Me pater saevis oneret catenis,

Quod viro clemens misero peperci :
Me vel extremos Numidarum in agros
Classe releget.

I, pedes quo te rapiunt et aurae,
Dum favet nox et Venus: i secundo
Omine, et nostri memorem sepulcro
Scalpe querelam.

XII. AD NEOBULEN.

MISERARUM est neque amori dare ludum neque dulci

Mala vino lavere, aut exanimari metuentes

Patruae verbera linguae.

Tibi qualum Cythereae puer ales, tibi telas

Operosaeque Minervae studium aufert, Neobule,
Liparaei nitor Hebri,

Simul unctos Tiberinis humeros lavit in undis,
Eques ipso melior Bellerophonte, neque pugno

Neque segni pede victus;

The same, when hunting, and at hand a herd of deer

descrying,

Spears with sure aim the startled stags athwart the open

flying:

Quick too he is wild boar to track, deep in close covert lying.

The researches of Capmartin de Chaupy have placed beyond doubt that there was an Apulian Fons Bandusiae a few miles from Horace's birthplace, Venusia. Still it is not improbable that, as Tate suggests, the poet may have honoured with the same name some spring on or near his Sabine farm.

THOU art worthy, O fount Bandusian,
Whose brilliance doth glass outshine,
That the vineyard's luscious effusion,
Not without flowers, were thine.

To-morrow shalt thou be gifted
With a kid, on whose tumefied brow
Horns, vainly now first uplifted,
Of Venus and battle foreshow:

For, in honour of thee, the slaughter
Of that offspring of parentage lewd
Shall tinge the refrigerant water,
With crimsoning life-blood imbued.

Catus idem per apertum fugientes agitato

Grege cervos jaculari et celer alto latitantem

Fruticeto excipere aprum.

XIII. AD FONTEM BANDUSIAE.

O FONS Bandusiae, splendidior vitro,

Dulci digne mero, non sine floribus,

Cras donaberis haedo,

Cui frons turgida cornibus

Primis et Venerem et proelia destinat,

Frustra: nam gelidos inficiet tibi

Rubro sanguine rivos

Lascivi suboles gregis.

Noxious days of dog-star flagrant
Nigh thee cannot come: tis thine
Pleasant chill to offer to vagrant
Sheep, and plough-wearied kine.

Mid noble fountains, moreover,

Shalt thou rank, now that I the holm sing
Whose branches the hollow stones cover
Whence thy garrulous waters down spring.

Written on the return of Augustus after closing the Cantabrian War. His return had been delayed by illness at Terracina.

CAESAR, of late declared by you, O people,

Hercules-like to be in quest of laurels

Sold at death's price, comes from the Spanish seaboard Homeward, victorious.

Let the wife, then, to him alone devoted,

Forth come, our just gods' ritual observing,

And the great general's sister; and, adorned with
Suppliant fillets,

Mothers of virgins, and of youths in safety
Newly restored. Ye sons, and ye, O daughters
Recently wed, beware ye well of using

Words of ill omen.

Te flagrantis atrox hora Caniculae Nescit tangere: tu frigus amabile Fessis vomere tauris

Praebes, et pecori vago.

Fies nobilium tu quoque fontium, Me dicente cavis impositam ilicem Saxis unde loquaces

Lymphae desiliunt tuae.

XIV. AD ROMANOS.

HERCULIS ritu modo dictus, o plebs,
Morte venalem petiisse laurum,

Caesar Hispana repetit penates
Victor ab ora.

Unico gaudens mulier marito,
Prodeat, justis operata sacris:
Et soror clari ducis, et decorae
Supplice vitta

Virginum matres, juvenumque nuper Sospitum vos o pueri, et puellae Jam virum expertae, male ominatis Parcite verbis.