescimur
enauiganda, siue reges

siue inopes erimus coloni.

frustra cruento marte carebimus
fractisque rauci fluctibus Hadriae;
frustra per autumnos nocentem
corporibus metuemus Austrum.

I

2

RETROSPECTIVE TRANSLATIONS

To Chloe

THOU shun'st me, Chloe, like a fawn
That seeks on desolate glen and hill
Her fearful dam; whom breeze and woods
With idle terrors thrill.

Its leaves aquiver to the wind

Has bramble rustled? Thro' the brake
Has the green lizard push'd a way?
Heart, knees are all aquake.

Yet no Gaetulian lion I

Or furious tiger seek thy gore.
Then, maiden for a husband ripe,
Follow thy dam no more.

To Postumus

FRIEND, friend, the years are fleeting fast,
Ah me! nor will devotion stay
The nearing march of wrinkled age
And death that who can slay?

Nay not, if every passing morn

Smoke of three hundred bulls arise

To tearless Dis, who Tityos pens

And Geryon's triple size

'Twixt dismal waters all must cross,

Who from earth's bounty draw our food, Whether poor husbandmen we be

Or princes of the blood.

In vain we 'scape th' ensanguined field

And Hadria's hoarsely breaking surge, Shrink from the South wind's sickly breath, Of autumn hours the scourge.

3

uisendus ater flumine languido
Cocytos errans et Danai genus
infame damnatusque longi
Sisyphus Aeolides laboris.

linquenda tellus et domus et placens
uxor, neque harum quas colis arborum
te praeter inuisas cupressos

ulla breuem dominum sequetur. absumet heres Caecuba dignior seruata centum clauibus et mero tinguet pauimentum superbo pontificum potiore cenis.

HORACE, Odes II xv

IAM pauca aratro iugera regiae
moles relinquent, undique latius
extenta uisentur Lucrino

stagna lacu platanusque caelebs
euincet ulmos; tum uiolaria et
myrtus et omnis copia narium
spargent oliuetis odorem
fertilibus domino priori;

tum spissa ramis laurea feruidos
excludet ictus. non ita Romuli
praescriptum et intonsi Catonis
auspiciis ueterumque norma.

priuatus illis census erat breuis,
commune magnum; nulla decempedis
metata priuatis opacam

porticus excipiebat Arcton.

nec fortuitum spernere caespitem
leges sinebant, oppida publico
sumptu iubentes et deorum

templa nouo decorare saxo.

3

Slow black Cocytus must we see,

The felon brood of Danaus,

And him to penal ages doomed,
Aeolid Sisyphus.

Earth, home and fair wife must thou leave,
And, save the cypress trees abhorred,
Shall none from all thy planted parks
Follow their transient lord.

Through hundred locks a worthier heir
Shall spoil thy bins and drench thy hall
With prouder Caecuban than flows
At feasts pontifical.

The Good Old Days

SOON shall the palace leave the plough
Few roods, pools broader than Lucrine
O'erspread each prospect and the elm
To bachelor planes resign;

And violet beds and myrtle bowers,

And every nosegay flower that blows,
Scent garths where for a former lord
The fruited olive rose;

And interlacing bay shall turn

The heat's fierce strokes. Not ordered thus

The canons of our sires, unshorn

Cato and Romulus.

Scant then was private wealth, but great
The common stock. To northern shade
No ten feet measuring poles aligned
The private colonnade.

'Haphazard sods thou shalt not spurn'
Spake laws that in the state's design
Bade towns and temples of the Gods
With virgin marble shine.