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  45 So cries he with aught else that ye, hapless lovers, have learned to cry, and outclamours the birds of dawn. So by my mistress’ vices and her lover’s tears am I for aye defamed with ever-during scorn.

  XVII

  DESERVEDLY, since I have had the heart to fly from my mistress, do I now cry to the lonely sea-mews, nor shall Cassiope give her wonted welcome to my bark, and all my prayers fall idly on a heartless shore. Nay, more, though thou art far away the winds but aid thy cruelty: lo! what fierce threats the gale howls in my ear! Will Fortune never come to still the tempest? Shall yonder scanty sands hide my bones?

  9 Yet do thou but change thy savage complaints to kinder tones; let the dark night and threatening shoals be in thine eyes enough punishment for me. Wilt have the heart dry-eyed to demand my death and ne’er to hold mine ashes to thy bosom? Perish the man, whoe’er he was, that first devised ships and sails, and first voyaged over the unwilling deep! Easier task had it been to overcome my mistress’ heart — cruel was she, yet peerless among women! — than thus to gaze on shores fringed with unknown forests and seek in vain for the desired sons of Tyndareus.

  19 If some doom had buried all my grief at home, if there my love had ended and at the last the headstone marked its close, then would she have cast those locks I loved so well upon my pyre, and have laid my bones on a soft couch of delicate rose-leaves: she would have cried my name aloud over my last ashes, praying that earth might lie light upon me.

  25 But do ye, O sea-born daughters of lovely Doris, give prosperous escort and unfurl our white sails: if ever love has glided down and touched your waves, spare a fellow-bondsman and guide him to a kindly shore.

  XVIII

  HERE of a truth is a lonely and a silent place, where I may make my moan, and the breath of the West Wind only rules this deserted grove. Here may I freely utter my secret griefs, if only these lone crags can keep faith.

  5 From what first beginning, Cynthia, shall I trace thy scorn? What was the first cause for tears thou gavest me? I that but a short while since was counted among happy lovers, am now perforce an outcast from thy love. What woe such as this have I deserved? what spells alter thy love for me? Is jealousy of some new rival the cause of thine anger? So surely mayst thou return to my embrace, fickle maid, as no other woman has ever planted her fair feet within my threshold. Though my grief owes thee much bitterness, yet never shall my wrath fall so fierce upon thee, that I should always give thee just cause for fury and thine eyes be marred with streaming tears.

  17 Or is it that I give scant proof of my passion by changing colour, and that no token of my faith cries aloud upon my countenance? Ye shall be my witnesses, if trees know aught of love, beech-tree and pine, beloved of Arcady’s god. Ah! how oft do my passionate words echo beneath your delicate shades, how oft is Cynthia’s name carved upon your bark!

  23 Ah! how oft has thy injustice begotten troubles in my heart, that only thy silent portal knows! I have been wont to bear thy haughty commands with patience, nor ever to bemoan my grief in piercing accents of sorrow. Yet in return for this, ye founts divine, lo! this chill couch of rock is mine and broken slumbers on this rugged track: and all that my plaintive cries can tell must be uttered in this waste place to shrill-voiced birds.

  31 But be what thou wilt, still let the woods re-echo “ Cynthia,” nor these lone crags have rest from the sound of thy name.

  XIX

  No more now, my Cynthia, fear I the sad world of death; I care not for the doom that at the last must feed the fires of funeral; this fear alone is bitterer than death itself, that I should go down to the grave unloved by thee. Not with such light touch has Love cleaved to mine eyes that my dust should forget thee and lie loveless. Even in the dark underworld the hero son of Phylacus could not forget his sweet wife, but, yearning to enfold his dear one with phantom hands, the Thessalian returned in ghostly wise to his ancient home. There, whatsoe’er I be, as Cynthia’s lover shall my shade be known; strong love o’erpasses even the shores of doom. There let the fair queens of old, whom the spoils of Troy gave to Argive husbands, come in a troop to greet me! Yet the beauty of none of these shall please me more than thine, and though the doom of old age delay thy coming long — may earth be kind and grant this boon! — yet shall the sight of thine ashes be dear to my weeping eyes: and like love long mayst thou that livest feel, when I am dust; then wheresoe’er death find me, it shall have lost its sting. Yet, Cynthia, I have a fear that thou mayst spurn my tomb, and some cruel passion part thee from my dust, and force thee, though loth, to dry thy falling tears. Continued threats may bend the will even of a loyal maid. Wherefore, while yet may be, let us love and be merry together. Eternity itself is all too brief for love.

  XX

  TAKE this my warning, Gallus, in return for thine unfailing love: let it not slip from thy thoughtless mind: “Fortune oft proves adverse to the heedless lover so might Ascanius tell thee, that wreaked his spite upon the Minyae.

  5 Thou hast a love most like to Hylas, child of Theodamas, one not less fair nor of humbler birth. Beware then, whether thou wanderest by the holy streams of Umbrian forests, or Anio’s waters lave thy feet, or walk’st thou on the marge of the Giant’s strand, or wheresoe’er a river’s wandering waters welcome thee, beware and from thy love ward off the hands of nymphs that burn to steal (the Ausonian Dryads love as warmly as their sisters loved), lest it be thy fate ever to visit cruel mountain and icy crag and lakes, that thou hast tried to thy cost. Such woes the ill-starred wanderer Hercules suffered in a far land and bewailed by the shores of the relentless Ascanius, For they say that of old Argos set sail from the dockyards of Pagasa and went forth on the long way to Phasis, and at last, the waves of Helle past, moored his bark on Mysia’s rockbound coast. Here the band of heroes went forth upon the peaceful shore and carpeted the ground with a soft coverlet of leaves. But the comrade of the young unvanquished hero ranged afar to seek the scarce waters of some distant spring. Him the two brothers followed, Zetes and Calais, the North Wind’s sons, and, bowing o’er him, both pressed on to embrace him with hovering hands and snatch a kiss and bear it from his upturned face, each as in turn they fled. But the boy, swept off his feet, hides clinging to one by his pinion’s base, and with a branch wards off the other’s winged wiles. At last the children of Orithyia, Pandion’s daughter, retired discomfited, and Hylas, alas! went upon his way, went to be the wood-nymphs’ prey.

  33 Here beneath the peak of Arganthus’ mount lay the well of Pege, the watery haunt so dear to Bithynia’s nymphs, o’er which from lonely trees there hung dewy apples that owed naught to the hand of man, and round about in a water-meadow sprang snowy lilies mingled with purple poppies. And there, in boyish delight, he gently plucked them with soft finger-tips, preferring the flowers to his chosen task; and now in artless wonder bent over the fair waters and prolonged his truancy with gazing at their mirrored charms. At length he made ready to stretch forth his hands to the waves and draw water therefrom, leaning on his right shoulder and raising a plenteous draught. But, smitten with passion at the sight of that snowy shoulder, the Hamadryads in wonder ceased their wonted dance. Easily from where he lay reclined they dragged him through the yielding flood. Then Hylas as they seized his body uttered a cry, whereto in answer Alcides shouted again, again, and yet again; but the breezes bore him back from the fountain’s edge naught save the echo of the name.

  51 Warned by this tale, my Gallus, thou shalt keep thy love secure, thou that aforetime didst seem to entrust thy Hylas to the nymphs.

  XXI

  “SOLDIER, that hastenest to escape thy comrades doom, flying wounded from the Etruscan ramparts, and turnest thy swollen eyes at the sound of my moaning, I am one of thy nearest comrades in arms. So save thyself, that thy parents may rejoice over thy safety, nor thy sister learn my fate from the silent witness of thy tears; how Gallus, though he escaped through the midst of Caesar’s swordsmen, yet could not escape the hand of some unknown spoiler; and whatever bones she may find scattered on the mountains of Tuscany, let her not know them to be mine.”

  XXII

  TULLUS, thou askest ever in our friendship’s name, what is my rank, whence my descent, and where my home. If thou knowest our country’s graves at Perusia, the scene of death in the dark hours of Italy, when civil discord maddened the citizens of Rome (hence, dust of Tuscany, art thou my bitterest sorrow, for thou hast borne the limbs of my comrade that were cast out unburied, thou shroudest his ill-starred corpse with never a dole of earth), know then that where Umbria, rich in fertile lands, joins the wide plain that lies below, there was I born.

  BOOK II

  I

  You ask me, from what source so oft I draw my songs of love and whence comes my book that sounds so soft upon the tongue. ’Tis not Calliope nor Apollo that singeth these things; ’tis my mistress’ self that makes my wit. If thou wilt have her walk radiant in silks of Cos, of Coan raiment all this my book shall tell; or have I seen her tresses stray dishevelled o’er her brow, I praise her locks and she walks abroad in pride and gladness; or struck she forth music from the lyre with ivory fingers, I marvel with what easy skill she sweeps her hands along the strings; or when she droops those eyes that call for sleep I find a thousand new themes for song; or if, flinging away her robe, she enter naked with me in the lists, then, then I write whole Iliads long. Whate’er she does, whate’er she says, from a mere nothing springs a mighty tale.

  17 But if, Maecenas, the Fates had granted me power to lead the hosts of heroes into war, I would not sing the Titans, nor Ossa on Olympus piled, that Pelion might be a path to heaven. I’d sing not ancient Thebes nor Troy’s citadel, that is Homer’s glory, nor yet how at Xerxes’ bidding sea met sundered sea, nor, again, would I chant the primeval realm of Remus or the f
ierce spirit of lofty Carthage, the Cimbrian’s threats or the service wrought by Marius for the State. But I would tell of the wars and the deeds of thy master Caesar, and next after mighty Caesar my thoughts should turn on thee. For oft as I sang of Mutina or Philippi, where Romans lie by Romans slain, or of the sea-fight and the rout by the Sicilian shore, the ruined hearths of Etruria’s ancient race, and the capture of the shore where Ptolemy’s Pharos stands; oft as I sang of Egypt and the Nile, what time in mourning garb he went humbly to Rome with his seven captive streams, or of the necks of kings bound about with chains of gold, and the prows of Actium speeding along the Sacred Way; so oft would my Muse weave thy name into those deeds, true heart in peace or war.

  * * * * *

  Theseus to the shades below, Achilles to the gods above, proclaim a comrade’s love, the one of Ixion’s child, the other of the son of Menoetius.

  39 But neither would Callimachus’ scant breath avail to thunder forth the strife ‘twixt Jove and Enceladus on Phlegra’s plains, nor has my heart power in verse severe to trace the line of Caesar to his Phrygian grand-sires. The sailor talks of winds, the ploughman of oxen, the soldier counts o’er his wounds, the shepherd his sheep, while we for our part tell of lovers’ wars upon a narrow couch! Let each man pass his days in that wherein his skill is greatest. To die for love is glory; and glory yet again to have power to joy in one love only; ah, may I, and I alone, joy in the love that’s mine. If memory fails me not, she is wont to blame fickle-hearted maids, and on account of Helen frowns on the whole Iliad. Though I be doomed to drink of the cup that the stepdame Phaedra brewed, the cup whereof her stepson was destined to take no hurt, or must die of Circe’s herbs; or though for me the Colchian witch heat the caldron on the fires of Iolcus, yet since one girl hath stolen away my senses, from her house only shall go forth my funeral train.

  57 Medicine cures all the anguish of mankind; love alone loves no physician of its ill. Machaon healed Philoctetes’ limping feet, Chiron the son of Phillyra opened the eyes of Phoenix, the Epidaurian god restored the dead Androgeon to his father’s hearth by power of Cretan herbs, and the Mysian youth received succour from the same Haemonian spear that dealt the wound. If any can take this frailty from me, he and he alone will be able to bring the apple to the hands of Tantalus; he too shall fill the casks from the maidens’ pitchers, that their tender necks be not bowed for ever by the burden of water; he too shall loose Prometheus’ arms from the Caucasian crag and drive the vulture from his inmost heart.

  71 Therefore when at last the Fates demand my life, and I shall be no more than a brief name on a little stone of marble, then, Maecenas, thou hope and envy of our Roman youth, and, whether I live or die, mine own true glory, if perchance thy journeying lead thee near my tomb, stay awhile thy British chariot with carven yoke, and weeping pay this tribute to the silent dust: “An unrelenting maid wrought this poor mortal’s death.”

  II

  I WAS free and thought henceforth to lie alone of nights; but though the truce was made, Love played me false. Why abides such mortal beauty upon earth? Jupiter, I pardon thy gallantries of olden time. Yellow is her hair, and tapering her hands, tall and full her figure, and stately her walk, worthy the sister of Jove or like to Pallas, when she strides to Dulichian altars, her breast veiled by the Gorgons’ snaky locks. Fair is she as Ischomache, heroic child of the Lapithae, the Centaurs’ welcome spoil in the revel’s midst, or as Brimo when by the sacred waters of Boebeis she laid her virgin body at Mercury’s side. Yield now, ye goddesses, whom of old the shepherd saw lay aside your raiment on the heights of Ida! And oh! may old age never mar that face, though she reach the years of the Cumaean prophetess.

  III

  THOU, that didst boast that nought could harm thee more, art caught in the snare: thy proud spirit has fallen. Scarce, poor wretch, canst thou find rest for a single month, and now a second book of shame shall tell of thy doings. I was as one that seeks whether a fish may live on the dry sands, or a fierce wild boar in the midst of unfamiliar waves, when I tried if I could pass the night in sterner studies. Love is but put off, extinguished never.

  9 ’Twas not her face, bright though it be, that won me. Lilies would not surpass my mistress for whiteness; ’tis as though Maeotic snows were to strive with Spanish vermilion, or rose-leaves floated amid stainless milk. ’Twas not her hair flowing trimly o’er her smooth neck, ’twas not the twin torches of her eyes, my lodestars, nor a girl shining in Arabian silks: not for such trifles as these am I a gallant lover! ’Tis rather that at the revel’s close she dances wondrously, even as Ariadne led the Maenad dance; ’tis rather that when she essays to sing to the Aeolian lyre she rivals the harp of Aganippe in her skill to play, and challenges with her verse the writings of ancient Corinna, and counts not Erinna’s songs the equals of her own.

  23 My life, did not bright Love sneeze a shrill omen at thine hour of birth, when day first dawned for thee? These heavenly gifts the gods, the gods bestowed, for I would not have thee think that ’twas thy mother gave them. Such boons no human parentage can confer, those charms ne’er sprang from mortal womb. Thou and thou only wast born to be the glory of Roman maids; thou shalt be the first maid of Rome to lie with Jove, nor shalt thou forever in our midst visit mortal couches. Helen wore this beauty once, and now ’tis come to earth again with thee.

  33 For thee then that our youth should burn, why should I wonder now? Better, O Troy, to have perished for Cynthia’s sake. Of old I wondered that a girl should have been the cause of so mighty a conflict before the citadel of Troy, where Europe and Asia met in war. Now, Paris, I hold that thou, and thou, Menelaus, wert wise, thou that thou didst demand, thou that thou wert slow to reply. Worthy in sooth was such a face, that for it even Achilles should face death; even Priam could not but approve such cause for strife. If any desire to surpass the fame of all ancient pictures, let him take my mistress as model for his art; if he show her to the peoples of the West or to the peoples of the East, he will set the East and set the West afire.

  45 These bounds at least let me never more outstep! Or if I do, let another passion smite me, if such there be, that shall burn me with keener agony. As at first the ox refuses the plough, yet at length becomes familiar to the yoke and goes quietly to the fields, so do proud youths fret in the first ecstasy of love, then, calmer grown, bear good and ill alike. Melampus the seer endured dishonouring fetters, convicted of having stolen the kine of Iphiclus: yet ’twas not gain, but rather the fair face of Pero compelled him, Pero soon to be a bride in the halls of Amythaon.

  IV

  OFT first must thou bemoan the transgressions of thy mistress, oft must thou ask a boon, and oft depart denied. Oft must thou bite thy nails for wrath at thine unmerited woe, and in anger stamp the ground with hesitating foot.

  5 In vain was my hair drenched with perfumes, in vain my feet went lingeringly with measured step. For such a case as mine avails no drug, no Colchian sorceress of the night, no, nor the herbs Perimede’s hands distilled. For here we see no cause nor whence the blow is dealt; dark is the path whereby so many griefs come none the less. In such a case the sick man needs no physician, no soft pillows; him no inclement season, no wind of heaven racks: he walks abroad, and on a sudden his friends marvel to see him dead. Whate’er love be, ’tis a strange thing, that none may guard against. For what lying seer have I not rewarded? What hag has not three times three pondered my dreams?