ately beloved by the supreme Jupiter. Ye
(virgins), praise her that rejoices in the rivers, and the thick groves,
which project either from the cold Algidus, or the gloomy woods of
Erymanthus, or the green Cragus. Ye boys, extol with equal praises
Apollo's Delos, and his shoulder adorned with a quiver, and with his
brother Mercury's lyre. He, moved by your intercession, shall drive away
calamitous war, and miserable famine, and the plague from the Roman
people and their sovereign Caesar, to the Persians and the Britons.

* * * * *

ODE XXII.

TO ARISTIUS FUSCUS.

The man of upright life and pure from wickedness, O Fuscus, has no need
of the Moorish javelins, or bow, or quiver loaded with poisoned darts.
Whether he is about to make his journey through the sultry Syrtes, or
the inhospitable Caucasus, or those places which Hydaspes, celebrated in
story, washes. For lately, as I was singing my Lalage, and wandered
beyond my usual bounds, devoid of care, a wolf in the Sabine wood fled
from me, though I was unarmed: such a monster as neither the warlike
Apulia nourishes in its extensive woods, nor the land of Juba, the
dry-nurse of lions, produces. Place me in those barren plains, where no
tree is refreshed by the genial air; at that part of the world, which
clouds and an inclement atmosphere infest. Place me under the chariot of
the too neighboring sun, in a land deprived of habitations; [there] will
I love my sweetly-smiling, sweetly-speaking Lalage.

* * * * *

ODE XXIII.

TO CHLOE.

You shun me, Chloe, like a fawn that is seeking its timorous mother in
the pathless mountains, not without a vain dread of the breezes and the
thickets: for she trembles both in her heart and knees, whether the
arrival of the spring has terrified by its rustling leaves, or the green
lizards have stirred the bush. But I do not follow you, like a savage
tigress, or a Gaetulian lion, to tear you to pieces. Therefore, quit
your mother, now that you are mature for a husband.

* * * * *

ODE XXIV.

TO VIRGIL.

What shame or bound can there be to our affectionate regret for so dear
a person? O Melpomene, on whom your father has bestowed a clear voice
and the harp, teach me the mournful strains. Does then perpetual sleep
oppress Quinctilius? To whom when will modesty, and uncorrupt faith the
sister of Justice, and undisguised