Oft from Parnassus Bacchus drove his flocks Their armed throngs to brave the thickest fight. But when this earth with impious crime was stain'd, When virtue fled from man, and passion reign'd; When brothers dyed their hands in brothers' gore; When children wept a parent's death no more; d When the harsh father sigh'd for early fate To snatch the first-born of his buried mate; And leave him free from fonder ties, to press Bade incest's curse her household gods condemn, Impious alike to nature and to them; When rival honour crime and virtue knew ; Their favour justly all the gods withdrew; TO HORTALUS. SENT TO HIM WITH THE POEM OF BERENICE'S HAIR. THOUGH grief, my Hortalus, that wastes my heart, Nor can the Muses with their sweetest art For Lethe laves my brother's clay-cold foot, Shall I then never, in no future year, See thee again? yet will I hold thee dear, And in sad strains for ever mourn thy death. VOL. II. E Such as the Daulian bird so sadly pours; As, in some gloomy grove, whose branches crost Inweave their shade, she still at night deplores The hapless destinies of Itys lost. Yet not forgetting thy request, my friend, Lest, vainly borne upon the zephyrs swift, As the dear apple, love's clandestine gift, Which she forgetting in her vest conceal'd, Her blushes own, like me, neglect and shame. THE HAIR OF BERENICE. TRANSLATED BY CATULLUS FROM THE GREEK OF CALLIMACHUS. (The Hair speaks.) CONON, who knew the lights of yonder skies, To steal in Latmos' cave the mute embrace; He first mark'd me with heavenly light o'erspread, The honours once of Berenice's head: Which she, with arms outstretch'd in suppliant love, Vow'd to devote to many Gods above; |