As with your
conqueror
to fight
Is hard, I follow.
Is hard, I follow.
Warner - World's Best Literature - v13 - Her to Hux
The Sabine property was but thirty miles from Rome.
Horace never affected the aristocratic litter, but went and came
freely upon his own ambling mule, over one of the most beautiful
roads in all the world: southward across the campagna, threading
the hoary olives of the first ascent, and passing "many-fountained"
Tivoli; then up beside the Anio into the higher hills, until he turned
aside upon the left into the sunny silence of a yet more secluded
valley, that of the tributary Digentia, now Licenza.
men.
The early satires of Horace are plainly an outcome of the studies
of Archilochus which he had made at Athens; but he adopts the
measure and professes himself rather the disciple of Lucilius, the
rude forefather of the Latin satire. Of those first off-hand squibs
and sketches,-which he intimates in a passage already quoted that
he wrote for immediate pay,—it is uncertain how many he cared
afterward to include in his collected writings. The seventh satire of
the first book bears marks of having been written very early,-per-
haps while he was still playing the soldier in Greece. The third,
fourth, and tenth of the first book are in the main apologetic. They
defend the satire as the readiest and most efficient weapon of the
moralist, and as a wholesome check upon the follies and excesses of
They also proclaim his own resolve never to abuse the cen-
sor's privilege; and to indulge in no personal criticisms inconsist-
ent with the code of social honor of his age, and with a generally
kindly and tolerant view of the infirmities of humankind. The first
satire of the second book is one of the most dramatic and amusing
of the whole series. It is in the form of a dialogue with one Tre-
batius,—a rich and famous old lawyer, on the best of terms with the
powers that then were, who good-humoredly advises the poet to give
up altogether the ticklish trade of a satirist, and when he finds him-
self growing dangerously hot over the follies of the day, to reduce
his temperature by a bath in the Tiber! Great interest attaches to
the name of Horace's supposed interlocutor in this witty piece, for he
is the selfsame Trebatius for whom Cicero twenty-five years before
had procured a place on the staff of Cæsar in Gaul; who had loathed
the hardships of that country, and adroitly avoided following the
conqueror to Britain; and in whose beautiful villa at Reggio, Cicero
## p. 7624 (#434) ###########################################
7624
HORACE
had found refuge ten years later, when he was himself a fugitive
from Rome after the death of Cæsar. Trebatius was never the man
to have lost his head through any romantic adhesion to a fallen
cause; and it is positively startling to see how he preserves his
identity across a complete gap of so many years in our knowledge
of him.
All the eighteen satires of the two books, as well as most of the
Epodes, were apparently given to the world under the patronage of
Mæcenas, during the ten years or so which intervened between the
poet's introduction to that dignitary and the close of the weary civil
war by the victory of Actium. In them we find faithfully reflected
the daily life of the Roman streets, as well as the fashion of the
moment in what claimed to be the most exclusive circles of the cap-
ital. The earlier the composition, as a rule, the coarser the language
and the more caustic the tone. We fancy that we can see the
writer's expression becoming ever more suave and genial as his tem-
per mellowed with his days of modest prosperity, and his easy and
indulgent though never unmanly or ignoble philosophy of life took
shape and became a consciously accepted creed. He was never,
either in theory or practice, a very rigid moralist. He lashed men's
follies lightly and forgave their lapses freely. Himself, as judged by
the standards of the time, a clean and quiet liver, he was content to
hold up to ridicule, rather than to stern reprobation, the vices of
other men
"Telling a tale not too importunate
To those who in the sleepy region stay,
Lulled by the singer of an empty day. "
We have plenty of proof that there were moments when the gay
and facile Horace felt, no less keenly than the pensive and clair-
voyant Virgil habitually felt, the essential "emptiness," for a Roman
of that day, which followed the extinction of his civic personality.
More and more, as the years of his outwardly successful and brilliant
middle life slipped away, the patriotism of Horace became a resolutely
smothered regret; while his loves, which can never have been very
absorbing or impassioned, resolved themselves into the half amused,
half wistful recollection of transient affairs with women who had had
many lovers.
It is only when he sings of friendship, of honor and
gratitude, of faith and charity between man and man, that this con-
vinced Epicurean strikes a deeper note. The brevity of life and the
vacuity of death were ever present in the background of his thought;
but all the more was he minded to enjoy, to the full, the sunshine of
the passing day. Moderation in all things, content with the present,
courage in view of an absolutely uncertain future. - these things, in
## p. 7625 (#435) ###########################################
HORACE
7625
so far as Horace aspires to be didactic, constitute the sum and sub-
stance of his teaching.
It was inevitable that such a man, already fast bound by the
warmest of private ties to the first minister of Cæsar Octavianus,
should have accepted frankly the changed order of things when the
latter returned to Rome in 725, after the battle of Actium and the
deaths of Antony and Cleopatra, to assume the sceptre of a pacified
world. Liberty was past, and it behooved men to be thankful for
peace, and poets to praise it; believing if they could that it implied
the beginning of another age of gold. A good many of the more
respectable and better disposed Romans of that period did probably
believe this, after a fashion. The tragic note of covert warning dis-
cernible in the ode addressed by Horace (Odes, II. , x. ) to his ill-fated
friend Licinius Murena, the brother-in-law of Mæcenas, who was con-
demned and executed a few years later for conspiring against the
new government, shows how utterly wild and wanton that enterprise
must have appeared at the time. Sixty or seventy years were to
pass before the mystery of iniquity was ripe and all the vices inher-
ent in the imperial system became fully apparent; before the next
great Roman satirist, Persius, gave vent in mordant and melancholy
verse to the smothered rage of the best of the patrician remnant,
against the degrading "regiment" of their parvenu sovereigns.
Virtually, therefore, though not officially, Horace became the poet
laureate of the court which formed itself about the ruler who pres-
ently assumed the name of Augustus. All the great odes of the four
books belong to the next fifteen years; and of these, all the statelier
and more impersonal were written under imperial inspiration, and
some few, like the 'Carmen Sæculare,' and the fourth ode of the
fourth book,- which celebrates the German victories of Drusus,- in
response to direct imperial request. Yet Horace always managed to
preserve his personal freedom, and to avoid even the suspicion of
servility. He sang the triumphs of Augustus in golden numbers, but
he declined with respectful thanks the post of his private secretary.
Nor would he write an ode, to order, on the achievements of Agrippa;
but politely, if a little ironically, excused himself on the ground that
his light muse was unequal to so serious a theme (Odes, I. , vi. ).
The first book of the Epistles appeared about 731; probably be-
tween the second and third books of the Odes. The second, com-
prising the unfinished essay on the 'Art of Poetry,' was Horace's last
work, produced after he was fifty years old. His health was no longer
what it had been, and even the air of the dear valley overlooked
by pleasant Lucretilis" was becoming a trifle too brisk and bracing
for his nerves. Tibur (Tivoli) he thought suited him better, and he
prepared for himself a little installation there; but confesses in one
<<
## p. 7626 (#436) ###########################################
7626
HORACE
of his letters (Epistles, I. , viii. ) that he was restless as the wind:-
"When I am in Rome I am in love with Tibur, and when at Tibur,
with Rome. " Sometimes he longed for yet softer skies; and the
nook of earth which smiled upon him above all others "Ille terra-
rum mihi præter omnes Angulus ridet». was sunny Tarentum, with
its long spring and its gentle winter, which produced better honey
than Hymettus, better olives than leafy Venafrum, and better grapes
than Falernum itself (Odes, II. , vi. ). The end came when the poet
lacked only a few days of having completed his fifty-seventh year:
and by order of the Emperor he was laid beside Mæcenas, some-
where in the great gardens which the latter had planted upon the
redeemed Esquiline hill.
It is in the Odes that the genius of Horace finds its most perfect
expression, and through them he lives in the memory of mankind.
In them he shows himself so consummate an artist in words that
he can impart distinction even to the commonplaces of thought and
sentiment through the mere perfection of their form. His diction is
distilled to such crystalline clearness, he says what he has to say
so unapproachably and incredibly well, that his thought would be
wronged and obscured by the attempt to express it in any other
words than his own. Hence, of all poets ancient or modern, Shake-
speare alone excepted, he is perhaps most frequently quoted. The
phrase "curious felicity," applied in the age succeeding the Augus-
tan by Petronius to the style of Horace, is very apt; yet it seems
to emphasize just a little too strongly the notion of research. For
Horace's manner is after all so simple and seemingly spontaneous,
and his matter of such universal interest, that he has the effect of
addressing each reader confidentially, and making a special appeal to
him. And this air of exquisite familiarity and naturalness is the
more remarkable, because it pleased the accomplished singer of the
Odes to discard for the most part the simple iambics and hexameters
of his previous compositions, and to employ the most elaborate of
Greek lyric measures; molding in a truly miraculous manner the stiff
Latin syllables into harmony with the graces of an alien rhythm, and
now and again simply paraphrasing from the Greek. The éclat of
this feat has helped no doubt to render the adventure of translating
Horace more enticing; but he has never been adequately translated,
and it is safe to prophesy that he never will be. His qualities are
combined in too rare and subtle proportions.
The first printed edition, with date, of the works of Quintus Ho-
ratius Flaccus appeared in Milan in 1474; and almost every year in
the four hundred odd that have elapsed since then has added one
more to the devoted critics and commentators of his text.
The end-
less procession of his poetical translators comprises, in English only,
## p. 7627 (#437) ###########################################
HORACE
7627
and within our own time, such names as those of Bulwer-Lytton,
Conington, Gladstone, Sir Theodore Martin, and Sir Stephen de Vere;
while the lively paraphrases of the brothers Field of Chicago, per-
haps for the very reason that they deal with Horace so nearly in the
spirit in which he dealt with his Grecian models, appear to come
nearer, sometimes, than all the laborious efforts of more exact schol-
ars to catching the tone of the inimitable original.
The subjoined English versions are nearly all selected from these
more modern renderings, for the reason that they are upon the whole
both the most scholarly and the most successful; and an effort has
been made to present a fair idea of their comparative merits.
Harmet Traces Preston
TO LEUCONOË
O
SEEK not thou-'tis not to know- what end to me, what end
to thee
The gods have given, nor Babylonish numbers test, Leuconoë.
How better far it is to bear whatever lot for us be cast!
Or whether Jove more winters still, or whether gives he this the last,
Which now on pumice-crags opposing ever breaks th' Etruscan sea;
Be wise; strain out thy wines, and trim thine all too long expectancy
To life's brief span. Now while we speak, invidious time hath slipt
away.
O thou, as little as may be the morrow trusting, snatch to-day!
Translation of Caskie Harrison.
TO THALIARCHUS
A
SPECTRAL form Soracte stands, snow-crowned,
His shrouded pines beneath their burden bending;
Not now, his rifts descending,
Leap the wild streams, in icy fetters bound.
Heap high the logs! Pour forth with lavish hand,
O Thaliarchus, draughts of long-stored wine,
Blood of the Sabine vine!
To-day be ours: the rest the gods command.
While storms lie quelled at their rebuke, no more
Shall the old ash her shattered foliage shed,
## p. 7628 (#438) ###########################################
7628
HORACE
The cypress bow her head,
The bursting billow whiten on the shore.
Scan not the future: count as gain each day
That Fortune gives thee; and despise not, boy,
Or love, or dance, or joy
Of martial games, ere yet thy locks be gray.
Thine be the twilight vow from faltering tongue;
The joyous laugh that self-betraying guides
To where the maiden hides;
The ring from finger half resisting wrung.
O
Translation of Sir Stephen de Vere.
TO THE SHIP OF STATE
From W. E. Gladstone's 'Odes of Horace. Copyright 1894, by Charles Scrib-
ner's Sons
SHIP! new billows sweep thee out
Seaward. What wilt thou? Hold the port, be stout!
Seest not thy mast
How rent by stiff southwestern blast?
Thy side, of rowers how forlorn!
Thine hull, with groaning yards, with rigging torn,
Can ill sustain
The fierce and ever fiercer main;
Thy gods, no more than sails entire,
From whom, yet once, thy need might aid require.
O Pontic pine,
The first of woodland stock is thine,
Yet race and name are but as dust.
Not painted sterns give storm-tost seamen trust
Unless thou dare
To be the sport of storms, beware!
Of old at best a weary weight,
A yearning care and constant strain of late,
O shun the seas
That gird those glittering Cyclades.
## p. 7629 (#439) ###########################################
HORACE
7629
C
TO CHLOE
Paraphrase out of Echoes from the Sabine Farm,' by E. and R. M. Field.
Copyright 1892, by A. C. McClurg & Co. ; 1895, by Charles Scribner's Sons
HLOE, you shun me like a hind
That, seeking vainly for her mother,
Hears danger in each breath of wind,
And wildly darts this way and t'other;
Whether the breezes sway the wood
Or lizards scuttle through the brambles,
She starts; and off as though pursued
The foolish frightened creature scrambles.
But, Chloe, you're no infant thing
That should esteem a man an ogre:
Let go your mother's apron-string
And pin your faith upon a toga!
TO VIRGIL
HY should we stem the tears that needs must flow?
WHY Why blush that they should freely flow and long
To think of that dear head in death laid low?
Do thou inspire my melancholy song.
Melpomene, in whom the Muses' sire
Joined with a liquid voice the mastery of the lyre!
And hath the sleep that knows no waking morn
Closed o'er Quinctilius,— our Quinctilius dear?
Where shall be found the man of woman born
That in desert might be esteemed his peer-
So simply meek, and yet so sternly just,
Of faith so pure, and all so absolute of trust?
He sank into his rest, bewept of many,
And but the good and noble wept for him;
But dearer cause thou, Virgil, hadst than any,
With friendship's tears thy friendless eyes to dim.
Alas, alas! not to such woeful end
Didst thou unto the gods thy prayers unceasing send!
What though thou modulate the tuneful shell
With defter skill than Orpheus of old Thrace,
## p. 7630 (#440) ###########################################
7630
HORACE
When deftliest he played, and with its spell
Moved all the listening forest from its place,
Yet never, never can thy art avail
To bring life's glowing tide back to the phantom pale
Whom, with his black, inexorable wand,
Hermes, austere and pitiless as fate,
Hath forced to join the dark and spectral band,
In their sad journey to the Stygian gate.
'Tis hard-great Heavens, how hard! But to endure
Alleviates the pang we cannot crush or cure.
Translated by Sir Theodore Martin.
TO QUINTUS DELLIUS
Paraphrase out of Echoes from the Sabine Farm,' by E. and R. M. Field.
Copyright 1892, by A. C. McClurg & Co. ; 1895, by Charles Scribner's Sons
E TRANQUIL, Dellius, I pray;
B
For though you pine your life away
With dull complaining breath,
Or speed with song and wine each day,
Still, still, your doom is death.
Where the white poplar and the pine
In glorious arching shade combine,
And the brook singing goes,
Bid them bring store of nard and wine
And garlands of the rose.
Let's live while chance and youth obtain:
Soon shall you quit this fair domain
Kissed by the Tiber's gold,
And all your earthly pride and gain
Some heedless heir shall hold.
One ghostly boat shall sometime bear
From scenes of mirthfulness or care
Each fated human soul,-
Shall waft and leave its burden where
The waves of Lethe roll.
So come, I prithee, Dellius mine;
Let's sing our songs and drink our wine
In that sequestered nook
Where the white poplar and the pine
Stand listening to the brook.
## p. 7631 (#441) ###########################################
HORACE
7631
AD AMPHORAM
O
HONEST jar! whose birth takes date,
Like mine, from Manlius's consulate,
Whether complaints or jokes they be,
Wrangling, or love's insanity,
Or quiet sleep that dwell with thee;
Beneath whatever brand 'tis thine
To bottle up choice Massic wine,
For happy day like this thou'rt fit:
Come down-Corvinus orders it—
And thy more mellow juice emit.
Though steeped in all Socratic learning,
From thee he will not, shocked, be turning.
The elder Cato oft, 'tis said,
His virtue's fire with liquor fed.
With Bacchic mirth thou layest bare
Wise men's deep counsel and their care.
Thou bring'st back hope to minds forlorn,
And vigor; and the poor man's horn
Upliftest, so that after thee
No dread of angered majesty
Or of a soldier's arms has he.
With thee shall Bacchus linger still,
And Venus (so she gladly will),
And Graces, slow to disunite,
And living lanterns, shining bright,
Till Phoebus put the stars to flight.
Translation of W. T. Thornton.
TO PHIDYLE
F, PHIDYLE, your hands you lift
I'
To heaven, as each new moon is born,
Soothing your Lares with the gift
Of slaughtered swine, and spice, and corn,
Ne'er shall Sirocco's bane assail
Your vines, nor mildew blast your wheat;
Ne'er shall your tender younglings fail
In autumn, when the fruits are sweet.
The destined victim, 'mid the snows
Of Algidus in oak woods fed,
Or where the Alban herbage grows,
Shall dye the pontiff's axes red.
## p. 7632 (#442) ###########################################
7632
HORACE
No need of butchered sheep for you
To make your homely prayers prevail!
Give but your little gods their due:
The rosemary twined with myrtle frail,
The sprinkled salt, the votive meal,
As soon their favor will regain —
Let but the hand be pure and leal-
As all the pomp of heifers slain.
Translation of John Conington.
AN INVITATION TO MECENAS
Paraphrase from Echoes from the Sabine Farm,' by E. and R. M. Field.
Copyright 1892, by A. C. McClurg & Co. ; 1895, by Charles Scribner's Sons
D
EAR noble friend! A virgin cask
Of wine solicits your attention;
And roses fair to deck your hair,
And things too numerous to mention.
So tear yourself awhile away
From urban turmoil, pride, and splendor,
And deign to share what humble fare
And sumptuous fellowship I tender.
The sweet content retirement brings
Smooths out the ruffled front of kings.
The evil planets have combined
To make the weather hot, and hotter;
By parboiled streams the shepherd dreams
Vainly of ice-cream soda-water.
And meanwhile you, defying heat,
With patriotic ardor ponder
On what old Rome essays at home,
And what her heathen do out yonder.
Mæcenas, no such vain alarm
Disturbs the quiet of this farm!
God in his providence obscures
The goal beyond this vale of sorrow,
And smiles at men in pity when
They strive to penetrate the morrow.
With faith that all is for the best,
Let's bear what burdens are presented;
Then we shall say, let come what may,
"We die, as we have lived, contented!
## p. 7633 (#443) ###########################################
HORACE
7633
Ours is to-day; God's is the rest -
He doth ordain who knoweth best. "
Dame Fortune plays me many a prank:
When she is kind, oh, how I go it!
But if again she's harsh, why, then
I am a very proper poet.
When favoring gales bring in my ships,
I hie to Rome and live in clover;
Elsewise I steer my skiff out here
And anchor till the storm blows over.
Compulsory virtue is the charm
Of life upon the Sabine Farm!
XIII-478
HORRIDA TEMPESTAS
THROU
HROUGH narrowed skies the tempest rages loud:
A vault low-hung and roofed with cloud
Bursts forth in rain and snow. The woods, the sea,
Echo the storm from Thracian Rhodope.
-
now:
Snatch we, my friends, the fitting moment -
While strong our knees, make smooth the wrinkled brow;
Bring forth the wine of ancient date
Pressed in Torquatus's consulate;
Of toil and danger speak no more:
Some god may yet our shattered state restore!
Perfume your hair with Achæmenian balm,
And bid Cyllene's lyre your troubled spirits calm.
-
'Twas thus the noble Centaur sung :-
"Unconquered youth, from Thetis sprung,
Thyself a mortal! The Dardanian land,
And cool Scamander rippling through the sand,
And gliding Simois, call thee to their side;
Nor shall thy mother o'er her azure tide
Lead thee in triumph to thy Phthian home:
Such the weird Fate's inexorable doom.
Grieve not, my son: in song and wassail find
A soothing converse and a solace kind. "
Translation of Sir Stephen de Vere.
## p. 7634 (#444) ###########################################
7634
HORACE
SATIRE
CHANCED that I, the other day,
I
Was sauntering up the Sacred Way,
And musing, as my habit is,
Some trivial random fantasies,
That for the time absorbed me quite,-
When there comes running up a wight,
Whom only by his name I knew:
"Ha, my dear fellow, how d'ye do? »
Grasping my hand, he shouted. "Why,
As times go, pretty well,” said I:
"And you, I trust, can say the same. "
But after me as still he came,
"Sir, is there anything," I cried,
"You want of me? " "Oh," he replied,
"I'm just the man you ought to know:
A scholar, author! "-"Is it so?
For this I'll like you all the more! "
Then, writhing to evade the bore,
I quicken now my pace, now stop,
And in my servant's ear let drop
Some words, and all the while I feel
Bathed in cold sweat from head to heel.
"Oh for a touch," I moaned in pain,
«< Bolanus, of thy slap-dash vein,
To put this incubus to rout! "
As he went chattering on about
Whatever he descries or meets,
The crowds, the beauty of the streets,
The city's growth, its splendor, size,
"You're dying to be off," he cries-
For all the while I'd been struck dumb:
"I've noticed it some time. But come,
Let's clearly understand each other:
It's no use making all this pother.
My mind's made up to stick by you;
So where you go, there I go too. "
"Don't put yourself," I answered, "pray,
So very far out of your way.
I'm on the road to see a friend,
Whom you don't know, that's near his end,
Away beyond the Tiber far,
Close by where Cæsar's gardens are. "
## p. 7635 (#445) ###########################################
HORACE
7635
"I've nothing in the world to do,
And what's a paltry mile or two?
I like it, so I'll follow you! "
Now we were close on Vesta's fane;
'Twas hard on ten, and he, my bane,
Was bound to answer to his bail,
Or lose his cause if he should fail.
"Do, if you love me, step aside
One moment with me here," he cried
"Upon my life, indeed I can't:
Of law I'm wholly ignorant,
And you know where I'm hurrying to. "
"I'm fairly puzzled what to do:
Give you up, or my cause. ” — “Oh, me,
Me, by all means! "-"I won't," quoth he,
And stalks on, holding by me tight.
As with your conqueror to fight
Is hard, I follow. "How," anon
He rambles off-"How get you on,
You and Mæcenas? To so few
He keeps himself. So clever, too!
No man more dexterous to seize
And use his opportunities.
Just introduce me, and you'll see
We'll pull together famously;
And hang me then, if with my backing
You don't send all your rivals packing! "
"Things in that quarter, sir, proceed
In very different style indeed.
No house more free from all that's base,
In none cabals more out of place.
It hurts me not if there I spy
Men richer, better read than I.
Each has his place! "- "Amazing tact!
Scarce credible! ». "But 'tis the fact. "
―
"You quicken my desire to get
An introduction to his set. "
We ran
At the next turn against the man
Who had the lawsuit with my bore.
"Ha, knave," he cried with loud uproar,
"Where are you off to? Will you here
Stand witness? " I present my ear.
To court he hustles him along;
High words are bandied, high and strong;
## p. 7636 (#446) ###########################################
7636
HORACE
HⓇ
ORACE
――
A mob collects, the fray to see:
So did Apollo rescue me.
Translation of Sir Theodore Martin.
CONTENTMENT
What did you think, my friend, of far-famed Lesbos and
Chios?
-
How about Samos the dainty, and Croesus's capital, Sardis ?
Colophon, too, and Smyrna? Above their fame, or beneath it?
Tiber's stream and the Campus excel them far, do you tell me?
Have you been praying for one of Attalus's cities, I wonder?
Lebedos is it you praise, of the sea and your journeyings wearied?
Bullatius- Yes! You know what Lebedos is: more dead than
Fidenæ.
Ay, or than Gabii; yet I would gladly abide there, forgetting
Those I have loved, and expecting that they in their turn will forg
me.
There I would dwell, and gaze from the shore on the furious waters.
Horace If a man travel in mud and in rain from Capua Rome-
ward,
Drenched though he be, he will choose not to tarry for life in the
tavern.
Even when chilled to the bones, we praise not the bath and the
furnace,
Truly believing that they would make life full and successful;
Nor, if impetuous Auster has tossed you about on the billow,
Would you for that get rid of your vessel beyond the Ægean.
If you are perfectly sound, then Rhodes and fair Mitylene
Help you no more than a cloak in the dog-days, trunks in midwinter,
Or in December a plunge in the Tiber, a furnace in August.
Now that you may, and the face of Fortune is smiling upon you,
Here at Rome praise far-off Rhodes, and Chios, and Samos.
This one hour that a god has bestowed upon you in his bounty,
Take with a grateful hand, nor plan next year to be happy:
So that wherever your life may be spent, you will say you enjoyed it.
For if anxieties only by reason and foresight are banished,—
Not by a spot that commands some outlook wide on the waters. —
Never our nature, but only the sky do we change as we travel.
Toilsome idleness wears us out. On wagon and shipboard
Comfort it is that we seek; yet that which you seek, it is with you,
Even in Ulubræ, if you lack not contentment of spirit.
Translation of William C. Lawton.
## p. 7637 (#447) ###########################################
HORACE
7637
HORACE'S FARM
L
EST you may question me whether my farm, most excellent Quinc-
tius,
Feeds its master with grain, or makes him rich with its olives,
Or with its orchards and pastures, or vines that cover the elm-trees,
I, in colloquial fashion, will tell you its shape and position.
Only my shadowy valley indents the continuous mountains,
Lying so that the sun at his coming looks on the right side,
Then, with retreating chariot, warming the left as he leaves it.
Surely the temperature you would praise; and what if the bushes
Bear in profusion scarlet berries, the oak and the ilex
Plentiful food for the herd provide, and shade for the master?
You would say, with its verdure, Tarentum was hither transported.
There is a fountain, deserving to give its name to a streamlet.
Not more pure nor cooler in Thrace runs winding the Hebrus.
Helpful it is to an aching head or a stomach exhausted.
Such is my ingle: sweet, and, if you believe me, delightful;
Keeping me sound and safe for you even in days of September.
Translation of William C. Lawton.
TO HIS BOOK
Paraphrase from Echoes from the Sabine Farm, by E. and R. M. Field.
Copyright 1892, by A. C. McClurg & Co. ; 1895, by Charles Scribner's Sons
vain self-conscious little book,
Companion of my happy days,
Now eagerly you seem to look
For wider fields to spread your lays;
My desk and locks cannot contain you,
Nor blush of modesty restrain you.
YOU
Well then, begone, fool that thou art!
But do not come to me and cry,
When critics strike you to the heart,
"Oh wretched little book am I! "
You know I tried to educate you
To shun the fate that must await you.
In youth you may encounter friends,
(Pray this prediction be not wrong! )
But wait until old age descends,
And thumbs have smeared your gentlest song:
## p. 7638 (#448) ###########################################
7638
HORACE
Then will the moths connive to eat you,
And rural libraries secrete you.
However, should a friend some word
Of my obscure career request,
Tell him how deeply I was stirred
To spread my wings beyond the nest;
Take from my years, which are before you,
To boom my merits, I implore you.
Tell him that I am short and fat,
Quick in my temper, soon appeased,
With locks of gray. but what of that?
Loving the sun, with nature pleased.
I'm more than four-and-forty, hark you-
But ready for a night off, mark you!
-
THE ART OF POETRY
SU
UPPOSE, by some wild freak of fancy led,
A painter were to join a human head
To neck of horse, cull here and there a limb,
And daub on feathers various as his whim,
So that a woman, lovely to a wish,
Went tailing off into a loathsome fish:
Could you, although the artist's self were there,
From laughter long and loud, my friends, forbear?
Well, trust me, Pisos, of that freak of art
The book would be the very counterpart,
Which with a medley of wild fancies teems,
Whirling in chaos like a sick man's dreams,
A maze of forms incongruous and base,
Where naught is of a piece, naught in its place.
To dare whate'er they please has always been
The painter's, poet's, privilege, I ween.
It is a boon that any one may plead -
Myself I claim it, and in turn concede;
But 'twill not do to urge the plea too far.
To join together things that clash and jar.
The savage with the gentle, were absurd,
Or couple lamb with tiger, snake with bird.
Mostly, when poems open with a grand
Inposing air, we may surmise at hand
## p. 7639 (#449) ###########################################
HORACE
7639
Some flashy fustian, here and there a patch
Of flaming scarlet, meant the eye to catch.
A grove shall be described, or Dian's shrine,
Or through delightsome plains for many a line
A brook shall wind, or the Rhine's rushing stream,
Or o'er the page the heavenly bow shall gleam.
All very fine, but wholly out of place!
You draw a cypress with consummate grace;
But what of that, if you have had your fee
To paint a wrecked man struggling in the sea?
A vase was meant: how comes it then about,
As the wheel turns, a common jug comes out?
Whate'er you write, by this great maxim run:
Let it be simple, homogeneous, one.
We poets, most of us, by the pretense,
Dear friends, are duped of seeming excellence.
We grow obscure in striving to be terse;
Aiming at ease, we enervate our verse;
For grandeur soaring, into bombast fall,
And, dreading that, like merest reptiles crawl:
Whilst he who seeks his readers to surprise
With common things shown in uncommon wise,
Will make his dolphins through the forests roam,
His wild boars ride upon the billows' foam.
So unskilled writers, in their haste to shun
One fault, are apt into a worse to run.
The humblest statuary, of those that nigh
The Emilian Circus their vocation ply,
A finger-nail will to a turn express,
And hit you off in bronze a flowing tress,-
Yet is his work a failure; for his soul
Can neither grasp nor mold a living whole.
In anything that I may ever write,
I would no more resemble such a wight
Than I would care to have dark hair, dark eyes,
If coupled with a nose of uncouth size.
All ye who labor in the Muses' bowers,
Select a theme proportioned to your powers,
And ponder long, and with the nicest care,
How much your shoulders can and cannot bear.
Once right in this, your words will freely flow,
And thought from thought in lucid order grow.
Now, if my judgment be not much amiss,
The charm and worth of order lie in this:
## p. 7640 (#450) ###########################################
7640
HORACE
In saying just what should just then be said,
And holding much that comes into the head
Deliberately back for future use,
When it may just the right effect produce.
In choice of words be cautious and select;
Dwell with delight on this, and that reject.
No slight success will be achieved, if you
By skillful setting make old phrases new.
Then, should new terms be wanted to explain
Things that till now in darkness hid have lain,
And you shall coin, now here, now there, a word
Which our bluff ancestors have never heard,
Due leave and license will not be refused,
If with good taste and sound discretion used.
Nay, such new words, if from a Grecian source,
Aptly applied, are welcomed as of course.
To Virgil and to Varius why forbid
What Plautus erewhile and Cæcilius did?
Or why to me begrudge a few words more,
If I can add them to my scanty score,
When Cato and old Ennius reveled each
In coining new words that enriched our speech?
A word that bears the impress of its day
As current coin will always find its way.
As forests change their foliage year by year,
Leaves that came first, first fall and disappear,-
So antique words die out, and in their room
Other spring up, of vigorous growth and bloom.
Ourselves, and all that's ours, to death are due;
And why should words not be as mortal too?
The landlocked port, a work well worthy kings,
That takes whole fleets within its sheltering wings;
Swamps, sterile long, all plashy, rank, and drear,
Groan 'neath the plow, and feed whole cities near;
The river, perilous to field and farm,
Its channel changed, can now no longer harm,-
These, and all earthly works, must pass away;
And words, shall they enjoy a longer day?
Some will revive that we no more allow,
And some die out that are in favor now,
If usage wills it so; for 'tis with her
The laws of language rest as sovereign arbiter.
Translation of Sir Theodore Martin.
## p. 7641 (#451) ###########################################
7641
RICHARD HENRY HENGIST HORNE
(1803-1884)
ICHARD HENRY HENGIST HORNE, English poet and essayist, au-
thor of more than twenty volumes of verse and prose, is
now chiefly remembered for his epic poem 'Orion. ' Three
large editions of this he published at a farthing a copy, "to show his
appreciation of the low esteem into which heroic poetry had fallen. "
The fourth edition commanded a shilling, and the fifth a half-crown.
Ten editions had been exhausted by 1874.
Horne's life was adventurous and interesting. He was born in
London January 1st, 1803, was educated at Sandhurst, and entered
as midshipman the Mexican navy, where he
served till the close of the War of Inde-
pendence. He then returned to London to
begin a literary career. To his early period
belong two tragedies, Cosmo de' Medici'
and The Death of Marlowe,' both of which
contain fine passages. A poem sent to him
for criticism by Elizabeth Barrett opened
the way to a cordial friendship and a cor-
respondence of seven years. These delight-
ful letters were published in 1877. Mrs.
Browning contributed to Horne's 'Poems of
Geoffrey Chaucer Modernized,' and wrote
several essays for his 'Spirit of the Age,'
a collection of criticisms published in 1844.
In 1852 Horne removed to Australia, and remained there until
1866; his book 'Australian Facts and Principles' was one outcome
of this residence. Again returning to England, he continued literary
work until his death at Margate, March 13th, 1884. His last works
were tragedies, including 'Judas Iscariot: A Miracle-Play,' and a
curious prose tract, Sithron the Star-Stricken' (1883), which he pre-
tended to take from the Arabian.
"
R. H. H. HORNE
Poe said that his 'Orion' might be called " a homily against
supineness and apathy in the cause of human progress, and in favor
of energetic action for the good of the race.
It is our delib-
erate opinion," he affirmed, "that in all that regards the loftiest and
holiest attributes of true poetry, 'Orion' has never been excelled. "
## p. 7642 (#452) ###########################################
7642
RICHARD HENRY HENGIST HORNE
The narrative is drawn from a number of Greek and Roman fables.
It describes the giant hunter Orion, who is loved by Artemis (Diana),
Merope, and Eos (Aurora). The jealous Artemis pierces him with her
arrows; but Zeus, in answer to the prayers of Eos, places him among
the constellations, where he may enjoy her affection forever.
MORNING
From Orion'
L
EVEL with the summit of that eastern mount
By slow approach, and like a promontory
Which seems to glide and meet a coming ship,
The pale-gold platform of the morning came
Towards the gliding mount. Against a sky
Of delicate purple, snow-bright courts and halls
Touched with light silvery green, gleaming across,
Fronted by pillars vast, cloud-capitaled,
With shafts of changeful pearl, all reared upon
An isle of clear aerial gold, came floating;
And in the centre, clad in fleecy white,
With lucid lilies in her golden hair,
Eos, sweet Goddess of the Morning, stood.
From the bright peak of that surrounded mount,
One step sufficed to gain the tremulous floor
Whereon the Palace of the Morning shone,
Scarcely a bow-shot distant; but that step
Orion's humbled and still mortal feet
Dared not adventure. In the Goddess's face
Imploringly he gazed. "Advance! " she said,
In tones more sweet than when some heavenly bird,
Hid in a rosy cloud, its morning hymn
Warbles unseen, wet with delicious dews,
And to earth's flowers all looking up in prayer,
"Believe-advance! —
Tells of the coming bliss.
Or, as the spheres move onward with their song
That calls me to awaken other lands,
That moment will escape which ne'er returns! »
Forward Orion stepped: the platform bright
Shook like the reflex of a star in water
Moved by the breeze, throughout its whole expanse;
And even the palace glistened fitfully,
As with electric shiver it sent forth
Odors of flowers divine and all fresh life.
## p. 7643 (#453) ###########################################
RICHARD HENRY HENGIST HORNE
7643
Still stood he where he stepped, nor to return
Attempted. To essay one pace beyond
He felt no power; yet onward he advanced
Safe to the Goddess, who, with hand outstretched,
Into the palace led him. Grace and strength,
With sense of happy change to finer earth,
Freshness of nature and belief in good,
Came flowing o'er his soul, and he was blest.
'Tis always morning somewhere in the world,
And Eos rises, circling constantly
The varied regions of mankind. No pause
Of renovation and of freshening rays
She knows; but evermore her love breathes forth
On field and forest, as on human hope,
Health, beauty, power, thought, action, and advance.
All this Orion witnessed, and rejoiced.
The turmoil he had known, the late distress
By loss of passion's object and of sight,
Were now exchanged for these serene delights
Of contemplation, as the influence
That Eos wrought around forever, dawned
Upon his vision and his inmost heart
In sweetness and success. All sympathy
With all fair things that in her circle lay,
She gave, and all received; nor knew of strife:
For from the Sun her cheek its bloom withdrew,
And ere intolerant noon, the floating realm
Of Eos-queen of the awakening earth
Was brightening other lands, wherefrom black Night
Her faded chariot down the sky had driven
Behind the sea. Thus from the earth upraised,
And over its tumultuous breast sustained
In peace and tranquil glory,- oh blest state!
Clear-browed Orion, full of thankfulness
And pure devotion to the goddess, dwelt
Within the glowing Palace of the Morn.
But these serene airs did not therefore bring
A death-sleep o'er the waves of memory,
Where all its clouds and colors, specks of sails,
Its car-borne gods, shipwrecks, and drowning men,
Passed full in view; yet with a mellowing sense
Ideal, and from pain sublimed. Thus came
Mirrors of nature to him, and full oft
Downward on Chios turned his happy eyes,
## p. 7644 (#454) ###########################################
7644
RICHARD HENRY HENGIST HORNE
With grateful thoughts that o'er life's sorrows wove
The present texture of a sweet content,
Passing all wisdom, or its fairest flower.
He saw the woods, and blessed them for the sake
Of Artemis; the city, and rich gloom
That o'er the cedar forest ever hung,
He also blessed for Merope; the isle
And all that dwelt there, he with smiles beheld.
## p. 7645 (#455) ###########################################
7645
JULIA WARD HOWE
(1819? -)
B
Y BIRTH a member of a fashionable New York circle; by edu-
cation a cultivated and accomplished woman of society; by
marriage made one of a group of zealous and uncompromis-
ing philanthropists,-abolitionists, prison reformers, equal-suffragists,
coeducationists, - Mrs. Julia Ward Howe has turned her eclectic train-
ing only to generous uses. She has published verse, travels, and
essays; she has taught - if much serious and eloquent journalistic
work may be reckoned among the higher forms of teaching; she has
won much reputation as a public speaker
on social, educational, and political subjects;
and it is not impossible that even had she
written nothing, her brilliant fame as a con-
versationist, and as the most inspiring of
companions, might insure her that vague
though sure renown which belongs to the
famous French hostesses of the seventeenth
century.
JULIA WARD HOWE
The New York of her youth was still a
neighborly city, where the small set of cul-
tivated and leisurely families saw much not
only of each other, but of the agreeable
foreigners who came to this country. Her
father, Samuel Ward, was a well-known
banker, to whom all notable persons brought letters of introduction,
and in whose household the young people learned to be agreeable, to
be alert, and to adjust their mental vision to an ever-widening hori-
zon. Mrs. Ward, a very cultivated woman, was herself a poet of some
merit, whose poems, never published, were greatly admired in private
circles. The clever second daughter took profit from all her experi-
ences, read everything that came in her way, attacked with energy
Latin and German,- a knowledge of languages being then generally
deemed superfluous if not disastrous in what was known as "female
education," and when still in short dresses wrote reams of verse.
Her wise elders, however, while encouraging her literary tastes, per-
mitted none of this intellectual green fruit to find a market.
She had been a New York belle for two or three seasons when her
marriage with Dr. Samuel Gridley Howe, of Boston, placed her in a
## p. 7646 (#456) ###########################################
7646
JULIA WARD HOWE
new world. This eminent philanthropist, then in the prime of middle
age, had devoted his whole life to the unfortunate. When hardly out
of college and medical school he had enlisted as a volunteer in the
cause of Greek Independence in the revolution of 1824,-the contest
to which Lord Byron gave his life; out of untrained material he had
created an excellent surgical corps for the insurgents; at the declara-
tion of peace he had established an industrial colony on the Isthmus
of Corinth; in 1830 he had served as president of a relief committee
in the Polish uprising, and been imprisoned in Prussia for his pains:
he had founded in South Boston the first American institution for the
instruction of the blind; and he was among the most efficient of the
antislavery crusaders. The friends who surrounded him took life and
themselves very seriously, and all sorts of causes came to the Howe
abode to be justified and adopted.
«<
Mrs. Howe's nature responded generously to these new demands.
She became the eager advocate of the oppressed, whether victims of
the law like the slave, of political tyranny like the Irish, the Poles,
or the Hungarians, or of public opinion,-as, to her thinking, were
all women. Her ready pen was always at service of her many
clients. But she found time to study French, Greek, and Italian, and
to devote herself to modern philosophy, working hard at Schelling,
Hegel, Fichte, Spinoza, and Kant. She wrote philosophical lectures.
which she read at her own house, and she helped to establish philo-
sophical clubs. With her husband she edited an able antislavery
paper, the Boston Commonwealth, to which she contributed leaders,
essays, poems, letters, and witty comments. In the ten or twelve
years following 1854 she published three volumes of poems,-'Passion
Flowers,' 'Words for the Hour,' and 'Later Lyrics'; two books of
travel, 'A Trip to Cuba' and 'From the Oak to the Olive'; and a
drama, 'The World's Own'; having written also in the same period
hundreds of clever newspaper letters to the New York Tribune and
the Anti-Slavery Standard. Since 1881 she has published 'Modern
Society,' a 'Life of Margaret Fuller,' and a second volume of essays,
entitled 'Is Polite Society Polite? ' She has chosen to include within
covers only a small part of her writings, nor does even their whole
bulk represent the life work of this versatile and public-spirited
author. She inspired the prosperous New England Women's Club, the
pioneer of its kind in America. She was a delegate to the World's
Prison Reform Congress in London, in 1872, and helped to found the
Women's Peace Association. She was president of the women's
branch of the great New Orleans Exposition in 1884, and she has
presided over innumerable clubs, conventions, and congresses.
Notwithstanding this enormous activity and productiveness, her
own countrymen associate her name almost wholly with one poem,
## p. 7647 (#457) ###########################################
JULIA WARD HOWE
7647
'The Battle Hymn of the Republic'; a poem struck off at white heat
early in the Civil War, when, in the camps about Washington, Mrs.
Howe was thrilled by the marching of thousands of gallant young
soldiers to the martial air of John Brown's Body. ' The regiments
caught up with enthusiasm the new words which she set to the
familiar tune; and the 'Battle Hymn' was sung in camp and field,
from Maine to the Gulf of Mexico. It became the Marseillaise of the
unemotional Yankee.
[All the following poems are taken from 'Later Lyrics,' copyright 1865, and
are reprinted by permission of Lee & Shepard, publishers, Boston. ]
BATTLE HYMN OF THE REPUBLIC
INE eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord:
M
He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are
stored;
He hath loosed the fateful lightning of his terrible swift sword:
His truth is marching on.
I have seen him in the watch-fires of a hundred circling camps;
They have builded him an altar in the evening dews and damps;
I can read his righteous sentence by the dim and flaring lamps:
His day is marching on.
I have read a fiery gospel, writ in burnished rows of steel:
"As ye deal with my contemners, so with you my grace shall deal;
Let the Hero, born of woman, crush the serpent with his heel,
Since God is marching on. "
He has sounded forth the trumpet that shall never call retreat;
He is sifting out the hearts of men before his judgment-seat:
Oh! be swift, my soul, to answer him! be jubilant, my feet!
Our God is marching on.
Horace never affected the aristocratic litter, but went and came
freely upon his own ambling mule, over one of the most beautiful
roads in all the world: southward across the campagna, threading
the hoary olives of the first ascent, and passing "many-fountained"
Tivoli; then up beside the Anio into the higher hills, until he turned
aside upon the left into the sunny silence of a yet more secluded
valley, that of the tributary Digentia, now Licenza.
men.
The early satires of Horace are plainly an outcome of the studies
of Archilochus which he had made at Athens; but he adopts the
measure and professes himself rather the disciple of Lucilius, the
rude forefather of the Latin satire. Of those first off-hand squibs
and sketches,-which he intimates in a passage already quoted that
he wrote for immediate pay,—it is uncertain how many he cared
afterward to include in his collected writings. The seventh satire of
the first book bears marks of having been written very early,-per-
haps while he was still playing the soldier in Greece. The third,
fourth, and tenth of the first book are in the main apologetic. They
defend the satire as the readiest and most efficient weapon of the
moralist, and as a wholesome check upon the follies and excesses of
They also proclaim his own resolve never to abuse the cen-
sor's privilege; and to indulge in no personal criticisms inconsist-
ent with the code of social honor of his age, and with a generally
kindly and tolerant view of the infirmities of humankind. The first
satire of the second book is one of the most dramatic and amusing
of the whole series. It is in the form of a dialogue with one Tre-
batius,—a rich and famous old lawyer, on the best of terms with the
powers that then were, who good-humoredly advises the poet to give
up altogether the ticklish trade of a satirist, and when he finds him-
self growing dangerously hot over the follies of the day, to reduce
his temperature by a bath in the Tiber! Great interest attaches to
the name of Horace's supposed interlocutor in this witty piece, for he
is the selfsame Trebatius for whom Cicero twenty-five years before
had procured a place on the staff of Cæsar in Gaul; who had loathed
the hardships of that country, and adroitly avoided following the
conqueror to Britain; and in whose beautiful villa at Reggio, Cicero
## p. 7624 (#434) ###########################################
7624
HORACE
had found refuge ten years later, when he was himself a fugitive
from Rome after the death of Cæsar. Trebatius was never the man
to have lost his head through any romantic adhesion to a fallen
cause; and it is positively startling to see how he preserves his
identity across a complete gap of so many years in our knowledge
of him.
All the eighteen satires of the two books, as well as most of the
Epodes, were apparently given to the world under the patronage of
Mæcenas, during the ten years or so which intervened between the
poet's introduction to that dignitary and the close of the weary civil
war by the victory of Actium. In them we find faithfully reflected
the daily life of the Roman streets, as well as the fashion of the
moment in what claimed to be the most exclusive circles of the cap-
ital. The earlier the composition, as a rule, the coarser the language
and the more caustic the tone. We fancy that we can see the
writer's expression becoming ever more suave and genial as his tem-
per mellowed with his days of modest prosperity, and his easy and
indulgent though never unmanly or ignoble philosophy of life took
shape and became a consciously accepted creed. He was never,
either in theory or practice, a very rigid moralist. He lashed men's
follies lightly and forgave their lapses freely. Himself, as judged by
the standards of the time, a clean and quiet liver, he was content to
hold up to ridicule, rather than to stern reprobation, the vices of
other men
"Telling a tale not too importunate
To those who in the sleepy region stay,
Lulled by the singer of an empty day. "
We have plenty of proof that there were moments when the gay
and facile Horace felt, no less keenly than the pensive and clair-
voyant Virgil habitually felt, the essential "emptiness," for a Roman
of that day, which followed the extinction of his civic personality.
More and more, as the years of his outwardly successful and brilliant
middle life slipped away, the patriotism of Horace became a resolutely
smothered regret; while his loves, which can never have been very
absorbing or impassioned, resolved themselves into the half amused,
half wistful recollection of transient affairs with women who had had
many lovers.
It is only when he sings of friendship, of honor and
gratitude, of faith and charity between man and man, that this con-
vinced Epicurean strikes a deeper note. The brevity of life and the
vacuity of death were ever present in the background of his thought;
but all the more was he minded to enjoy, to the full, the sunshine of
the passing day. Moderation in all things, content with the present,
courage in view of an absolutely uncertain future. - these things, in
## p. 7625 (#435) ###########################################
HORACE
7625
so far as Horace aspires to be didactic, constitute the sum and sub-
stance of his teaching.
It was inevitable that such a man, already fast bound by the
warmest of private ties to the first minister of Cæsar Octavianus,
should have accepted frankly the changed order of things when the
latter returned to Rome in 725, after the battle of Actium and the
deaths of Antony and Cleopatra, to assume the sceptre of a pacified
world. Liberty was past, and it behooved men to be thankful for
peace, and poets to praise it; believing if they could that it implied
the beginning of another age of gold. A good many of the more
respectable and better disposed Romans of that period did probably
believe this, after a fashion. The tragic note of covert warning dis-
cernible in the ode addressed by Horace (Odes, II. , x. ) to his ill-fated
friend Licinius Murena, the brother-in-law of Mæcenas, who was con-
demned and executed a few years later for conspiring against the
new government, shows how utterly wild and wanton that enterprise
must have appeared at the time. Sixty or seventy years were to
pass before the mystery of iniquity was ripe and all the vices inher-
ent in the imperial system became fully apparent; before the next
great Roman satirist, Persius, gave vent in mordant and melancholy
verse to the smothered rage of the best of the patrician remnant,
against the degrading "regiment" of their parvenu sovereigns.
Virtually, therefore, though not officially, Horace became the poet
laureate of the court which formed itself about the ruler who pres-
ently assumed the name of Augustus. All the great odes of the four
books belong to the next fifteen years; and of these, all the statelier
and more impersonal were written under imperial inspiration, and
some few, like the 'Carmen Sæculare,' and the fourth ode of the
fourth book,- which celebrates the German victories of Drusus,- in
response to direct imperial request. Yet Horace always managed to
preserve his personal freedom, and to avoid even the suspicion of
servility. He sang the triumphs of Augustus in golden numbers, but
he declined with respectful thanks the post of his private secretary.
Nor would he write an ode, to order, on the achievements of Agrippa;
but politely, if a little ironically, excused himself on the ground that
his light muse was unequal to so serious a theme (Odes, I. , vi. ).
The first book of the Epistles appeared about 731; probably be-
tween the second and third books of the Odes. The second, com-
prising the unfinished essay on the 'Art of Poetry,' was Horace's last
work, produced after he was fifty years old. His health was no longer
what it had been, and even the air of the dear valley overlooked
by pleasant Lucretilis" was becoming a trifle too brisk and bracing
for his nerves. Tibur (Tivoli) he thought suited him better, and he
prepared for himself a little installation there; but confesses in one
<<
## p. 7626 (#436) ###########################################
7626
HORACE
of his letters (Epistles, I. , viii. ) that he was restless as the wind:-
"When I am in Rome I am in love with Tibur, and when at Tibur,
with Rome. " Sometimes he longed for yet softer skies; and the
nook of earth which smiled upon him above all others "Ille terra-
rum mihi præter omnes Angulus ridet». was sunny Tarentum, with
its long spring and its gentle winter, which produced better honey
than Hymettus, better olives than leafy Venafrum, and better grapes
than Falernum itself (Odes, II. , vi. ). The end came when the poet
lacked only a few days of having completed his fifty-seventh year:
and by order of the Emperor he was laid beside Mæcenas, some-
where in the great gardens which the latter had planted upon the
redeemed Esquiline hill.
It is in the Odes that the genius of Horace finds its most perfect
expression, and through them he lives in the memory of mankind.
In them he shows himself so consummate an artist in words that
he can impart distinction even to the commonplaces of thought and
sentiment through the mere perfection of their form. His diction is
distilled to such crystalline clearness, he says what he has to say
so unapproachably and incredibly well, that his thought would be
wronged and obscured by the attempt to express it in any other
words than his own. Hence, of all poets ancient or modern, Shake-
speare alone excepted, he is perhaps most frequently quoted. The
phrase "curious felicity," applied in the age succeeding the Augus-
tan by Petronius to the style of Horace, is very apt; yet it seems
to emphasize just a little too strongly the notion of research. For
Horace's manner is after all so simple and seemingly spontaneous,
and his matter of such universal interest, that he has the effect of
addressing each reader confidentially, and making a special appeal to
him. And this air of exquisite familiarity and naturalness is the
more remarkable, because it pleased the accomplished singer of the
Odes to discard for the most part the simple iambics and hexameters
of his previous compositions, and to employ the most elaborate of
Greek lyric measures; molding in a truly miraculous manner the stiff
Latin syllables into harmony with the graces of an alien rhythm, and
now and again simply paraphrasing from the Greek. The éclat of
this feat has helped no doubt to render the adventure of translating
Horace more enticing; but he has never been adequately translated,
and it is safe to prophesy that he never will be. His qualities are
combined in too rare and subtle proportions.
The first printed edition, with date, of the works of Quintus Ho-
ratius Flaccus appeared in Milan in 1474; and almost every year in
the four hundred odd that have elapsed since then has added one
more to the devoted critics and commentators of his text.
The end-
less procession of his poetical translators comprises, in English only,
## p. 7627 (#437) ###########################################
HORACE
7627
and within our own time, such names as those of Bulwer-Lytton,
Conington, Gladstone, Sir Theodore Martin, and Sir Stephen de Vere;
while the lively paraphrases of the brothers Field of Chicago, per-
haps for the very reason that they deal with Horace so nearly in the
spirit in which he dealt with his Grecian models, appear to come
nearer, sometimes, than all the laborious efforts of more exact schol-
ars to catching the tone of the inimitable original.
The subjoined English versions are nearly all selected from these
more modern renderings, for the reason that they are upon the whole
both the most scholarly and the most successful; and an effort has
been made to present a fair idea of their comparative merits.
Harmet Traces Preston
TO LEUCONOË
O
SEEK not thou-'tis not to know- what end to me, what end
to thee
The gods have given, nor Babylonish numbers test, Leuconoë.
How better far it is to bear whatever lot for us be cast!
Or whether Jove more winters still, or whether gives he this the last,
Which now on pumice-crags opposing ever breaks th' Etruscan sea;
Be wise; strain out thy wines, and trim thine all too long expectancy
To life's brief span. Now while we speak, invidious time hath slipt
away.
O thou, as little as may be the morrow trusting, snatch to-day!
Translation of Caskie Harrison.
TO THALIARCHUS
A
SPECTRAL form Soracte stands, snow-crowned,
His shrouded pines beneath their burden bending;
Not now, his rifts descending,
Leap the wild streams, in icy fetters bound.
Heap high the logs! Pour forth with lavish hand,
O Thaliarchus, draughts of long-stored wine,
Blood of the Sabine vine!
To-day be ours: the rest the gods command.
While storms lie quelled at their rebuke, no more
Shall the old ash her shattered foliage shed,
## p. 7628 (#438) ###########################################
7628
HORACE
The cypress bow her head,
The bursting billow whiten on the shore.
Scan not the future: count as gain each day
That Fortune gives thee; and despise not, boy,
Or love, or dance, or joy
Of martial games, ere yet thy locks be gray.
Thine be the twilight vow from faltering tongue;
The joyous laugh that self-betraying guides
To where the maiden hides;
The ring from finger half resisting wrung.
O
Translation of Sir Stephen de Vere.
TO THE SHIP OF STATE
From W. E. Gladstone's 'Odes of Horace. Copyright 1894, by Charles Scrib-
ner's Sons
SHIP! new billows sweep thee out
Seaward. What wilt thou? Hold the port, be stout!
Seest not thy mast
How rent by stiff southwestern blast?
Thy side, of rowers how forlorn!
Thine hull, with groaning yards, with rigging torn,
Can ill sustain
The fierce and ever fiercer main;
Thy gods, no more than sails entire,
From whom, yet once, thy need might aid require.
O Pontic pine,
The first of woodland stock is thine,
Yet race and name are but as dust.
Not painted sterns give storm-tost seamen trust
Unless thou dare
To be the sport of storms, beware!
Of old at best a weary weight,
A yearning care and constant strain of late,
O shun the seas
That gird those glittering Cyclades.
## p. 7629 (#439) ###########################################
HORACE
7629
C
TO CHLOE
Paraphrase out of Echoes from the Sabine Farm,' by E. and R. M. Field.
Copyright 1892, by A. C. McClurg & Co. ; 1895, by Charles Scribner's Sons
HLOE, you shun me like a hind
That, seeking vainly for her mother,
Hears danger in each breath of wind,
And wildly darts this way and t'other;
Whether the breezes sway the wood
Or lizards scuttle through the brambles,
She starts; and off as though pursued
The foolish frightened creature scrambles.
But, Chloe, you're no infant thing
That should esteem a man an ogre:
Let go your mother's apron-string
And pin your faith upon a toga!
TO VIRGIL
HY should we stem the tears that needs must flow?
WHY Why blush that they should freely flow and long
To think of that dear head in death laid low?
Do thou inspire my melancholy song.
Melpomene, in whom the Muses' sire
Joined with a liquid voice the mastery of the lyre!
And hath the sleep that knows no waking morn
Closed o'er Quinctilius,— our Quinctilius dear?
Where shall be found the man of woman born
That in desert might be esteemed his peer-
So simply meek, and yet so sternly just,
Of faith so pure, and all so absolute of trust?
He sank into his rest, bewept of many,
And but the good and noble wept for him;
But dearer cause thou, Virgil, hadst than any,
With friendship's tears thy friendless eyes to dim.
Alas, alas! not to such woeful end
Didst thou unto the gods thy prayers unceasing send!
What though thou modulate the tuneful shell
With defter skill than Orpheus of old Thrace,
## p. 7630 (#440) ###########################################
7630
HORACE
When deftliest he played, and with its spell
Moved all the listening forest from its place,
Yet never, never can thy art avail
To bring life's glowing tide back to the phantom pale
Whom, with his black, inexorable wand,
Hermes, austere and pitiless as fate,
Hath forced to join the dark and spectral band,
In their sad journey to the Stygian gate.
'Tis hard-great Heavens, how hard! But to endure
Alleviates the pang we cannot crush or cure.
Translated by Sir Theodore Martin.
TO QUINTUS DELLIUS
Paraphrase out of Echoes from the Sabine Farm,' by E. and R. M. Field.
Copyright 1892, by A. C. McClurg & Co. ; 1895, by Charles Scribner's Sons
E TRANQUIL, Dellius, I pray;
B
For though you pine your life away
With dull complaining breath,
Or speed with song and wine each day,
Still, still, your doom is death.
Where the white poplar and the pine
In glorious arching shade combine,
And the brook singing goes,
Bid them bring store of nard and wine
And garlands of the rose.
Let's live while chance and youth obtain:
Soon shall you quit this fair domain
Kissed by the Tiber's gold,
And all your earthly pride and gain
Some heedless heir shall hold.
One ghostly boat shall sometime bear
From scenes of mirthfulness or care
Each fated human soul,-
Shall waft and leave its burden where
The waves of Lethe roll.
So come, I prithee, Dellius mine;
Let's sing our songs and drink our wine
In that sequestered nook
Where the white poplar and the pine
Stand listening to the brook.
## p. 7631 (#441) ###########################################
HORACE
7631
AD AMPHORAM
O
HONEST jar! whose birth takes date,
Like mine, from Manlius's consulate,
Whether complaints or jokes they be,
Wrangling, or love's insanity,
Or quiet sleep that dwell with thee;
Beneath whatever brand 'tis thine
To bottle up choice Massic wine,
For happy day like this thou'rt fit:
Come down-Corvinus orders it—
And thy more mellow juice emit.
Though steeped in all Socratic learning,
From thee he will not, shocked, be turning.
The elder Cato oft, 'tis said,
His virtue's fire with liquor fed.
With Bacchic mirth thou layest bare
Wise men's deep counsel and their care.
Thou bring'st back hope to minds forlorn,
And vigor; and the poor man's horn
Upliftest, so that after thee
No dread of angered majesty
Or of a soldier's arms has he.
With thee shall Bacchus linger still,
And Venus (so she gladly will),
And Graces, slow to disunite,
And living lanterns, shining bright,
Till Phoebus put the stars to flight.
Translation of W. T. Thornton.
TO PHIDYLE
F, PHIDYLE, your hands you lift
I'
To heaven, as each new moon is born,
Soothing your Lares with the gift
Of slaughtered swine, and spice, and corn,
Ne'er shall Sirocco's bane assail
Your vines, nor mildew blast your wheat;
Ne'er shall your tender younglings fail
In autumn, when the fruits are sweet.
The destined victim, 'mid the snows
Of Algidus in oak woods fed,
Or where the Alban herbage grows,
Shall dye the pontiff's axes red.
## p. 7632 (#442) ###########################################
7632
HORACE
No need of butchered sheep for you
To make your homely prayers prevail!
Give but your little gods their due:
The rosemary twined with myrtle frail,
The sprinkled salt, the votive meal,
As soon their favor will regain —
Let but the hand be pure and leal-
As all the pomp of heifers slain.
Translation of John Conington.
AN INVITATION TO MECENAS
Paraphrase from Echoes from the Sabine Farm,' by E. and R. M. Field.
Copyright 1892, by A. C. McClurg & Co. ; 1895, by Charles Scribner's Sons
D
EAR noble friend! A virgin cask
Of wine solicits your attention;
And roses fair to deck your hair,
And things too numerous to mention.
So tear yourself awhile away
From urban turmoil, pride, and splendor,
And deign to share what humble fare
And sumptuous fellowship I tender.
The sweet content retirement brings
Smooths out the ruffled front of kings.
The evil planets have combined
To make the weather hot, and hotter;
By parboiled streams the shepherd dreams
Vainly of ice-cream soda-water.
And meanwhile you, defying heat,
With patriotic ardor ponder
On what old Rome essays at home,
And what her heathen do out yonder.
Mæcenas, no such vain alarm
Disturbs the quiet of this farm!
God in his providence obscures
The goal beyond this vale of sorrow,
And smiles at men in pity when
They strive to penetrate the morrow.
With faith that all is for the best,
Let's bear what burdens are presented;
Then we shall say, let come what may,
"We die, as we have lived, contented!
## p. 7633 (#443) ###########################################
HORACE
7633
Ours is to-day; God's is the rest -
He doth ordain who knoweth best. "
Dame Fortune plays me many a prank:
When she is kind, oh, how I go it!
But if again she's harsh, why, then
I am a very proper poet.
When favoring gales bring in my ships,
I hie to Rome and live in clover;
Elsewise I steer my skiff out here
And anchor till the storm blows over.
Compulsory virtue is the charm
Of life upon the Sabine Farm!
XIII-478
HORRIDA TEMPESTAS
THROU
HROUGH narrowed skies the tempest rages loud:
A vault low-hung and roofed with cloud
Bursts forth in rain and snow. The woods, the sea,
Echo the storm from Thracian Rhodope.
-
now:
Snatch we, my friends, the fitting moment -
While strong our knees, make smooth the wrinkled brow;
Bring forth the wine of ancient date
Pressed in Torquatus's consulate;
Of toil and danger speak no more:
Some god may yet our shattered state restore!
Perfume your hair with Achæmenian balm,
And bid Cyllene's lyre your troubled spirits calm.
-
'Twas thus the noble Centaur sung :-
"Unconquered youth, from Thetis sprung,
Thyself a mortal! The Dardanian land,
And cool Scamander rippling through the sand,
And gliding Simois, call thee to their side;
Nor shall thy mother o'er her azure tide
Lead thee in triumph to thy Phthian home:
Such the weird Fate's inexorable doom.
Grieve not, my son: in song and wassail find
A soothing converse and a solace kind. "
Translation of Sir Stephen de Vere.
## p. 7634 (#444) ###########################################
7634
HORACE
SATIRE
CHANCED that I, the other day,
I
Was sauntering up the Sacred Way,
And musing, as my habit is,
Some trivial random fantasies,
That for the time absorbed me quite,-
When there comes running up a wight,
Whom only by his name I knew:
"Ha, my dear fellow, how d'ye do? »
Grasping my hand, he shouted. "Why,
As times go, pretty well,” said I:
"And you, I trust, can say the same. "
But after me as still he came,
"Sir, is there anything," I cried,
"You want of me? " "Oh," he replied,
"I'm just the man you ought to know:
A scholar, author! "-"Is it so?
For this I'll like you all the more! "
Then, writhing to evade the bore,
I quicken now my pace, now stop,
And in my servant's ear let drop
Some words, and all the while I feel
Bathed in cold sweat from head to heel.
"Oh for a touch," I moaned in pain,
«< Bolanus, of thy slap-dash vein,
To put this incubus to rout! "
As he went chattering on about
Whatever he descries or meets,
The crowds, the beauty of the streets,
The city's growth, its splendor, size,
"You're dying to be off," he cries-
For all the while I'd been struck dumb:
"I've noticed it some time. But come,
Let's clearly understand each other:
It's no use making all this pother.
My mind's made up to stick by you;
So where you go, there I go too. "
"Don't put yourself," I answered, "pray,
So very far out of your way.
I'm on the road to see a friend,
Whom you don't know, that's near his end,
Away beyond the Tiber far,
Close by where Cæsar's gardens are. "
## p. 7635 (#445) ###########################################
HORACE
7635
"I've nothing in the world to do,
And what's a paltry mile or two?
I like it, so I'll follow you! "
Now we were close on Vesta's fane;
'Twas hard on ten, and he, my bane,
Was bound to answer to his bail,
Or lose his cause if he should fail.
"Do, if you love me, step aside
One moment with me here," he cried
"Upon my life, indeed I can't:
Of law I'm wholly ignorant,
And you know where I'm hurrying to. "
"I'm fairly puzzled what to do:
Give you up, or my cause. ” — “Oh, me,
Me, by all means! "-"I won't," quoth he,
And stalks on, holding by me tight.
As with your conqueror to fight
Is hard, I follow. "How," anon
He rambles off-"How get you on,
You and Mæcenas? To so few
He keeps himself. So clever, too!
No man more dexterous to seize
And use his opportunities.
Just introduce me, and you'll see
We'll pull together famously;
And hang me then, if with my backing
You don't send all your rivals packing! "
"Things in that quarter, sir, proceed
In very different style indeed.
No house more free from all that's base,
In none cabals more out of place.
It hurts me not if there I spy
Men richer, better read than I.
Each has his place! "- "Amazing tact!
Scarce credible! ». "But 'tis the fact. "
―
"You quicken my desire to get
An introduction to his set. "
We ran
At the next turn against the man
Who had the lawsuit with my bore.
"Ha, knave," he cried with loud uproar,
"Where are you off to? Will you here
Stand witness? " I present my ear.
To court he hustles him along;
High words are bandied, high and strong;
## p. 7636 (#446) ###########################################
7636
HORACE
HⓇ
ORACE
――
A mob collects, the fray to see:
So did Apollo rescue me.
Translation of Sir Theodore Martin.
CONTENTMENT
What did you think, my friend, of far-famed Lesbos and
Chios?
-
How about Samos the dainty, and Croesus's capital, Sardis ?
Colophon, too, and Smyrna? Above their fame, or beneath it?
Tiber's stream and the Campus excel them far, do you tell me?
Have you been praying for one of Attalus's cities, I wonder?
Lebedos is it you praise, of the sea and your journeyings wearied?
Bullatius- Yes! You know what Lebedos is: more dead than
Fidenæ.
Ay, or than Gabii; yet I would gladly abide there, forgetting
Those I have loved, and expecting that they in their turn will forg
me.
There I would dwell, and gaze from the shore on the furious waters.
Horace If a man travel in mud and in rain from Capua Rome-
ward,
Drenched though he be, he will choose not to tarry for life in the
tavern.
Even when chilled to the bones, we praise not the bath and the
furnace,
Truly believing that they would make life full and successful;
Nor, if impetuous Auster has tossed you about on the billow,
Would you for that get rid of your vessel beyond the Ægean.
If you are perfectly sound, then Rhodes and fair Mitylene
Help you no more than a cloak in the dog-days, trunks in midwinter,
Or in December a plunge in the Tiber, a furnace in August.
Now that you may, and the face of Fortune is smiling upon you,
Here at Rome praise far-off Rhodes, and Chios, and Samos.
This one hour that a god has bestowed upon you in his bounty,
Take with a grateful hand, nor plan next year to be happy:
So that wherever your life may be spent, you will say you enjoyed it.
For if anxieties only by reason and foresight are banished,—
Not by a spot that commands some outlook wide on the waters. —
Never our nature, but only the sky do we change as we travel.
Toilsome idleness wears us out. On wagon and shipboard
Comfort it is that we seek; yet that which you seek, it is with you,
Even in Ulubræ, if you lack not contentment of spirit.
Translation of William C. Lawton.
## p. 7637 (#447) ###########################################
HORACE
7637
HORACE'S FARM
L
EST you may question me whether my farm, most excellent Quinc-
tius,
Feeds its master with grain, or makes him rich with its olives,
Or with its orchards and pastures, or vines that cover the elm-trees,
I, in colloquial fashion, will tell you its shape and position.
Only my shadowy valley indents the continuous mountains,
Lying so that the sun at his coming looks on the right side,
Then, with retreating chariot, warming the left as he leaves it.
Surely the temperature you would praise; and what if the bushes
Bear in profusion scarlet berries, the oak and the ilex
Plentiful food for the herd provide, and shade for the master?
You would say, with its verdure, Tarentum was hither transported.
There is a fountain, deserving to give its name to a streamlet.
Not more pure nor cooler in Thrace runs winding the Hebrus.
Helpful it is to an aching head or a stomach exhausted.
Such is my ingle: sweet, and, if you believe me, delightful;
Keeping me sound and safe for you even in days of September.
Translation of William C. Lawton.
TO HIS BOOK
Paraphrase from Echoes from the Sabine Farm, by E. and R. M. Field.
Copyright 1892, by A. C. McClurg & Co. ; 1895, by Charles Scribner's Sons
vain self-conscious little book,
Companion of my happy days,
Now eagerly you seem to look
For wider fields to spread your lays;
My desk and locks cannot contain you,
Nor blush of modesty restrain you.
YOU
Well then, begone, fool that thou art!
But do not come to me and cry,
When critics strike you to the heart,
"Oh wretched little book am I! "
You know I tried to educate you
To shun the fate that must await you.
In youth you may encounter friends,
(Pray this prediction be not wrong! )
But wait until old age descends,
And thumbs have smeared your gentlest song:
## p. 7638 (#448) ###########################################
7638
HORACE
Then will the moths connive to eat you,
And rural libraries secrete you.
However, should a friend some word
Of my obscure career request,
Tell him how deeply I was stirred
To spread my wings beyond the nest;
Take from my years, which are before you,
To boom my merits, I implore you.
Tell him that I am short and fat,
Quick in my temper, soon appeased,
With locks of gray. but what of that?
Loving the sun, with nature pleased.
I'm more than four-and-forty, hark you-
But ready for a night off, mark you!
-
THE ART OF POETRY
SU
UPPOSE, by some wild freak of fancy led,
A painter were to join a human head
To neck of horse, cull here and there a limb,
And daub on feathers various as his whim,
So that a woman, lovely to a wish,
Went tailing off into a loathsome fish:
Could you, although the artist's self were there,
From laughter long and loud, my friends, forbear?
Well, trust me, Pisos, of that freak of art
The book would be the very counterpart,
Which with a medley of wild fancies teems,
Whirling in chaos like a sick man's dreams,
A maze of forms incongruous and base,
Where naught is of a piece, naught in its place.
To dare whate'er they please has always been
The painter's, poet's, privilege, I ween.
It is a boon that any one may plead -
Myself I claim it, and in turn concede;
But 'twill not do to urge the plea too far.
To join together things that clash and jar.
The savage with the gentle, were absurd,
Or couple lamb with tiger, snake with bird.
Mostly, when poems open with a grand
Inposing air, we may surmise at hand
## p. 7639 (#449) ###########################################
HORACE
7639
Some flashy fustian, here and there a patch
Of flaming scarlet, meant the eye to catch.
A grove shall be described, or Dian's shrine,
Or through delightsome plains for many a line
A brook shall wind, or the Rhine's rushing stream,
Or o'er the page the heavenly bow shall gleam.
All very fine, but wholly out of place!
You draw a cypress with consummate grace;
But what of that, if you have had your fee
To paint a wrecked man struggling in the sea?
A vase was meant: how comes it then about,
As the wheel turns, a common jug comes out?
Whate'er you write, by this great maxim run:
Let it be simple, homogeneous, one.
We poets, most of us, by the pretense,
Dear friends, are duped of seeming excellence.
We grow obscure in striving to be terse;
Aiming at ease, we enervate our verse;
For grandeur soaring, into bombast fall,
And, dreading that, like merest reptiles crawl:
Whilst he who seeks his readers to surprise
With common things shown in uncommon wise,
Will make his dolphins through the forests roam,
His wild boars ride upon the billows' foam.
So unskilled writers, in their haste to shun
One fault, are apt into a worse to run.
The humblest statuary, of those that nigh
The Emilian Circus their vocation ply,
A finger-nail will to a turn express,
And hit you off in bronze a flowing tress,-
Yet is his work a failure; for his soul
Can neither grasp nor mold a living whole.
In anything that I may ever write,
I would no more resemble such a wight
Than I would care to have dark hair, dark eyes,
If coupled with a nose of uncouth size.
All ye who labor in the Muses' bowers,
Select a theme proportioned to your powers,
And ponder long, and with the nicest care,
How much your shoulders can and cannot bear.
Once right in this, your words will freely flow,
And thought from thought in lucid order grow.
Now, if my judgment be not much amiss,
The charm and worth of order lie in this:
## p. 7640 (#450) ###########################################
7640
HORACE
In saying just what should just then be said,
And holding much that comes into the head
Deliberately back for future use,
When it may just the right effect produce.
In choice of words be cautious and select;
Dwell with delight on this, and that reject.
No slight success will be achieved, if you
By skillful setting make old phrases new.
Then, should new terms be wanted to explain
Things that till now in darkness hid have lain,
And you shall coin, now here, now there, a word
Which our bluff ancestors have never heard,
Due leave and license will not be refused,
If with good taste and sound discretion used.
Nay, such new words, if from a Grecian source,
Aptly applied, are welcomed as of course.
To Virgil and to Varius why forbid
What Plautus erewhile and Cæcilius did?
Or why to me begrudge a few words more,
If I can add them to my scanty score,
When Cato and old Ennius reveled each
In coining new words that enriched our speech?
A word that bears the impress of its day
As current coin will always find its way.
As forests change their foliage year by year,
Leaves that came first, first fall and disappear,-
So antique words die out, and in their room
Other spring up, of vigorous growth and bloom.
Ourselves, and all that's ours, to death are due;
And why should words not be as mortal too?
The landlocked port, a work well worthy kings,
That takes whole fleets within its sheltering wings;
Swamps, sterile long, all plashy, rank, and drear,
Groan 'neath the plow, and feed whole cities near;
The river, perilous to field and farm,
Its channel changed, can now no longer harm,-
These, and all earthly works, must pass away;
And words, shall they enjoy a longer day?
Some will revive that we no more allow,
And some die out that are in favor now,
If usage wills it so; for 'tis with her
The laws of language rest as sovereign arbiter.
Translation of Sir Theodore Martin.
## p. 7641 (#451) ###########################################
7641
RICHARD HENRY HENGIST HORNE
(1803-1884)
ICHARD HENRY HENGIST HORNE, English poet and essayist, au-
thor of more than twenty volumes of verse and prose, is
now chiefly remembered for his epic poem 'Orion. ' Three
large editions of this he published at a farthing a copy, "to show his
appreciation of the low esteem into which heroic poetry had fallen. "
The fourth edition commanded a shilling, and the fifth a half-crown.
Ten editions had been exhausted by 1874.
Horne's life was adventurous and interesting. He was born in
London January 1st, 1803, was educated at Sandhurst, and entered
as midshipman the Mexican navy, where he
served till the close of the War of Inde-
pendence. He then returned to London to
begin a literary career. To his early period
belong two tragedies, Cosmo de' Medici'
and The Death of Marlowe,' both of which
contain fine passages. A poem sent to him
for criticism by Elizabeth Barrett opened
the way to a cordial friendship and a cor-
respondence of seven years. These delight-
ful letters were published in 1877. Mrs.
Browning contributed to Horne's 'Poems of
Geoffrey Chaucer Modernized,' and wrote
several essays for his 'Spirit of the Age,'
a collection of criticisms published in 1844.
In 1852 Horne removed to Australia, and remained there until
1866; his book 'Australian Facts and Principles' was one outcome
of this residence. Again returning to England, he continued literary
work until his death at Margate, March 13th, 1884. His last works
were tragedies, including 'Judas Iscariot: A Miracle-Play,' and a
curious prose tract, Sithron the Star-Stricken' (1883), which he pre-
tended to take from the Arabian.
"
R. H. H. HORNE
Poe said that his 'Orion' might be called " a homily against
supineness and apathy in the cause of human progress, and in favor
of energetic action for the good of the race.
It is our delib-
erate opinion," he affirmed, "that in all that regards the loftiest and
holiest attributes of true poetry, 'Orion' has never been excelled. "
## p. 7642 (#452) ###########################################
7642
RICHARD HENRY HENGIST HORNE
The narrative is drawn from a number of Greek and Roman fables.
It describes the giant hunter Orion, who is loved by Artemis (Diana),
Merope, and Eos (Aurora). The jealous Artemis pierces him with her
arrows; but Zeus, in answer to the prayers of Eos, places him among
the constellations, where he may enjoy her affection forever.
MORNING
From Orion'
L
EVEL with the summit of that eastern mount
By slow approach, and like a promontory
Which seems to glide and meet a coming ship,
The pale-gold platform of the morning came
Towards the gliding mount. Against a sky
Of delicate purple, snow-bright courts and halls
Touched with light silvery green, gleaming across,
Fronted by pillars vast, cloud-capitaled,
With shafts of changeful pearl, all reared upon
An isle of clear aerial gold, came floating;
And in the centre, clad in fleecy white,
With lucid lilies in her golden hair,
Eos, sweet Goddess of the Morning, stood.
From the bright peak of that surrounded mount,
One step sufficed to gain the tremulous floor
Whereon the Palace of the Morning shone,
Scarcely a bow-shot distant; but that step
Orion's humbled and still mortal feet
Dared not adventure. In the Goddess's face
Imploringly he gazed. "Advance! " she said,
In tones more sweet than when some heavenly bird,
Hid in a rosy cloud, its morning hymn
Warbles unseen, wet with delicious dews,
And to earth's flowers all looking up in prayer,
"Believe-advance! —
Tells of the coming bliss.
Or, as the spheres move onward with their song
That calls me to awaken other lands,
That moment will escape which ne'er returns! »
Forward Orion stepped: the platform bright
Shook like the reflex of a star in water
Moved by the breeze, throughout its whole expanse;
And even the palace glistened fitfully,
As with electric shiver it sent forth
Odors of flowers divine and all fresh life.
## p. 7643 (#453) ###########################################
RICHARD HENRY HENGIST HORNE
7643
Still stood he where he stepped, nor to return
Attempted. To essay one pace beyond
He felt no power; yet onward he advanced
Safe to the Goddess, who, with hand outstretched,
Into the palace led him. Grace and strength,
With sense of happy change to finer earth,
Freshness of nature and belief in good,
Came flowing o'er his soul, and he was blest.
'Tis always morning somewhere in the world,
And Eos rises, circling constantly
The varied regions of mankind. No pause
Of renovation and of freshening rays
She knows; but evermore her love breathes forth
On field and forest, as on human hope,
Health, beauty, power, thought, action, and advance.
All this Orion witnessed, and rejoiced.
The turmoil he had known, the late distress
By loss of passion's object and of sight,
Were now exchanged for these serene delights
Of contemplation, as the influence
That Eos wrought around forever, dawned
Upon his vision and his inmost heart
In sweetness and success. All sympathy
With all fair things that in her circle lay,
She gave, and all received; nor knew of strife:
For from the Sun her cheek its bloom withdrew,
And ere intolerant noon, the floating realm
Of Eos-queen of the awakening earth
Was brightening other lands, wherefrom black Night
Her faded chariot down the sky had driven
Behind the sea. Thus from the earth upraised,
And over its tumultuous breast sustained
In peace and tranquil glory,- oh blest state!
Clear-browed Orion, full of thankfulness
And pure devotion to the goddess, dwelt
Within the glowing Palace of the Morn.
But these serene airs did not therefore bring
A death-sleep o'er the waves of memory,
Where all its clouds and colors, specks of sails,
Its car-borne gods, shipwrecks, and drowning men,
Passed full in view; yet with a mellowing sense
Ideal, and from pain sublimed. Thus came
Mirrors of nature to him, and full oft
Downward on Chios turned his happy eyes,
## p. 7644 (#454) ###########################################
7644
RICHARD HENRY HENGIST HORNE
With grateful thoughts that o'er life's sorrows wove
The present texture of a sweet content,
Passing all wisdom, or its fairest flower.
He saw the woods, and blessed them for the sake
Of Artemis; the city, and rich gloom
That o'er the cedar forest ever hung,
He also blessed for Merope; the isle
And all that dwelt there, he with smiles beheld.
## p. 7645 (#455) ###########################################
7645
JULIA WARD HOWE
(1819? -)
B
Y BIRTH a member of a fashionable New York circle; by edu-
cation a cultivated and accomplished woman of society; by
marriage made one of a group of zealous and uncompromis-
ing philanthropists,-abolitionists, prison reformers, equal-suffragists,
coeducationists, - Mrs. Julia Ward Howe has turned her eclectic train-
ing only to generous uses. She has published verse, travels, and
essays; she has taught - if much serious and eloquent journalistic
work may be reckoned among the higher forms of teaching; she has
won much reputation as a public speaker
on social, educational, and political subjects;
and it is not impossible that even had she
written nothing, her brilliant fame as a con-
versationist, and as the most inspiring of
companions, might insure her that vague
though sure renown which belongs to the
famous French hostesses of the seventeenth
century.
JULIA WARD HOWE
The New York of her youth was still a
neighborly city, where the small set of cul-
tivated and leisurely families saw much not
only of each other, but of the agreeable
foreigners who came to this country. Her
father, Samuel Ward, was a well-known
banker, to whom all notable persons brought letters of introduction,
and in whose household the young people learned to be agreeable, to
be alert, and to adjust their mental vision to an ever-widening hori-
zon. Mrs. Ward, a very cultivated woman, was herself a poet of some
merit, whose poems, never published, were greatly admired in private
circles. The clever second daughter took profit from all her experi-
ences, read everything that came in her way, attacked with energy
Latin and German,- a knowledge of languages being then generally
deemed superfluous if not disastrous in what was known as "female
education," and when still in short dresses wrote reams of verse.
Her wise elders, however, while encouraging her literary tastes, per-
mitted none of this intellectual green fruit to find a market.
She had been a New York belle for two or three seasons when her
marriage with Dr. Samuel Gridley Howe, of Boston, placed her in a
## p. 7646 (#456) ###########################################
7646
JULIA WARD HOWE
new world. This eminent philanthropist, then in the prime of middle
age, had devoted his whole life to the unfortunate. When hardly out
of college and medical school he had enlisted as a volunteer in the
cause of Greek Independence in the revolution of 1824,-the contest
to which Lord Byron gave his life; out of untrained material he had
created an excellent surgical corps for the insurgents; at the declara-
tion of peace he had established an industrial colony on the Isthmus
of Corinth; in 1830 he had served as president of a relief committee
in the Polish uprising, and been imprisoned in Prussia for his pains:
he had founded in South Boston the first American institution for the
instruction of the blind; and he was among the most efficient of the
antislavery crusaders. The friends who surrounded him took life and
themselves very seriously, and all sorts of causes came to the Howe
abode to be justified and adopted.
«<
Mrs. Howe's nature responded generously to these new demands.
She became the eager advocate of the oppressed, whether victims of
the law like the slave, of political tyranny like the Irish, the Poles,
or the Hungarians, or of public opinion,-as, to her thinking, were
all women. Her ready pen was always at service of her many
clients. But she found time to study French, Greek, and Italian, and
to devote herself to modern philosophy, working hard at Schelling,
Hegel, Fichte, Spinoza, and Kant. She wrote philosophical lectures.
which she read at her own house, and she helped to establish philo-
sophical clubs. With her husband she edited an able antislavery
paper, the Boston Commonwealth, to which she contributed leaders,
essays, poems, letters, and witty comments. In the ten or twelve
years following 1854 she published three volumes of poems,-'Passion
Flowers,' 'Words for the Hour,' and 'Later Lyrics'; two books of
travel, 'A Trip to Cuba' and 'From the Oak to the Olive'; and a
drama, 'The World's Own'; having written also in the same period
hundreds of clever newspaper letters to the New York Tribune and
the Anti-Slavery Standard. Since 1881 she has published 'Modern
Society,' a 'Life of Margaret Fuller,' and a second volume of essays,
entitled 'Is Polite Society Polite? ' She has chosen to include within
covers only a small part of her writings, nor does even their whole
bulk represent the life work of this versatile and public-spirited
author. She inspired the prosperous New England Women's Club, the
pioneer of its kind in America. She was a delegate to the World's
Prison Reform Congress in London, in 1872, and helped to found the
Women's Peace Association. She was president of the women's
branch of the great New Orleans Exposition in 1884, and she has
presided over innumerable clubs, conventions, and congresses.
Notwithstanding this enormous activity and productiveness, her
own countrymen associate her name almost wholly with one poem,
## p. 7647 (#457) ###########################################
JULIA WARD HOWE
7647
'The Battle Hymn of the Republic'; a poem struck off at white heat
early in the Civil War, when, in the camps about Washington, Mrs.
Howe was thrilled by the marching of thousands of gallant young
soldiers to the martial air of John Brown's Body. ' The regiments
caught up with enthusiasm the new words which she set to the
familiar tune; and the 'Battle Hymn' was sung in camp and field,
from Maine to the Gulf of Mexico. It became the Marseillaise of the
unemotional Yankee.
[All the following poems are taken from 'Later Lyrics,' copyright 1865, and
are reprinted by permission of Lee & Shepard, publishers, Boston. ]
BATTLE HYMN OF THE REPUBLIC
INE eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord:
M
He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are
stored;
He hath loosed the fateful lightning of his terrible swift sword:
His truth is marching on.
I have seen him in the watch-fires of a hundred circling camps;
They have builded him an altar in the evening dews and damps;
I can read his righteous sentence by the dim and flaring lamps:
His day is marching on.
I have read a fiery gospel, writ in burnished rows of steel:
"As ye deal with my contemners, so with you my grace shall deal;
Let the Hero, born of woman, crush the serpent with his heel,
Since God is marching on. "
He has sounded forth the trumpet that shall never call retreat;
He is sifting out the hearts of men before his judgment-seat:
Oh! be swift, my soul, to answer him! be jubilant, my feet!
Our God is marching on.
