ODE 13. TO THE FOUNTAIN OF BANDUSIA. BANDUSIA, stainless mirror of the sky! Thine is the flower-crown'd bowl, for thee shall die, When dawns yon sun, the kid; Whose horns, half-seen, half-hid, Challenge to dalliance or to strife-in vain! Soon must the firstling of the wild herd be slain, And those cold springs of thine With blood incarnadine. Fierce glows the Dogstar, but his fiery beam Toucheth not thee: still grateful thy cool stream To labour-wearied ox, Or wanderer from the flocks: And henceforth thou shalt be a royal fountain: My harp shall tell how from yon cavernous mountain, Where the brown oak grows tallest, All babblingly thou fallest. ODE 18. TO A FAUN. WOOER of young Nymphs who fly thee, Trip, and go, nor injured by thee If the kid his doomed head bows, and When the year is full; and thousand Each flock in the rich grass gambols When the month comes which is thine; And the happy village rambles Fieldward with the idle kine: Lambs play on, the wolf their neighbour : And with glee the sons of labour BOOK IV. ODE 13. TO LYCE. LYCE, the gods have listened to my prayer: Still unshamed drink, and play, And, wine-flushed, woo slow-answering Love with weak Shrill pipings. With young Chia He doth dwell, Queen of the harp; her cheek Is his sweet citadel: He marked the withered oak, and on he flew Intolerant; shrank from Lyce grim and wrinkled, Whose teeth are ghastly-blue, Whose temples snow-besprinkled :— Not purple, not the brightest gem that glows, Brings back to her the years which, fleeting fast, Time hath once shut in those Dark annals of the Past. Oh, where is all thy loveliness? soft hue My heart out of my breast? Fair, and far-famed, and subtly sweet, thy face Ranked next to Cinara's. But to Cinara fate Gave but a few years' grace; And lets live, all too late, Lyce, the rival of the beldam crow: That fiery youth may see with scornful brow Beamed bright, a cinder now. EPODE 2. "HAPPY-who far from turmoil, like the men With his own oxen ploughs his native glen, Him the fierce clarion summons not to war; He dreads not angry seas: The courts the stately citizens' proud door- With poplars tall to wed: Or the rank outgrowth lopping off, ingraft Fair branches in its stead; To watch his kine, that wander, lowing, far Store the prest honey in the taintless jar, And soon as Autumn, with fair fruitage tricked, Then with what glee his purpling grape is picked, And newly-grafted pear, |