Then, would discourse of Liber, and the Muses,

Venus, the Boy who clingeth to her ever,

Also of Lycus, beauteous for his dark eyes,

And for his dark hair.

Glory of Phoebus, Shell that e'en art pleasing At the great Jove's feasts, O of all our sorrows Thou sweet dispeller, aid me aye when I shall Duly invoke thee!

XXXIII.

TO ALBIUS TIBULLUS.

DEPLORE, Albius, no more than it is meet; nor now
Thy mind fill with unkind Glycera; nor do thou
Wailing elegies sing, for that, with broken vow,
A youth hath thee with her outvied!

of face of a sweet grace beauteous Lycoris vain, Far-famed, Cyrus inflamed: Cyrus inclines, again, To the proud Pholoë; but with the wolves had fain

The goats sooner to be allied,

Than, so base and so low, Pholoë love confessed.

Venus wishes it thus: who, in her cruel jest,
Ill-joined, body and mind, loveth to have compressed,
Under her brazen yoke, a host.

For, e'en when a less mean Venus was seeking me, In kind fetters confined freedwoman Myrtale; Though far fiercer than are Adria's billows, she,

With bays 'denting Calabria's coast!

XXXIV.

ON PROVIDENCE.

A RARE, infrequent caller on Deity,

Whilst wand'ring filled with foolish philosophy:

I now am forced, again back-sailing,

That I retrack me my course late failing.

For Jove, whose wont is ever to cleave (great Sire !) The clouds with wavings of his effulgent fire,

Now ether's clear expanse hath riven:

Thunder-steeds in his winged car hath driven;

Whereat the mute earth, rivers that wand'ring glide,
And Styx, and seats of Tænarus dread, beside,
And Atlas' farthest bounds are quaking!

Jupiter aye hath the pow'r of making

The lowest lot change: he can abase the proud,

And bring th' obscure forth: Fortune, with clamour

loud,

From one the crown, so rapid, teareth,

Which to another she gladly beareth.