Galatea, a lady of Horace's acquaintance, was meditating a voyage

to Greece, when Horace, having the story of Europa to tell, ingeniously turned that into an occasion for telling it.

Under stress of rhyme I have been compelled, if not to coin a new

word, at least to employ an old word in a new sense. By 'iron stile,' in the twelfth stanza, the critical reader is entreated to understand, not the stilus used by the ancients in writing, but the weapon which would be indicated by the augmentative of the Italian stiletto-that is to say, a short pointed sword like that which formed part of the equipment of a Roman foot-soldier.

LET to the impious, the chattering jay

And pregnant bitch, as omens lead the way,
And fox with cub, and, from his haunts, a gray
Lanuvine wolf descending.

Let serpent interrupt their destined course
As, athwart darting with an arrow's force,
It frights the steeds. With provident resource
Will I, as augur, tending

Her whom I fear for, from the east invoke
With prayers, the raven of propitious croak,
Ere it, presaging rain's impending stroke,
Re-seek the still morasses.

Be happy, Galatea, wheresoe'er

:

You please of me live mindful: nor forbear
To go, for vagrant crow, or woodpecker

That on the left-hand passes.

XXVII.

IMPIOS parrae recinentis omen

Ducat, et praegnans canis, aut ab agro
Rava decurrens lupa Lanuvino,
Fetaque vulpes:

Rumpat et serpens iter institutum,
Si per obliquum similis sagittae

Terruit mannos.

Ego cui timebo

Providus auspex,

Antequam stantes repetat paludes
Imbrium divina avis imminentum,
Oscinem corvum prece suscitabo
Solis ab ortu.

Sis licet felix ubicunque mavis,
Et memor nostri, Galatea, vivas:
Teque nec laevus vetat ire picus,
Nec vaga cornix.

Yet, see how prone Orion hurries on
Tumultuous. Even I myself have known
How Adria's gulf can blacken; how anon
Bland Japyx faith be breaking.

Let wives and children of our foes deplore
Blind Auster's freshening blast, and wild uproar
Of tempest-darkened Ocean, and the shore
Beneath its lashes quaking.

So too Europa, daring to confide
To the deceitful bull her snowy side,
Paled as the swarming sea-beasts she descried
And treachery self-revealing.

Busied of late with flowers, she wandered through
The fields, and wreathed for nymphs their chaplets due:
Now, in the dusky night nought meets her view
Save stars, and billows reeling.

So soon as unto potent Crete she came,—
Crete, hundred-citied,' Sire,' she cried, 'oh name
Of daughter, which henceforth I ne'er may claim,
Oh duty, foiled by passion!

Whence come, and whither? can one death atone
For virgin's trespass? Is't awake I moan
My base offence? or, still by vice undone,
Doth dream, in spectral fashion,

Sed vides quanto trepidet tumultu
Pronus Orion! Ego, quid sit ater
Hadriae, novi, sinus; et quid albus
Peccet Iapyx.

Hostium uxores puerique caecos
Sentiant motus orientis Austri, et
Aequoris nigri fremitum, et trementes
Verbere ripas.

Sic et Europe niveum doloso
Credidit tauro latus, et scatentem
Beluis pontum, mediasque fraudes
Palluit audax.

Nuper in pratis studiosa florum, et
Debitae Nymphis opifex coronae,
Nocte sublustri nihil astra praeter
Vidit et undas.

Quae simul centum tetigit potentem
Oppidis Creten; 'Pater, o relictum
Filiae nomen pietasque!' dixit

Victa furore.

Unde? Quo veni? Levis una mors est Virginum culpae. Vigilansne ploro Turpe commissum? An vitiis carentem

Ludit imago

Emerging, vacant, from the ivory gate
Delude me? Is then bettered my estate,
Reduced a widening flood to navigate

Than when fresh flowrets culling?

How, to mine anger were that monster vile,
That bull vouchsafed, would I with iron stile
Rend him, and break those horns of his, erewhile
So much my fondness gulling.

Shameless, I quitted the paternal home:

Shameless, I put off death. Ah, should there some One of the gods be listening-may I roam

Naked 'mid lions raging:

Ere ugly leanness my fair cheeks depress,
Or ere of juice the tender prey have less,
Let me, I pray, in all my comeliness
Be tiger's ravin 'suaging.

My absent father taunts me: 'Why delay
To die, Europa base? With girdle, aye
Faithfully following, your neck you may
Break, from an elm suspended.

Do rather rocks, death-pointed, captivate,
Or precipices? Do not hesitate:

Trust the swift storm, unless from royal state
To harlotry descended,