s mighty pupil: "Invincible mortal, son of the
goddess Thetis, the land of Assaracus awaits you, which the cold
currents of little Scamander and swift-gliding Simois divide: whence the
fatal sisters have broken off your return, by a thread that cannot be
altered: nor shall your azure mother convey you back to your home. There
[then] by wine and music, sweet consolations, drive away every symptom
of hideous melancholy."

* * * * *

ODE XIV.

TO MAECENAS.

You kill me, my courteous Maecenas, by frequently inquiring, why a
soothing indolence has diffused as great a degree of forgetfulness on my
inmost senses, as if I had imbibed with a thirsty throat the cups that
bring on Lethean slumbers. For the god, the god prohibits me from
bringing to a conclusion the verses I promised [you, namely those]
iambics which I had begun. In the same manner they report that Anacreon
of Teios burned for the Samian Bathyllus; who often lamented his love to
an inaccurate measure on a hollow lyre. You are violently in love
yourself; but if a fairer flame did not burn besieged Troy, rejoice in
your lot. Phryne, a freed-woman, and not content with a single admirer,
consumes me.

* * * * *

ODE XV.

TO NEAERA.

It was night, and the moon shone in a serene sky among the lesser stars;
when you, about to violate the divinity of the great gods, swore [to be
true] to my requests, embracing me with your pliant arms more closely
than the lofty oak is clasped by the ivy; that while the wolf should
remain an enemy to the flock, and Orion, unpropitious to the sailors,
should trouble the wintery sea, and while the air should fan the
unshorn locks of Apollo, [so long you vowed] that this love should be
mutual. O Neaera, who shall one day greatly grieve on account of my
merit: for, if there is any thing of manhood in Horace, he will not
endure that you should dedicate your nights continually to another, whom
you prefer; and exasperated, he will look out for one who will return
his love; and though an unfeigned sorrow should take possession of you,
yet my firmness shall not give way to that beauty which has once given
me disgust. But as for you, whoever you be who are more successful [than
me], and now strut proud of my misfortune; though you be rich in flocks
and abundance of land, and Pactolus flow for you, nor the mysteries of
Pythagoras, born again, escape you, and you exce