Echoes from the Sabine Farm Part 2

QUITTING AGAIN

The hero of Affairs of love By far too numerous to be mentioned, And scarred as I'm, It seemeth time That I were mustered out and pensioned.

So on this wall My lute and all I hang, and dedicate to Venus; And I implore But one thing more Ere all is at an end between us.

O G.o.ddess fair Who reignest where The weather's seldom bleak and snowy, This boon I urge: In anger scourge My old cantankerous sweetheart, Chloe!

SAILOR AND SHADE

SAILOR

You, who have compa.s.sed land and sea, Now all unburied lie; All vain your store of human lore, For you were doomed to die.

The sire of Pelops likewise fell,-- Jove's honored mortal guest; So king and sage of every age At last lie down to rest.

Plutonian shades enfold the ghost Of that majestic one Who taught as truth that he, forsooth, Had once been Pentheus' son; Believe who may, he's pa.s.sed away, And what he did is done.

A last night comes alike to all; One path we all must tread, Through sore disease or stormy seas Or fields with corpses red.

Whate'er our deeds, that pathway leads To regions of the dead.

SHADE

The fickle twin Illyrian gales Overwhelmed me on the wave; But you that live, I pray you give My bleaching bones a grave!

Oh, then when cruel tempests rage You all unharmed shall be; Jove's mighty hand shall guard by land And Neptune's on the sea.

Perchance you fear to do what may Bring evil to your race?

Oh, rather fear that like me here You'll lack a burial place.

So, though you be in proper haste, Bide long enough, I pray, To give me, friend, what boon shall send My soul upon its way!

LET US HAVE PEACE

In maudlin spite let Thracians fight Above their bowls of liquor; But such as we, when on a spree, Should never brawl and bicker!

These angry words and clas.h.i.+ng swords Are quite _de trop_, I'm thinking; Brace up, my boys, and hush your noise, And drown your wrath in drinking.

Aha, 't is fine,--this mellow wine With which our host would dope us!

Now let us hear what pretty dear Entangles him of Opus.

I see you blush,--nay, comrades, hus.h.!.+

Come, friend, though they despise you, Tell me the name of that fair dame,-- Perchance I may advise you.

O wretched youth! and is it truth You love that fickle lady?

I, doting dunce, courted her once; Since when, she's reckoned shady!

TO QUINTUS DELLIUS

Be tranquil, Dellius, I pray; For though you pine your life away With dull complaining breath, Or speed with song and wine each day, Still, still your doom is death.

Where the white poplar and the pine In glorious arching shade combine, And the brook singing goes, Bid them bring store of nard and wine And garlands of the rose.

Let's live while chance and youth obtain; Soon shall you quit this fair domain Kissed by the Tiber's gold, And all your earthly pride and gain Some heedless heir shall hold.

One ghostly boat shall some time bear From scenes of mirthfulness or care Each fated human soul,-- Shall waft and leave its burden where The waves of Lethe roll.

_So come, I prithee, Dellius mine; Let's sing our songs and drink our wine In that sequestered nook Where the white poplar and the pine Stand listening to the brook_.

POKING FUN AT XANTHIAS

Of your love for your handmaid you need feel no shame.

Don't apologize, Xanthias, pray; Remember, Achilles the proud felt a flame For Brissy, his slave, as they say.

Old Telamon's son, fiery Ajax, was moved By the captive Tecmessa's ripe charms; And Atrides, suspending the feast, it behooved To gather a girl to his arms.

Now, how do you know that this yellow-haired maid (This Phyllis you fain would enjoy) Hasn't parents whose wealth would cast you in the shade,-- Who would ornament you, Xan, my boy?

Very likely the poor chick sheds copious tears, And is bitterly thinking the while Of the royal good times of her earlier years, When her folks regulated the style!

It won't do at all, my dear boy, to believe That she of whose charms you are proud Is beautiful only as means to deceive,-- Merely one of the horrible crowd.

So constant a sweetheart, so loving a wife, So averse to all notions of greed Was surely not born of a mother whose life Is a chapter you'd better not read.

As an unbiased party I feel it my place (For I don't like to do things by halves) To compliment Phyllis,--her arms and her face And (excuse me!) her delicate calves.

Tut, tut! don't get angry, my boy, or suspect You have any occasion to fear A man whose deportment is always correct, And is now in his forty-first year!

TO ARISTIUS FUSCUS

Fuscus, whoso to good inclines, And is a faultless liver, Nor Moorish spear nor bow need fear, Nor poison-arrowed quiver.

Ay, though through desert wastes he roam, Or scale the rugged mountains, Or rest beside the murmuring tide Of weird Hydaspan fountains!

Lo, on a time, I gayly paced The Sabine confines shady, And sung in glee of Lalage, My own and dearest lady;

And as I sung, a monster wolf Slunk through the thicket from me; But for that song, as I strolled along, He would have overcome me!

Set me amid those poison mists Which no fair gale dispelleth, Or in the plains where silence reigns, And no thing human dwelleth,--

Still shall I love my Lalage, Still sing her tender graces; And while I sing, my theme shall bring Heaven to those desert places!