as in the case
of the critical essay inspired by the _Ars Poetica_, it is not always
easy to distinguish adaptation or imitation from actual creation.
Bernardo Tasso's _Ode_, for example, and Giovanni Prati's _Song of
Hygieia_, while really independent poems, are so charged with Horatian
matter and spirit that one hesitates to call them original. The same is
true of the many inspirations traceable to the famous _Beatus Ille
Epode_, which, with such _Odes_ as _The Bandusian Spring_, _Pyrrha_,
_Phidyle_, and _Chloe_, have captured the fancy of modern poets. Pope's
_Solitude_, on the other hand, while surely an inspiration of the second
_Epode_, shows hardly a mark affording proof of the fact.

To some of the most manifest imitations and adaptations, it is
impossible to deny originality. The _Fifth Book of Horace_, by Kipling
and Graves, is an example. Thackeray's delightful _Ad Ministram_ is
another example which must be classed as adaptation, yet such is its
spontaneity that not to see in it an inspiration would be stupid and
unjust:

AD MINISTRAM

D_ear Lucy, you know what my wish is_--
I_ hate all your Frenchified fuss_:
Y_our silly entrees and made dishes_
W_ere never intended for us_.
N_o footman in lace and in ruffles_
N_eed dangle behind my arm-chair_;
A_nd never mind seeking for truffles_
A_lthough they be ever so rare_.

B_ut a plain leg of mutton, my Lucy_,
I_ prithee get ready at three_:
H_ave it smoking, and tender, and juicy_,
A_nd what better meat can there be?_
A_nd when it has feasted the master_,
'T_will amply suffice for the maid_;
M_eanwhile I will smoke my canaster_,
A_nd tipple my ale in the shade_.

In similar strain of exquisite humor are the adaptations of the
Whichers, American examples of spirit and skill not second to that of
Thackeray:

MY SABINE FARM

LAUDABUNT ALII

S_ome people talk about "Noo Yo'k"_;
O_f Cleveland many ne'er have done_;
T_hey sing galore of Baltimore_,
C_hicago, Pittsburgh, Washington_.

O_thers unasked their wit have tasked_
T_o sound unending praise of Boston_--
O_f bean-vines found for miles around_
A_nd crooked streets that I get lost on_.

G_ive me no jar of truck or car_,
N_o city smoke and noise of mills_;
R_ather the slow Connecticut's flow_
A_nd sunny orchards on the hills_.

T_here like the haze of summer days_
B_efore the wind flee care and sor