Frater Megillae, quo beatus Volnere, qua pereat sagitta. Cessat voluntas? Non alia bibam Mercede. Quae te cunque domat Venus, Ignibus, ingenuoque semper Amore peccas: quidquid habes, age, Quanta laborabas in Charybdi! Quae saga, quis te solvere Thessalis Pegasus expediet Chimaera. XXVIII. TE maris et terrae numeroque carentis arenae Mensorem cohibent, Archyta, Pulveris exigui prope litus parva Matinum Munera; nec quidquam tibi prodest Aught for that thou in spirit hast aerial mansions tried, And of the arched expanse of heaven hast made the circuit wide. The sire of Pelops likewise died, he who was guest of gods, Tithonus also, borne away along ethereal roads, And Minos, confidant of Jove. Nor less Panthoides, To Orcus once again consigned, does Tartarus possess: Though with his shield in evidence, of Trojan times he taught When to black death, save nerves and skin, he had surrendered naught: And, in your estimation, he, of truth and nature, rates As no mean judge. But one same night all human kind awaits: All must once tread the fatal path. to Mars, Some, to be sport The Furies give: the greedy sea yawns for the lives of tars: Of old and young together massed, the mingled corpses lie: No head is there that Proserpine, the ruthless, passes by. Me, also, did the stormy south, which in his downward. track Accompanies Orion, 'mid Illyrian billows wrack. Then do not you, O mariner, refuse, in churlish wise, To these my bones and this my head that here unburied lies, Some particles of shifting sand. So the east wind, howe'er It menace the Hesperian sea, and woods Venusine tear, Aërias tentâsse domos, animoque rotundum Percurrisse polum, morituro. Occidit et Pelopis genitor, conviva deorum, Et Jovis arcanis Minos admissus; habentque Demissum; quamvis clipeo Trojana refixo Nervos atque cutem morti concesserat atrae; Judice te, non sordidus auctor Naturae verique. Sed omnes una manet nox, Et calcanda semel via leti. Dant alios Furiae torvo spectacula Marti: Exitio est avidum mare nautis. Mixta senum ac juvenum densentur funera; nullum Saeva caput Proserpina fugit. Me quoque devexi rapidus comes Orionis Illyricis Notus obruit undis. At tu nauta, vagae ne parce malignus arenae Ossibus et capiti inhumato Particulam dare. Sic, quodcunque minabitur Eurus Fluctibus Hesperiis, Venusinae F Leave you in safety so for you abundant streams of gain, Come they from whencesoe'er they may, do righteous Jove ordain, And Neptune, at Tarentum hailed as guardian deity. But, if you scruple not at fraud, foredoomed erelong to be Visited on your guiltless bairns, then may it chance for you That like neglectful scorn in turn and retribution due Shall be reserved: I shall not be left without vengeful prayer. No expiatory sacrifice will your offence repair. What though in such impatient haste-I crave but brief delay; Sprinkle but thrice the dust on me, then speed you on your way. In the year 23 B. C. an army was sent by Augustus into Arabia Felix, under Aelius Gallus, Governor of Egypt, and the prospects of plunder which the expedition held out would seem to have induced a number of young men at Rome, and among others Iccius, a man of studious habits, to join it. So, Iccius, the vast wealth which Arabs store What gentile girl, whose lover you may kill, What boy from court with essenced hair Plectantur silvae, te sospite: multaque merces, Unde potest, tibi defluat aequo Ab Jove, Neptunoque sacri custode Tarenti. Negligis immeritis nocituram Postmodo te natis fraudem committere? Fors et Debita jura vicesque superbae Te maneant ipsum. Precibus non linquar inultis; Teque piacula nulla resolvent. Quamquam festinas (non est mora longa) licebit, Injecto ter pulvere, curras. XXIX. AD ICCIUM. ICCI, beatis nunc Arabum invides Ad cyathum statuetur unctis, |