referred to and quoted by Servius on Virg. E. 7. 22, and Aen. II. 457. The scattered and doubtful hints which can be gleaned about him will be found in the Dict. Biog. He stands in Sat. 1. 10. 82 with Varius, Maecenas, Virgil, and the other select few for whose literary approbation Horace cares. The Scholiasts speak of him as a 'Consularis,' and the name occurs in the Consular Fasti, B.C. 12.

The date of the Ode has been a subject of controversy. Vv. 19, 20 can hardly be unconnected with Virgil's lines, G. 3. 30 foll. :—

'Addam urbes Asiae domitas pulsumque Niphaten,
Fidentemque fuga Parthum versisque sagittis,

Et duo rapta manu diverso ex hoste tropaea,
Bisque triumphatas utroque ab litore gentes.'

In both cases one set of interpreters see a reference to the year B.C. 20, when Augustus was himself in Asia, and Tiberius, under his orders, advanced into Armenia, and replaced Tigranes on the throne of that country, and alarmed Phraates into restoring the prisoners and standards taken at Charrae. It is impossible, however, in these poetical references to Augustus' exploits to disentangle anticipation from history or the hyperbolical dress of historical fact. Horace's language will be sufficiently accounted for by Virgil's, so that, if with Heyne we think it unnecessary to imagine that Virgil inserted the lines in question ten years after the composition of the Georgics and in the year before his death, we shall think it equally unnecessary to set aside, for the sake of this Ode, Franke's judgment, that the three Books were complete in B.C. 23. See Introd. to Books i-iii, § 2.

Line 1. hispidos, predicative: of the roughened and tangled look of the country after rains, opp. to Virgil's 'nitentia culta.'

3. inaequales, 'gusty,' or, perhaps, roughening'; cp. 'inaequalis tonsor,' Epp. I. I. 94.

5. stat, we should rather say 'lies,' 'stands stiff and deep.'

iners, 1. 22. 17 'pigris campis.'

7. Gargani, a rocky promontory at the north-east corner of Apulia. Cp. Epp. 2. 1. 202 Garganum mugire putes nemus.'

9. tu semper.

The absence of any adversative particle to mark the antithesis is supplied by the emphatic use of the pronoun and the repetition of 'semper' from v. I, see on 4. 4. 17. Notice also the emphatic position of 'semper,' v. I, 'usque,' v. 4, ' semper,' v. 17.

urges, Prop. 4. II. I 'Desine, Paulle, meum lacrymis urgere sepulchrum.''Urgere' adds to some simple metaphor, such as 'prosequi,' the idea of perseverance.

II. surgente, used inaccurately of the stars coming into sight at night, as in Virg. Aen. 4. 352 quoties astra ignea surgunt.'

12. rapidum, striding,' helps the metaphor of 'fugiente.' Horace probably had in mind Virgil's 'Te veniente die te decedente canebat,' G. 4. 465.

13. ter aevo functus, 'who lived life three times over.' seems (like Cicero's 'tertiam [Nestor] iam aetatem hominum vivebat, de Sen. 10) to be an exaggeration of the Homeric ἤδη δύο μὲν γενεαὶ μερόπων ἀνθρώπων ἐφθίατο . . μετὰ δὲ τριτάτοισιν ἄνασσεν, which means only that the other princes were the grandsons of Nestor's contemporaries. The old age of Nestor, which needed the support of a son, would have excused his grief, as would the 'loveable' character of his son. The story of Antilochus' death, as he was defending his father, is told in Pind. Pyth. 6. 28 foll.

15. impubem. His youth is meant to add to the pathos, Infelix puer atque impar congressus Achilli,' Virg. Aen. 1. 479.

16. Troïlon.

His death does not occur within the period of the Iliad it is just mentioned by Priam, Il. 24. 257. Virgil (Aen. 1. 474 foll.) makes it the subject of one of the paintings which Aeneas saw in Dido's hall.

Phrygiae sorores. This climax points to the exhortation which follows: If barbarian women dried their tears, perpetual lamentations may well be called 'molles' in one who may sing of the arms of Rome.

17. desine querelarum, after the model of the Greek genitive with πaúeσdai, λýɣeiv; so Virg. Aen. 10. 441 'desistere pugnae.' Horace similarly copies the genitive with ảπéxeσ0αι, Od. 2. 27. 69 abstineto irarum,' and with pooveîv, Sat. 2. 6. 84 Sepositi ciceris nec longae invidit avenae.'

20. rigidum Niphaten, stiff frozen Niphates.' The later Roman poets took it for a river: Lucan 3. 245 volventem saxa Niphaten'; cp. Juv. 6. 409, Sil. 13. 765; and this is perhaps the most natural interpretation of Virgil's metaphor, pulsum Niphaten' (cp. Aen. 11. 405 'retro fugit Aufidus'). The geographers, however, recognize only a mountain of the name in Armenia.

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21. Medum flumen, the Euphrates. The expressions are very parallel to Virg. Aen. 8. 726 Euphrates ibat iam mollior undis,' where also the Geloni and the Armenian Araxes appear.

23. intra praescriptum,' within the bounds that we have set them.' Gelonos, see Introd. to Books i-iii, 1. § 7.

24. exiguis is predicative, and find them all too narrow.'

ODE X.

'The wise sailor is neither tempted too far out to sea nor frightened on to rocks and shallows. One who has learnt to love the golden mean

neither has a hovel with a roof falling in nor a palace that would attract the evil eye. The higher the seat the greater the fall. The wise man is prepared for fortune to change like everything else. Be brave and hopeful if things are against you, and so, too, do not spread all your sails because the wind chances to be favourable.'

Horace recommends moderation of life and manners. Professedly it is a mean that he praises; but it is clear throughout that it is excess that he deprecates; the danger of defect is not really before his mind. This is shown in the first part of the Ode by omission-the hypothesis would require a stanza corresponding to st. 3 to illustrate the danger of being too low, as that illustrates the danger of being too high,—in the second part by the stress laid on the alternative least contemplated, under cover of which the poet at last ventures to put plainly the lesson on which his heart is really set.

The person to whom the Ode is addressed is the same as the " augur Murena' of Od. 3. 19. 11 (see also Sat. 1. 5. 38). He is variously called 'Lucius Murena' (Vell. Pat. 2. 91), 'Licinius Murena' (Dio Cass. 54. 3), 'Varro Murena' (Suet. Tib. 8), and he is said by Dio (1. c.) to have been the brother of Terentia, the wife of Maecenas. There is one of Cicero's friends who is called A. Varro (ad Fam. 16. 12, see note in Watson's Select Letters, p. 305) and Varro Murena (ad Fam. 13. 22). The friend of Horace has been sometimes identified with the friend of Cicero, sometimes taken to be his son. The double set of names must imply that their bearer, or, if there were two, the elder bearer of them, had passed by adoption from one gens' to the other.

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The Murena' of Horace had been employed by Augustus in B.C. 25, in the subjugation of the Salassi, the inhabitants of the Val d'Aosta, and had been named as Consul Suffectus in 23. In 22 he was accused, er' οὖν ἀληθῶς εἴτε καὶ ἐκ διαβολῆς (Dio 54. 3), of a conspiracy with Fannius Caepio, and, in spite of the efforts of Proculeius, his brother (see on Od. 2. 2. 5), and Maecenas, his brother-in-law' (Dio 1. c.), was put to death. In the character given of him (ἀκράτῳ καὶ κατακορεῖ παρρησίᾳ πρὸς πάντας ὁμοίως ἐχρῆτο, see Dio 1. c., who tells a story of his boldness of speech towards Augustus himself) we may probably see the appropriateness of Horace's persuasive to moderation.

On the argument drawn from this Ode as to the date of the publication of the three Books, see Introd. to Books i-iii, § 2.

Line 1. neque.. neque, not one any more than the other.

altum urgendo, steering on and on into the open sea.

3. nimium, with premendo,' 'hugging too close the dangerous shore.'

5. auream mediocritatem, the μéтpiov, μéσov, so much praised in

Greek γνῶμαι, e. g. παντὶ μέσῳ τὸ κράτος θεὸς ὤπασεν, Aesch. Eum. 529 ; πολλὰ μέσοισιν ἄριστα· μέσος θέλω ἐν πόλει εἶναι, Phocyl. ap. Arist. Pol. 4. II. It is here both the mean estate and the moderation of mind which is content with it.

6-8. In point of grammar, doubtless, 'tutus' belongs to the first clause, sobrius' to the second; he avoids the meanness of a ruinous hovel and is safe, is sober and avoids the palace that raises envy'; but in sense, 'sober and therefore safe' is the idea of the sentence, and neither adjective is confined to its own clause. The safety of moderation is dwelt on further in the next stanza, its prudence in the one following, which suggests the mutability of fortune.

7. invidenda, as Od. 3. 1. 45 ‘invidendis postibus,' in the same connection.

9-11. ingens, celsae, summos, all in emphatic positions, for their height. Cp. Herod. 7. 1ο ὁρᾷς τὰ ὑπερέχοντα ζῶα ὡς κεραυνοῖ ὁ θεὸς οὐδὲ ἐᾷ φαντάζεσθαι, τὰ δὲ σμικρὰ οὐδέν μιν κνίζει· ὁρᾷς δὲ ὡς ἐς οἰκήματα τὰ μέγιστα αἰεὶ καὶ δένδρεα τὰ τοιαῦτ ̓ ἀποσκήπτει τὰ βέλεα.

13. infestis, secundis, ablative absolute.

14. alteram sortem, a change of fortune.'

17. male, sc. est,' Od. 3. 16. 43, Epp. 1. 1. 89, 'bene est.'

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18. quondam, sometimes.' 'Quondam etiam victis redit in praecordia virtus,' Virg. Aen. 2. 367.

19. arcum, the bow with which he inflicts death, plague, etc., as in Hom. II. 1. 49. 382, etc. Cp. Carm. Saec. 33 Condito mitis placidusque telo.'

21. angustis, 'in straits of fortune.' This metaphor seems to suggest the return to the metaphor of the first stanza, good fortune being the oupos before which we run fast and free.

22. appare, 'show yourself.'

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23. nimium, with secundo,'' dangerously favourable,' dvooúpiσTOV.

ODE XI.

'Do not trouble yourself with foreign politics, Quintius, nor with schemes of business. Life wants very little, and it is flying fast: spring flowers die and moons wane. Do not weary yourself over plans as if things remained for ever. Better crown with roses our hairs already whitening with age, and drink and play while we may.'

Nothing is known of Quintius Hirpinus; possibly he is the same as the Quintius to whom Epp. 1. 16 is addressed.

The nature of the name 'Hirpinus' is not certain. It is very probably a local name (as Marrucine Asini,' Catull. 12. 1), the Hirpini being a Samnite tribe, of which Beneventum was the capital.

Line 1. bellicosus, Od. 2. 6. 2, 3. 8. 21, 4. 14. 41: cp. Virg. G. 3. 408 'impacatos Hiberos.' Notice that 'bellicosus' really applies to 'Scythes' also, and divisus Hadria' suggests a parallel divisus Tyrrheno mari' for the Cantaber.' See on Od. 2. 10. 6, 8, 2. 15. 18, 20.

2. Hadria divisus, a reason for not troubling ourselves about him, 'the broad barrier of Hadria is between us.'

3. remittas, with infinitive, omittere,' 3. 29. II.

forbear,' as 'mittere,' Od. 1. 38. 3;

4. trepides in usum, as Orelli interprets it, anxie provideas usui,' 'worry thyself about provision for life, which needs but little.' 'Trepidare' is used in the same sense in 3. 29. 31' Ridetque si mortalis ultra Fas trepidat.' Orelli quotes Plat. Phaed. 68, C tò nepì tàs étiovμías πтоñolαι. There is no need with Dill. to join 'trepides aevi.' He compares Virg. Aen. 12. 589 trepidae rerum.'

5. fugit retro, said of those who have passed the flower of youth, to whom its years are 'recedentes,' no longer 'venientes,' A. P. 175.

6. levis, opposed to 'rugosa,' 'arida' (v. 6), 'hispida' (4. 10. 5), which are epithets of 'senectus.' So 'levis Agyieu,' 4. 6. 28, of the everyoung Apollo.

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9-12. Immortalia ne speres monet annus,' 4. 7. 7. Aeterna consilia' are plans for a life that is not to end. Compare the advice of 1. 11. 6 'spatio brevi Spem longam reseces.'

9. honor, pride of beauty. Epod. 17. 18.

10. rubens nitet. This phrase for the brightness of the moon, which is not common (though Propertius uses it 1. 10. 8 Et mediis caelo Luna ruberet equis'), is helped by the metaphor of 'vultu.' 'It is not with one and the same blushing face that the moon shines on us.'

II. minorem, Tтоva imparem,' ' overtasked by them.'

12. consiliis. The ablative is constructed åпò коwoû with 'minorem ' and fatigas.' See on 1. 3. 6.

13. cur non . . vel hac, this very pine, without looking for another.' 14. Sic ouтws, 'as we are.'

temere, ciêî, ́ with no preparation.' All express the easiness of the alternative which Horace proposes for Quintius' anxious scheming. 14. rosa odorati capillos ='rosis bene olentibus coronati.' singular (see on 1. 5. 1) seems to be usual.

The

16. dum licet, 'while we may,' we shall soon be unable; 2. 3. 15 foll.

Assyria. There is no need to alter the gender. Nardus,' feminine, is the plant from which the oil was obtained, and is used for its produce as balanus,' 3. 29. 4; 'uva,' I. 20. 10. Assyria,' probably = "Syria '; see 3. 4. 32.

18. quis puer. For the form of issuing orders cp. 2. 7. 23.