dæans, as Cicero calls them; and were probably as much Chaldæans as the Gipsies of Norwood are Bohemians or Indians. Horace gives his fair friend a brief admonition, which, in proof of the common-sense that keeps him always modern, might be equally given to ladies, and even to the ruder sex, in our own day. For wherever we travel in England or Europe, it is rare to find a town, however deficient in books, in which a prophetic astrological almanac may not be seen in the shop-windows. CARM. XI. Tu ne quæsieris, scire nefas, quem mihi, quem tibi Quæ nunc oppositis debilitat pumicibus mare ODE XII. IN CELEBRATION OF THE DEITIES AND THE WORTHIES OF ROME. This poem is commonly inscribed very inappropriately 'De Augusto,' and sometimes more accurately' De laudi What man, what hero, or what god select'st thou, bus Whose honoured name shall that gay sprite-voice, Echo, Whether on Helicon's umbrageous margent, In their swift course, and winds in their wild hurry Whom should I place for wonted rites of homage From whom not greater than Himself proceedeth— 'Arte materna '-the Muse Calliope, mother of Orpheus. Temperat horis.' 'Mundum' here means cœlum,'' sky'-i.e. the whole framework of nature, in sea, earth, and heaven, is under the dominion of Jove. bus Deorum vel hominum.' It was certainly composed before the death of the young Marcellus. A.U.C. 731; and Orelli and Macleane agree in accepting Franke's date, A.U.C. 729. CARM. XII. Quem virum aut heroa lyra vel acri Quem Deum? Cujus recinet jocosa Aut in umbrosis Heliconis oris Arte maternal rapidos morantem Quid prius dicam solitis parentis Unde nil majus generatur ipso, Nec viget quidquam simile aut secundum : Pallas honores. Left not unsung be Liber, bold in battle; Sing let me, too, the demigod Alcides, And Leda's twins, the rider and the athlete- Back from the rocks recedes the rush of waters, Should, after these, be Romulus first honoured, Noble self-slaughter? Regulus, and the Scauri,' and Æmilius Lavish of his great life when Carthage triumphed, He and rude unkempt Curius and Camillus,- Fitted for warfare. Tree-like grows up through unperceived increases Either the Scauri enjoyed at that time a higher reputation than they have retained in history, or Horace had some special reason, personal or political, now inexplicable, or placing them in the rank of Rome's foremost worthies. Æmilius Paulus, having advised the disastrous battle Proliis audax, neque te silebo, Dicam, et Alciden, puerosque Ledæ, Defluit saxis agitatus humor, Romulum post hos prius, an quietum Regulum, et Scauros,' animæque magnæ Hunc et incomptis Curium capillis Sæva paupertas et avitus apto Crescit, occulto velut arbor ævo, Fama Marcelli;2 micat inter omnes Julium sidus, velut inter ignes. Luna minores. of Cannæ, refused the horse offered to him by a tribune of the soldiers, and remained to perish on the field. As the name of Marcellus, whom I understand, with Orelli, to be the Marcellus who took Syracuse, stands for all his family, and particularly the young Marcellus, so the star of Julius Cæsar, and the lesser lights of that family, are meant by what follows.'-MACLEANE. |