by Tibullus
And oft Diana met him there,
And blushed at his disgrace.
O often, if his voice divine
Echoed the mountain glens along,
Out-burst the loud, audacious kine,
And bellowing drowned his song.
His tripods prince and people found
All silent to their troubled cry,
His locks dishevelled and unbound
Woke fond Latona’s sigh.
To see his pale, neglected brow,
And unkempt tresses, once so fair, —
They cried, “O where is Phoebus now?
“His glorious tresses, where?”
“In place of Delos’ golden fane,
“Love gives thee but a lowly shed!
“O, where are Delphi and its train?
“The Sibyl, whither fled?”
Happy the days, forever flown,
When even immortal gods could dare
Proudly to serve at Venus’ throne,
Nor blushed her chain to wear!
“Irreverent fables!” I am told.
But lovers true these tales receive:
Rather a thousand such they hold,
Than loveless gods believe.
O Ceres, who didst charm away
My Nemesis from life in Rome,
May barren glebe thy pains repay
And scanty harvest come!
A curse upon thy merry trade!
Young Bacchus, giver of the vine!
Thy vine-yards have ensnared a maid
Far sweeter than thy wine.
Let herbs and acorns be our meat!
Drink good old water! Better so
Than that my fickle beauty’s feet
To those far hills should go!
Did not our sires on acorns feed,
And love-sick rove o’er hill and dale?
Our furrowed fields they did not need,
Nor did love’s harvest fail.
When passion did their hearts employ,
And o’er them breathed the blissful hour,
Mild Venus freely found them joy
In every leafy bower.
No chaperone was there, no door
Against a lover’s sighs to stand.
Delicious age! May Heaven restore
Its customs to our land!
Nay, take me! In my lady’s train
Some stubborn field I fain would plough
Lay on the lash and clamp the chain!
I bear them meekly now.
ELEGY THE FOURTH
ON HIS LADY’S AVARICE
A woman’s slave am I, and know it well.
Farewell, my birthright! farewell, liberty!
In wretched slavery and chains I dwell,
For love’s sad captives never are set free.
Whether I smile or curse, love just the same
Brands me and burns. O, cruel woman, spare!
O would I were a rock, to ‘scape this flame
Far off upon the frosty mountains there!
Would I were flint, to front the tempest’s power,
Wave-buffeted on some wild, wreckful shore!
My sad days bring worse nights, and every hour
Fills me some cup of gall and brims it o’er.
What use are songs? Her greedy hands disdain
Apollo’s gift. She says some gold is due.
Farewell, ye Muses, I have sung in vain!
Only in quest of her I followed you.
I sing no wars; nor how the moon and sun
In heavenly paths their circling chariots steer.
To win my lady’s smiles my numbers run;
Farewell, ye Muses, if ye fail me here!
Let deeds of bloody crime now make me bold!
No longer at her bolted door I whine;
But I will find that necessary gold,
Though I steal treasure from some holy shrine.
Venus I first will violate; for she
Compelled my crime, and did my heart enthrall
To beauty that requires a golden fee.
Yes, Venus’ shrine shall suffer worst of all.
Curse on that man who finds the emerald green,
And Tyrian purples for our flattered girls!
He makes them greedy. Now they must be seen
In Coan robe and gleaming Red Sea pearls.
It spoils them all. Now bolts and barriers hold
Their doors, and watch-dogs threaten through the dark;
But let the lover overflow with gold, —
All bolts fly back and not a dog will bark.
What God did beauty unto gold degrade,
And mix one bliss with many a woe and shame?
Tears, quarrels, curses were the gifts he made;
And Love bears now a very evil name.
False girl, who dost for riches thrust aside
Love’s honest vow, may winds and flames conspire
To wreck thy wealth, while all thy beaux deride
The loss, nor throw one bowl-full on the fire!
O when dark Death shall be thy final guest,
No lover true will shed the faithful tear,
Nor bring an offering where thy ashes rest,
Nor lay one garland on thy lonely bier I
But some warm-hearted lass who loved not gain
Shall live a hundred years, yet be much mourned;
Her tomb shall be some lover’s holiest fane,
With annual gift of all sad flowers adorned.
“Farewell, true heart!” his trembling lips will say,
“Let peace untroubled bless thy relics dear!”
Oft will he visit, and departing pray,
“Light lie this earth on her whose rest is here!”
Nay, it is vain such serious songs to breathe:
I must be modern, if I would prevail.
How much? Just all my ancestors bequeath?
Come, Lares! You are advertised for sale.
Let Circe and Medea bring the lees
Of some foul cup! Let Thessaly prepare
Its direst poison! Bring hippomanes,
Fierce philtre from the frantic, brooding mare!
For if my mistress mix it with a smile,
I drain a draught a thousand times as vile.
ELEGY THE FIFTH
THE PRIESTHOOD OF APOLLO
Smile, Phoebus, on the youthful priest
Who seeks thy shrine to-day!
With lyre and song attend our feast,
And with imperious finger play
Thy loudly thrilling chords to anthems high!
Come, with temples laurel-bound,
O’er thine own thrice-hallowed ground,
Where incense from our altars meets the sky!
Come radiant and fair,
In golden garb and glorious, clustering hair,
The famous guise in which thou sang’st so well
Of victor Jove, when Saturn’s kingdom fell!
The far-off future all is thine!
Thy hallowed augurs can divine
Whate’er dark song the birds of omen sing;
Of augury thou art the king,
And thy wise haruspex finds meaning fit
For what the gods have in the victims writ.
The hoary Sibyl taught of thee
Never sings of Rome untrue,
Chanting forth in measures due
Her mysterious prophecy.
Once she bade Aeneas look
In her all-revealing book,
What time from Trojan shore
His father and his fallen gods he bore.
Doubtful and dark to him was Rome’s bright name,
While yet his mournful eyes
Saw Ilium dying and her gods in flame.
Not yet beneath the skies
Had Romulus upreared the weight
Of our Eternal City’s wall,
Denied to Remus by unequal fate.
Then lowly cabins small
Poss
essed the seat of Capitolian Jove;
And, over Palatine, the rustics drove
Their herds afield, where Pan’s similitude
Dripped down with milk beneath an ilex tall,
And Pales’ image rude
Hewn out by pruning-hook, for worship stood.
The shepherd hung upon the bough
His babbling pipes in payment of a vow, —
The pipe of reeds in lessening order placed,
Knit well with wax from longest unto last.
Where proud Velabrum lies,
A little skiff across the shallows plies;
And oft, to meet her shepherd lover,
The village lass is ferried over
For a woodland holiday:
At night returning o’er the watery way,
She brings a tribute from the fruitful farms —
A cheese, or white lamb, carried in her arms.
The Sibyl
“High-souled Aeneas, brother of light-winged Love,
“Thy pilgrim ships Troy’s fallen worship bear.
“To thee the Latin lands are given of Jove,
“And thy far-wandering gods are welcome there.
“Thou thyself shalt have a shrine
“By Numicus’ holy wave;
“Be thou its genius strong to bless and save,
“By power divine!
“O’er thy ship’s storm-beaten prow
“Victory her wings will spread,
“And, glorious, rest at last above a Trojan head.
“I see Rutulia flaming round me now.
“O barbarous Turnus, I behold thee dead!
“Laurentum rushes on my sight,
“And proud Lavinium’s castled height,
“And Alba Longa for thy royal heir.
“Now I see a priestess fair
“Close in Mars’ divine embrace.
“Daughter of Ilium, she fled away
“From Vesta’s fires, and from her virgin face
“The fillet dropped, and quite unheeded lay;
“Nor shield nor corslet then her hero wore,
“Keeping their stolen tryst by Tiber’s sacred shore!
“Browse, ye bulls, along the seven green hills!
“For yet a little while ye may,
“E’er the vast city shall confront the day!
“O Rome! thy destined glory fills
“A wide world subject to thy sway, —
“Wide as all the regions given
“To fruitful Ceres, as she looks from heaven
“O’er her fields of golden corn,
“From the opening gates of morn
“To where the Sun in Ocean’s billowy stream
“Cools at eve his spent and panting team.
“Troy herself at last shall praise
“Thee and thy far-wandering ways.
“My song is truth. Thus only I endure
“The bitter laurel-leaf divine,
“And keep me at Apollo’s shrine
“A virgin ever pure.”
So, Phoebus, in thy name the Sibyl sung,
As o’er her frenzied brow her loosened locks she flung.
In equal song Herophile
Chanted forth the times to be,
From her cold Marpesian glade.
Amalthea, dauntless maid,
In the blessed days gone by,
Bore thy book through Anio’s river
And did thy prophecies deliver,
From her mantle, safe and dry.
All prophesied of omens dire,
The comet’s monitory fire,
Stones raining down, and tumult in the sky
Of trumpets, swords, and routed chivalry;
The very forests whispered fear,
And through the stormful year
Tears, burning tears, from marble altars ran;
Dumb beast took voice to tell the fate of man;
The Sun himself in light did fail
As if he yoked his car to horses mortal-pale.
Such was the olden time. O Phoebus, now
Of mild, benignant brow,
Let those portents buried be
In the wild, unfathomed sea!
Now let thy laurel loudly flame
On altars to thy gracious name,
And give good omen of a fruitful year
Crackling laurel if the rustic hear,
He knows his granary shall bursting be,
And sweet new wine flow free,
And purple grapes by jolly feet be trod,
Vat and cellar will be too small,
While at the vintage-festival,
With choral song,
The tipsy swains carouse the shepherd’s god:
“Away, ye wolves, and do our folds no wrong!”
Then shall the master touch the straw-built fire,
And as it blazes high and higher,
Lightly leap its lucky crest.
A welcome heir with frolic face
Shall his jovial sire embrace,
And kiss him hard and pull him by the ears;
While o’er the cradle the good grand-sire bent
Will babble with the babe in equal merriment,
And feel no more his weight of years.
There in soft shadow of some ancient tree,
Maidens, boys, and wine-cups be,
Scattered on the pleasant grass;
From lip to lip the cups they pass;
Their own mantles garland-bound
Hang o’er-head for canopy,
And every cup with rose is crowned;
Each at banquet buildeth high
Of turf the table, and of turf the bed, —
Such was ancient revelry!
Here too some lover at his darling’s head
Flings words of scorn, which by and by
He wildly prays be left unsaid,
And swears that wine-cups lie.
O under Phoebus’ ever-peaceful sway,
Away, ye bows, ye arrows fierce, away!
Let Love without a shaft among earth’s peoples stray!
A noble weapon! but when Cupid takes
His arrow, — ah! what mortal wound he makes!
Mine is the chief. This whole year have I lain
Wounded to death, yet cherishing the pain,
And counting my delicious anguish gain.
Of Nemesis my song must tell!
Without her name I make no verses well,
My metres limp and all fine words are vain!
Therefore, my darling, since the powers on high
Protect the poets, — O! a little while
On Apollo’s servant smile!
So let me sing in words divine
An ode of triumph for young Messaline.
Before his chariot he shall bear
Towns and towers for trophies proud,
And on his brow the laurel-garland wear;
While, with woodland laurel crowned.
His legions follow him acclaiming loud,
“Io triumphe,” with far-echoing sound.
Let my Messala of the festive crowd
Receive applause, and joyfully behold
His son’s victorious chariot passing by!
Smile, Phoebus there! Thy flowing locks all gold!
Thy virgin sister, too, stoop with thee from the sky!
ELEGY THE SIXTH
LET LOVERS ALL ENLIST
Now for a soldier Macer goes. Will Cupid take the field?
Will Love himself enlist, and bear on his soft breast a shield?
Through weary marches over land, through wandering waves at sea,
Armed cap-a-pie, will that small god the hero’s comrade be?
O burn him, boy, I pray, that could thy blessed favors slight!
Back to the ranks the straggler bring beneath thy standard bright!
Yet, if to soldiers thou art kind, I too will volunteer,
I too will from a helmet drink, nor thirst in desert’s fear
.
Venus, good-bye! Now, off I go! Good-bye, sweet ladies all!
I am all valor, and delight to hear the trumpets call.
Large is my brag! But while with pride my project I recite,
I see her bolted door, — and then my boasting fails me quite.
Never to visit her again, with many an oath I swore;
But while I vowed, my feet had run unguided to her door.
Come now, ye lovers all! who serve in Cupid’s hard campaign,
Let us together to the wars, and thus our peace regain!
This age of iron frowns on love and smiles on golden gain, —
On spoils of war which must be won by agony and pain.
For spoils alone our swords are keen, and deadly spears are hurled
While carnage, wrath, and swifter death fly broadcast through the world.
For spoils, with double risk of death the threatening seas we sail,
And climb the steel-beaked ship-of-war, so mighty and so frail!
The spoilers proud to boundless lands their bloody titles read,
And see innumerable flocks o’er endless acres feed
Fine foreign marbles they will bring; and all the city stare,
While one tall column for a house a thousand oxen bear.
They bind with bars the tameless sea; behind a rampart proud
Their little fishes swim in calm, when wintry storms are loud.
Ah! Love! Will not a Samian bowl hold all our mirth and wine?
And pottery of poor Cuman clay, with love, seem fair and fine?
Nay! Woe is me! Naught now but gold can please our ladies gay;
And so, since Venus asks for wealth, the spoils of war must pay.
My Nemesis shall roll in wealth; and promenade the town,
All glittering, with my golden gifts upon her gorgeous gown.
Her filmy web of Coan weave with golden broidery gleams;
Her swarthy slaves the Indian sun touched with its burning beams.
In rival hues to make her fair all conquered regions vie,
Afric its azure must bestow, and Tyre its purple dye.
O look — I tell what all men know — on that most favored lover!
Once in the market-place he sat, with both his soles chalked over.
BOOK III
ELEGY THE FIRST
THE NEW-YEAR’S GIFT
Now the month of Mars beginning brings the merry season near,
By our fathers named and numbered as the threshold of the year.
Faithfully their custom keeping, through the wide streets to and fro,
Offered at each friendly dwelling, seasonable gifts must go.
O what gifts, Pierian Muses, may acceptably be poured
On my own adored Neaera? — or, if not my own, adored!
Song is love’s best gift to beauty; gold but tempts the venal soul;
Therefore, ’tis a song I send her on this amateurish scroll.
