Ibc Cantcrburj? NTHOLDGY EX iiBiys IVELLIS^i FVODEIVrSi EM ipoo Z\)c Canterbury) poet: Edited by William Sharp. SELECTIONS FROM THE GREEK ANTHOLOGY. mi ^m ELECTIONS FROM THE Xc) GREEK ANTHOLOGY. EDITED BY GRAHAM R. TOMS ON. Author of " The Bird Bride : and other Poeiivi,'' iL-c, d-c. The Translations by Dr. Richard Garxett, Mr. Andrew Lang, Miss Alma Strettell, Mr. Goldwin Smith, Mr. W. M. Hardinge, and Others. LONDON : WALTER SCOTT, 24 WARWICK LANE, NEW YORK AND TORONTO: W. J. GAGE & CO. CONTENTS. PAGE h, Agathias Alma Strettell 1 Agathiaa William M. Uardinge 2 Agathias Andrew Lan J 3 Agathias William i[. Hardinge 4 Agathias . Richard Garnett 5 Agathias . Richard Garnett 6 Agathias Robert Bland 7 Agathias William M. Uardinge 8 Agathias W. She.pherd 9 Agathias . Richard Garnett 10 Agathias . Richard Garnett 11 Agathias Alma Strettell 12 Agathias . Richard Garnett 13 Agathias . Richard Garnett 14 -; Agis . . Richard Garnett 15 /' Alcaeus of Mess ene Robert Bland 16 ^ Anacreon Anacreon Thomas Bateson 17 . Sir Edwin Arnold 18 ;^1 Anonymous Alma Strettell 19 Anonymous Alma Strettell 20 Anonymous . Richard Garnett 21 Anonymous Almu Strettell 22 Anonymous Andreio Lang 23 Anonymous William M. Hardinge 24 Anonymous Alma Strettell 25 Anonymous (or ^sopu.s) Alma Strettell 26 Anonymous .... Alma Strettell 27 vi CONTENTS. PAGE Anonymous . . . . . . TF. Cowper 28 Anonymous . Goldwin Smith 29 Anonymous J. E. Sandys 30 Anonymous . Richard Garnett 31 Anonymous Edmund Gosse 32 Anonymous Edmund Gosse 33 Anonymous Alma Strettell 34 Anonymous . Richard Garnett 35 Anonymous Croive 36 Anonymous J A. Sijmonds, M.D. 37 Anonymous . Ft. Wrangham 38 Anonymous . H. Welledey 39 Anonymous Goldwin Smith 40 AnonjTnous Shelley 41 Anonymous Alma Strettell 42 Anonymous Goldwin Smith 43 Anonymous (or Callimachus \ W illiam M. Hardinge 44 Anonymous Richard Garnett 45 Anonymous Alma Strettell 46 Anonymous Alma Strettell 47 Anonymous Alma Strettell 48 Anonymous George Surges 49 Anonymous '. W lliavi M. Hardinge 50 Anonymous Anonymous 51 Antipater of Byzantium Alma Strettell 52 Antipater of Sidon Lewis Campbell 53 Antipater of Sidon . . Richard Garnett 54 Antipater Charles Whihley 55 Antipater of Sidon . Richard Garnett 56 Antipater Andrew Lang 57 Antipater of Sidon . Andrew Lang 58 Antipater of Sidon Richard Garnett 59 Antipater of Sidon J.l Iddington Symonds 60 Antipater of Sidon . . Andrew Lang 61 Antipater of Sidon . . Andrctv Lang 62 Antipater of Sidon . Anon. (Spectator) 63 . Antiphilus • Andrew Lang 64 CONTENTS. vii PAGE Antiphilus . . . . ; Alma Strettell 65 Antiphilus . Leivis Campbell G6 Antiphilus . Richard Garnett 67 / Anytes . John William Burton 68 ' Apollonidas . . Richard Garnett 69 ' Marcus Argentarius . W. Coicper 70 Marcus Argentarius . Richard Garnett 71 Marcus Argentarius . Richard Garnett 72 Marcus Argentarius . Richard Garnett 73 iMarcus Argentarius . Richard Garnett 74 Marcus Argentarius . Richard Garnett 75 ' Archias . Alma Strettell 76 Archias of Byzantium Andreto Lang 11 '--• Asclepiades . Alma Strettell 78 Asclepiades . . Alma Strettell 79 Asclepiades Andrew Lang 80 Asclepiades . . Richard Garnett 81 Bacchylides . H. Wellesley 82 Bianor . . Alma Strettell 83 : Bianor of Bithynia Alma Strettell 84 Bianor of Bithynia . Alma Strettell 85 Bion Andrew Lang 86 Bion . Leigh Hunt 87 Callimachus . John Hermann Merivale 88 Callimachus . . Richard Garnett 89 Callimachus . . Richard Garnett 90 Callimachus . Andrew Lang 91 Callimachus . . William M. Hardinge 92 Callimachus . . Richard Garnett 93 Callimachus . H. Wellesley 94 Carphyllidas . Andrew Lan/j 95 ''■ Crinagoras Robert Bland 96 Crinagoras . Richard Garntt 97 Crinagoras John William Burgon 98 Damocharis the Grammaria n Thomas' Percival Rogers 99 , Diotimus Alma Strettell 100 Diotimus (or Leonidas) Andrew Lang 101 viii CONTENTS. PAGE Erinna ..... Richard Garnett 102 Evenus . W. Cowper 103 Hegesippus . C. MeHmle 104 Heracletus . Richard Garnett 105 Heracletus Alma Strettcll 106 Hybrias the Cretan . John Leyden 107 ■ Ion . J. Addington Symonds 103 Isidorus . W. Comper 109 Julianus Antecessor . H. Wellesley 110 . Julian of Egypt . Addison 111 Julian of Egypt Edmund Gosse 112 Julian of Egypt John Hermann Merivale 113 Julian of Egypt Goldwin Smith 114 Julian of Egypt H. Wellesley 115 Leoniclas of Alexandria . Richard Garnett 116 Leonidas of Alexandria . Richard Garnett 117 ■; Leonidas of Tarentum William M. Hardinge 118 Leonidas of Tarentum . CharUs Whibley 119 Leonidas of Tarentum . RicJard Garnett im Leonidas of Tarentum . Richard Garnett 121 Leonidas of Tarentum C. Merivale 122 Leonidas of Tarentum . Richard Garnett 123 Leonidas of Tarentum C. Merivale 124 Leonidas of Tarentum John Hermann Merivale 125 Leonidas of Tarentum William M. Hardinge 126 Leonidas of Tarentum Andrew Lang 127 Leonidas of Tarentum Andrew Lang 128 Leonidas of Tarentum Alma Strettell 129 Lucian .... . Richard Garnett 130 Lucian . . Richard Garnett 131 Lucian . . Richard Garnett 132 Lucian . . Richard Garnett 133 Lucian . . Thomas Farley 134 Lucian . . Richard Garnett 135 ': LucUlius . Richard Garnett 136 Lucillius . W. Cowper 137 LuciUius . Richard Garnett 138 CONTENTS. ix PAGE Lucillius ..... Francis Hodgson \2Q Lucillius . W. Covrper 140 '!-'- Macedonius Alma Strettell 141 Macedonius Alma Strettell 142 Macedonius . Richard Garnett 143 Macedonius Robert Bland \i.\ : Maccius Alma Strettell 145 Maccius . Richard Garnett 146 T Marianus Scholasticus H. Wellesley 147 Marianus Scholasticus Shakespeare (?) 148 3' Meleager William M. Harding e 149 Meleager Andrew Lang 151 Meleager Alma Strettell 152 Meleager William M. Hardinge 153 Meleager Andrew Lang 154 Meleager William M. Hardinge 155 Meleager . Charles Whibley 156 Meleager . Richard Garnett 157 Meleager Alma Strettell 153 Meleager William M. Hardinge 159 Meleager William M. Hardinge 160 Meleager Abna Strettell 161 Meleager . Richard Garnett 162 Meleager . Richard Garnett 163 Meleager John Hermann iferivale 16-4 Meleager John Hennann Merivale 165 Meleager Alma Strettell 166 Meleager William M. Hardinge 167 Meleager . Richard Garnett 168 Meleager . Richard Garnett 169 Meleager . Richard Garnett 170 Meleager William M. Hardinge 171 Meleager . Richard Garnett 172 Meleager William M. Hardinge 173 Meleager . T. Moore 174 Meleager William M. Hardinge 175 Meleager William M. Hardinge 170 A I CONTENTS. Meleager Mel eager Meleager IMeleager Meleager Meleager Mnasalcas Mnasalcas Mnasalcas Mnasalcas ISIoschus Moschiis Moschus Nicarchus Nicarchus Nicarchus Palladas Palladas Palladas Palladas Palladas Palladas Palladas Palladas Palladas Pamphilus Pancrates Paul us Silentiarius Paulas Silentiarius Paulus Silentiarius Paulus Silentiarius Paulus Silentiarius Paulus Silentiarius Paulus Silentiarius Paulus Silentiarius Paulus Silentiarius Philippus PAGE Alma Strettell 177 Andrei!) Lang 178 Andrew Lang 179 Alma Strettell 180 . Richard Garnett 181 Andrew Lang 182 . Richard Garnett 183 . Richard Garnett 184 John Hermann Merivale 185 . Richard Garnett 186 Ernest Myers 187 Ernest Myers 188 Ernest Myers 189 Andrew Lang 190 . Richard Garnett 191 H. Wellesley 192 Robert Bland 193 . Richard Garnett 194 . W. Coivper 195 William M. Eardinge 196 Alma Strettell 197 William M. Hardinge 198 Robert Bland 199 Alma Strettell 200 Alma Strettell 201 Edward Stokes 202 C. Merivale 203 Alma Strettell 204 Alma Strettell 205 Andrew Lang 206 Andrew Lang 207 . Richard Garnett 208 . Richard Garnett 209 . Richard Garnett 210 Goldwin Smith 211 . W. Cowper 212 . Richard Garnett 213 CONTENTS. xi VXr.v. , Philippus . Richard Ganiett 214 5 Pliilodemus of Gadara WaUam 31. Ilardinje 215 Philodemus of Gadam . Richard Garnctt 216 Pliilodemus of Gadara J. Addington Symoads 217 Philodemus of Gadara , Richard Garnett 218 Philodemus of Gadara A)idrew Lang 219 //v Plato .... Shelley 220 Plato ; Richard Garnett 221 Plato .... . E. Parker 222 Plato .... . Goldivin Smith 223 Plato .... . Richard Garnett 224 Plato .... . Orlando Gibbons 225 Plato .... . Richard Garnett 226 Plato .... . Richard Garnett 227 Plato .... . Richard Garnett 228 Plato .... Shelley 229 Plato .... William M. Hardinge 230 Plato (?) . Leiois Campbell 231 Plato .... . Charles Whibley 232 Plato .... . Richard Garnett 233 Julius Polyaenus . Lewis Campbell 234 Pompeius, the Younger Andrew Lang 235 Poseidippus . William M. Hardinge 236 -;. Ptolemy . Richard Garnett 237 Ptolemy Alma Strettell 238 "t-Rhianus Elton 239 Rhianus . Richard Garnett 240 "7 Ruliuus ' Rufinus Andrew Lang 2il Andrew Lang 242 Rufinus . Alma Strettell 243 Rufinus . Alma Strettell 244 Rufinus William J/. Hardinge 245 Rufinus i/. Wellesley 246 Rufinus Robert Bland 247 / Sappho Elton 248 V Simmias . Goldwin Smith 249 Simmias William .U. Hardinge 250 xii CONTENTS. PAGE Simonides . . . ^0^71 Uennann Merivale 251 Simonides J. Sterling 252 | Simonides J. Sterling 253 Simonides . Alma Strettell 254 Simonides Alma Strettell 255 Simonides Alma Strettell 256 ! Sophocles Richard Garnett 257 ' " Theocritus Andrew Lang 258 Theocritus Andrew Lang 259 Theocritus Andrew Lang 260 Theocritus Andrew Lang 261 Theocritus Andrew Lang 262 Theocritus Andretv Lang 263 Theocritus Andrew Lang 264 Theocritus Andrew Lang 265 Theocritus Andretv Lang 266 Theocritus Andreiv Lang 267 Theocritus Richard Garnett 268 Theocritus Andreio Lang 269 Theocritus Andrew Lang 270 Theocritus Andrew Lang 271 Theocritus Andreio Lang 272 Theocritus Andreiu Lang 273 Theocritus Andrew Lang 274 Theodoridas fl". WellesUy 275 Zonas . ulZma Strettell 276 Zonas . iJo&erf £to/id 277 INTRODUCTORY NOTE. THE object of the Editor in forming this selection has been to gather together some of the more adequately rendered epigrams from the Greek Anthology' — that well-nigh inexhaustible mine of wealth for the translator — the solace of Dr. Johnson, who would often while away a sleepless night therewith by turning portions into Latin verse. To Dr. Richard Garnett, to Mr. Andrew Lang, to Miss Alma Strettell (whose epigrams, Englished from the originals, here appear for the first time), and to Mr. William AL Hardinge, most grateful acknowledgments are due. Very hearty thanks are also owed to Mr. Goldwin Smith, to Professor Campbell, and Mr. Edmund Gosse. The transla- tions borrowed from the two latter authors have been hitherto unpublished. xiv INTRODUCTOR V NOTE. Mr, Andrew Lang's prose translations from Theocritus, one, in verse, from Meleager, and others from " Grass of Parnassus," are repubhshed in this volume by permission, respectively, of Messrs. Macmillan & Co., Messrs. Kegan Paul, and Messrs. Longmans. The epigrams from each poet are arranged in alphabetical, not chronological, order. By the word "Anthology" is vaguely under- stood the collection, bequeathed to us by anti- quity, of epitomised lyrics, idyls, odes, elegies, epitaphs, that pass under the somewhat widely comprehensive title of Epigrams ; although the term "Epigram," according to the sense in which it has been used in modern times, cannot be applied to these stray blossoms of Greek poetry, with which indeed it has nothing in common but the spontaneity and terse completeness— the peculiarly Greek method of using the best words in the best places. The satiric tone was indeed but seldom affected by the poets of the Anthology, their poems being principally invested with the wings and the minute proportions, but not the sting, of the bee ; and yet, when they really wished to be acrimonious, their INTRO D UCTOR Y NO TE. xv irony was of the harshest and least subtle kind. Witness this epigram by Ammianus (translated by John Hermann Merivale) — " Light lie the earth, Nearchus, on thy clay, That thus the dogs may easier find their prey." Or this, by Lucillius (translated by the Rev. H. Wellesley)— " Though to your face that mirror lies. 'Tis just the glass for you, Demosthenis ; you'd shut your eyes If it reflected true." Yet in a volume where well-nigh every note in the gamut of life is sounded it is hardly surprising to find some incongruities, and these, indeed, seem akin to the " wit that fells you like a mace.'"' But, taking the book as a whole, it consists of miniature idyls, abridged odes, j'et/x d'^esprit of a single feature, elegies no longer than a sigh ; love lyrics as exquisitely perfect and uncramped in their constricted compass as are the groups on Greek intaglios of the best period. Four Anthologies have existed : the first gathered together by Meleager about loo B.C. ; the second was that of Philip of Thessalonica, who lived xvi IN TROD UCTOR Y NO TE. later under Trajan ; Agathias, an advocate, com- piled the third in the latter half of the sixth century, after the reign of Justinian ; and the fourth, coming four centuries after its predecessor, was put together by a certain Constantine Cephalas, of whom nothing e^se is known. In the fourteenth century a Byzantine monk, Maximus Planudes, re-arranged, abridged, and expurgated the Anthology of Cephalas, making a distribution into seven books, under different heads, in accordance with the various subjects of the poems. And this mutilated collection was the first published, having been saved from the ruins of Constantinople by John Lascaris, who had it printed at Florence in 1494. Nine years after another edition appeared, the first given by the Aldi, which takes the foremost place of the three editions issued by the Aldine Press, owing to its extreme rarity and the variants it contains. Several other editions of this collec- tion succeeded one another during the sixteenth century, and always under the same title (coined by the Aldi) of Florilegium, the literal Latin translation of Anthologia. Another, which appeared in the early part of the seventeenth INTRO D UCTOR V NO TE. xvii century, comprises the notes and commentaries of the Canon Brondeau and of Vincent Obsopoeus. It possesses also an Appendix epigranwiatum and the poem on the " Baths of Pythia," but is in the same state of confusion and obscurity that characterises all three editions. All this time the original text of the collection of Cephalas remained totally unknown, while its maimed and mutilated impersonator engaged the enthusiastic attention of the world of letters. But in, or about, 1606 it was discovered by Salmasius, then a young student of eighteen, at Heidelberg (what an enviable "find" for a youthful treasure- seeker !), and then became accessible to a small number of the initiated. This circle was presently still further narrowed by the removal of the precious manuscript to the Vatican in the course of the vicissitudes consequent on the Thirty Years' War. Yet, in spite of the untoward circumstances, fragments of this more valuable Anthology cir- culated among the finer cog?70sce?ifi of the time. The extracts and copies made by Salmasius and other savants took wing, like fire-flies, from cabinet to cabinet, charming the leisure moments of Bonhier, La Monnoye, and many of the learned xviii INTRO D UCTOR V NO TE. luminaries of their day. But it was Brunck who, in 1776, first deposed the monkish changeling of Byzantium, and brought home the fairy child of the nightingale and the rose to its rightful heritage. He published the Anthology of Cephalas, placing together all epigrams by the same poets, and uniting all those of doubtful authorship. Needless to say that this publication formed an epoch in the history of literature. Frederick Jacobs, setting to work with the ardent enthusiasm of the Hellenophile, and the patient zeal of the archaeologist, produced from the Analecta of Brunck, in 1794, a new edition in five volumes, with very valuable tables, and, above all, with a commentary that is a marvel of exegesis, filling thirteen volumes. Following closely on the heels of this triumph came the successes of the French armies in Italy, and assuredly not least among the spoils of war was the Palatine Manuscript of Heidelberg, now become the Codex Vaticaniis^ ceded to the con- querors, with many other glories of the Roman museums and treasures of her libraries, by the treaty of Tolentino. Perhaps two of the world's greatest treasures were brought home to Paris then INTRO D UCTOR V NO TE. xix —the Anthology of Cephalas, and the Aphrodite of Melos. The fame of the literary trophy spread far and wide, drawing to Paris as to a magnet all the German savants eager to collate and compare manuscript copies and edited texts. And so, armed with newly-acquired implements, and notably with an antique copy of Spaletti, the indefatigable philologist of Gotha com- menced anew his labour of love, the fruits of which he gave to the world in 1813.* This admirable and monumental work, con- forming as it does faithfully to the original, and with an appendix of critical notes, with learned and ingenious conjectures and interpretations, holds, deservedly, the foremost place at the present time ; and Frederick Jacobs has but reaped the just award of his labours in having his name thus eternally associated with one of the most beautiful of the heirlooms of antiquity. The Anthology, then, may be said to have passed through four editions, of which the fourth alone remains to us. The first, gathered by * Antliologia Graeca ad fidem codicis olim Palatini nunc Parisini en apographa Gotliano edita. Curiart F. Jacobs, 3 torn. Lipsiae, 1813-17. XX INTRO D UCTOR V NO TE. Meleager, contained the flower of the "fugitive verse" of old time. The last, compiled, as we have already seen, in the tenth century by a monk of the Base-Empire, must be, as com- pared to the first, but a confused and imperfect medley of the highest excellence and the merest mediocrity. A thread, as it were, on which are strung impartially pearls and glass beads — rarely graven gems beside tokens of brass or lead. How many perfect blossoms plucked from the gardens of Sappho and Stesichorus have disappeared, and by what weeds have they been replaced ! For, with every re-arrangement of the Anthology, many poems by the older poets were eliminated, in order to make way for the works of those who had sprung up in the interval ; and thus the little that actually remains of the original garland of Meleager is only too thickly set with worthless growths of the later decadence. Yet, with all that is irretrievably lost to us, there remains much that is admirable, much that is incomparable; and with this we should be content, nay, more than content. But little is known of the poets of the Anthology, and that little is of an apocryphal and misty INTRO D UCTOR V NO TE. xxi nature, Fortunate poets ! There is no one who can tell us of the youthful indiscretions of Meleager (though, indeed, he gossips perhaps a little too freely of these himself), no one to portray for us "The Real Rufinus"; no dishonourable ghoul to " howk up" and re-print some old, forgotten love- letters of "pure Simonides," proving him thereby not pure, in very sooth, bat most unworthy — a weak and garrulous sensualist. No ; praise be to Zeus that all these things are impossible. The corpse-worm may have feasted on those dead poets, but not his prototype, the memoir-hunter. And now our slight, well-nigh conjectural infor- mation it may prove not altogether unprofitable to sum up briefly; for though not sufficiently intimate (or scandalous) to be keenly interesting for those who deal in such wares, to some it may yet possess, in common with most historical surmise, a certain vague, far-off charm of its own. Of jMeleager, then, the first of the floiver- gathcrcrs, the prince of love-poets, we will speak first, albeit with diffidence, for St. Beuve and Paul de St. Victor have already written so admirably of this sweet singer of Syria. And he himself xxii INTRODUCTORY NOTE. has fairly clearly epitomised his loves and his life, his places of birth and dwelling, in exquisitely graceful verse. His epitaph on himself re- minds one irresistibly of the tone of " the old captive" who sang the fortunes of Aucassin and Nicolete, centuries later, in France. By this epi- taph of Meleager's on himself we may find that much of the same kindliness and geniality is common to both — both love Youth and Love as embodied in humanity, though these have slipped from their grasp — both are half-humorously, half- pathetically resigned. His birthplace, he tells us, was Gadara, in Syria ; in Tyre his first youth was passed, and his later years in the island of Ceos, the native place of his predecessor, Simonides. Born about a century and a half after Theocritus, Bion, and Moschus, arriving, as it were, on the morrow of the great harvest, it seems only natural that the idea of binding into a sheaf the scattered ears should have presented itself to Meleager. Here is Mr. Hardinge's translation of the poem placed by Meleager by way of preface to his Anthology, the garland twined by him for Diodes. For whom the fruitage of this strain, my Muse ? And who among the hards hath made this wreath ? INTRODUCTORY NOTE. xxiii Meleager wove it, and his weaving gives For keepsake to most noble Diocles. Here many lilies are of Anyte, And white lilies of Maero, many an one, And Sappho's flowers— so few, but roses all — And daffodils of Melanippides Heavy with ringing hymns— and thy young branch, Vine of Simonides, and twisted in Nossis, thine iris flower that breathes of myrrh, And in its tablets are Love's stores of wax. Herewith, Ehianus' scented marjoram, And the sweet crocus of Erinna too. Clear as the girl's own skin— and hyacinth, Alcseus' hyacinth that speaks to bards — And a dark spray of Samius' laurel tree, Fresh ivy-clusters of Leonidas, And foliage of Mnasalcus' needled pine. And from the plane-tree song of Paniphilus He cut a branch, and with the walnut boughs Of Pancrates he twined it, and white leaves Of Tymnes' poplar. Nicias' green mint And sandwort of Euphemus from the shore ; And Damagetus' purple violet. And the sweet myrtle of Callimachus Full of sharp honey — with Euphorion's flower. The lychnis and, therewith, his cyclamen, Tlie Muses call after the sons of Zeus. And Hegesippus' maddening grape-cluster xxi V INTRO D UCTOR Y NO TE. He set therein, and Persus' scented flag And a sweet aj^ple from Diotimns' tree- Pomegranate flowers of Menecrates, And the myrrli branches of Nica-netus, Pha^nnus' flax plant — Simmias' tall wild pear. And a few leaves he pulled of Parthenis Her delicate meadow-parsley, and — ^gleanings fair Of the honey-dropping muses — golden ears From the wheat-harvest of Bacchylides. And old Anacreon — that sweet strain of his, An unsown flowerage of his nectar songs : And the rough white-thorn of Archilochus He gathered from the pasture — as it were. Only a few drops from a sea of bloom — Young shoots of Alexander's olive grown And Polycleitus' dark blue cornflower There He set Polystratus the amaracus, The poets' flower, and from Antipater A young Phoenician cypress : and therewith Eared Syrian spikenard which he gathered him Out of his singing they call Hermes' gift,* And Poseidippus too, and Hasdulus — Flowers of the field — and wi-.idflowers springing glad In airs Sicilian, + and the golden bough Of sacred Plato, shining in its worth. And he threw in Aratus learned in stars, ^ Hermodorus. t Possibly Asclepias. IN TROD UCTOR V NO TE. xx Cutting the first spires of his heaven-high pine, Chsersemon's leafy lotus, mixing it With flox of Phsedimus and chamomile — The crinkled oxeye — of Antagoras, And fresh green thyme of Theodoridas — The wine-cup's charm— and Phanieus' beanflowers too, With many shoots fresh sprung of other bards. Adding thereto white early violets Of his own muse. But to my friends I give Thanks, And this gracious coronal of song Be for all such as love these holy things. Not the least portion of the debt we owe to Meleager, in common with other later poets of the Anthology, lies in the light they cast upon the semi-oriental Greece of Asia Minor and the Archipelago ; for, w^ith the conquest and desertion of Athens, and the removal of the Hellenic capital to Alexandria, departed the heroism and love of country, the stem and pure simplicity of old Greece, and all the arts suffered proportionately with the decadence of their producers. The epics of Homer, and indeed the epic itself, as a vehicle for narrative verse, fell into disfavour, being supplanted by the graceful vers de soci^t^ and genre-pictures which survive in the Anthology — a xxvi INTROD UCTOR V NOTE. parterre for a pine forest — marble-rimmed artificial waters in place of the sea. The sonorous refrain was discarded as clumsy and superfluous ; aiitres fe?nps, aiitres mceurs — and thus from the fall of heroic Greece and the transfusion of Asiatic blood into her veins was born the effeminacy and corrupt luxury of a conquered people, whose stern dignity had declined with altered climate and conditions. Religion itself lost caste. The highest symbols were stripped of their original significance, and served only as pegs whereon to hang equivocal stories or ribald pleasantries. The great gods sung by Homer and sculptured by Pheidias became but as licentious idols, the playthings of rhetoricians and raconteurs. Eros, the fair and terrible youth of the old mythology, gave place to a 7nenie of rosy Cupidons, such as may be seen in the frescoes of Pompeii, or in the paintings of Boucher, flitting hither and thither everywhere ; masquerading now under this guise, now that, and even twitting the Cloud-compeller with his intrigues. Hera became a termagant. Aphrodite a courtesan, Dionysius a wine-bibber. Paul de St. Victor compares this national degringolade to that pf Venice in the eighteenth century. INTRO D UCTOR V NO TE. xxvii The same voluptuous effeminacy, the same listless, wistful decadence was common to both. We see the multitudinous courtesans of this Alexandrian Hellas as much adulated and honoured as the honeste meretrici of Venice. Boats pass and re-pass, like gondolas, laden with loves and amorous messages. The flower-girls carrying their roses through the streets of Rhodes and Cyprus bring to mind those little bouqiieiieres vending their wares among the doves on the Piazza of St. Mark. Yet, despite all this, the spirit of Greek art was not dead ; it was but partly merged in the new influences, and in the poetry of Meleager is to be found the most agreeable results of this curious combination, the marriage of Hellenism and Orientalism. He has his harem of light loves Zenophila, Demo, Anticleia, Timarion, Fanie (the Greek equivalent for a "little flame" — "Fiametta," the name of Boccaccio's mistress, is an Italian synonym for this last), but all the more modem sentiment of love seems to have entered into his passion for Heliodora. What latter-day poet could bewail his lost lady with a more tender, more fervent affection than breathes in every word of Meleager's incomparable lament for her xxvlii INTRODUCTORY NOTE. whom he loved — the one woman who possessed his soul ? In justice to Meleager I cannot refrain from quoting Mr. Lang's rendering of this — Tears for my lady dead— Heliodore ! Salt tears, and strange to shed, Over and o'er ; Tears to my lady dead. Love do we send, Longed for, remembered, Lover and friend ! Sad are the songs we sing, Tears that we shed, Empty the gifts we bring Gifts to the dead ! Go, tears, and go, lament, Fare from her tomb. Wend where my lady went Down through the gloom ! Ah, for my flower, my love, Hades hath taken, Ah, for the dust above Scattered and shaken ! Mother of blade and grass, Earth, in thy breast Lull her that gentlest was Gently to rest 1 * * Cleopatra. By H. Rider Haggard. IN TROD UCTOR Y NO TE. xxix In his lighter poems, with what an exquisite sense of colour and balance, with how much of airy grace, does he epitomise some fantastic incident, some gallant or tender idea. What a delicate conceit is embodied in his command to the gnat, who must waken Zenophila and bring her back. If the winged atom successfully performs this labour, the poet will for guerdon hang a lion's skin upon its shoulders, and place a club, like to that of Hercules, in its talons. In another poem he sings of the eyes of Asclepia, how, reflecting the azure of calm skies, they persuade all voyagers to set sail upon Love's sea. Often he bids the faithful love-lamp keep watch and ward over his lady ; often he rates the treacherous winged child who shows no mercy even to Cytherea, his mother ; he threatens him with exile, with slavery; then again, Love is lost, and the hue and cry is raised till he is found — in the eyes of Zenophila. The Greeks did not write Nature-books, nor did they pose as students of her cult, but their pastorals of a few lines show the truest observation, the most intimate knowjedge imaginable, of the loveliness of land and sea, and of the changing seasons. Perhaps this may XXX INTRO D UCTOR V NO TE. be attributable to their sincere and instinctive love for everything beautiful, which was with them no question of taste, but a veritable passion, a natural instinct; and in no poem is this more perfectly and spontaneously expressed than in Meleager's " Spring." But whatever he touched he turned to gold, or to flowers rather, singing with equal sweetness songs of love and longing, of tears and laughter. If sometimes his treatment of his theme was un peu leger^ blame the times, not the poet. Indeed, it would seem to savour almost of bigotry and affectation could we seriously deplore the combination of circum- stances that — but temporarily — deposed Homer and made Meleager. No man could have been more the actual result, the very incarnation, of his period than was he; and without the mingling of races, the Grceco-Asiatic environ- ment, he could never have existed. Surely there are many singers whom we could have better spared than this poet of the twilight time of Greece. Through the lips of Simonides, the predecessor by about four centuries of Meleager, spoke for the last time the voice of heroic Greece. Born in IN TROD UCTOR Y NO TE. xxxi Ceos (B.C. 556), the nearest of the Cyclades to Attica, whose people were a mixture of Dorian and Ionian races, Simonides was as certainly the outcome of his own time and country as was the Gadarean Meleager of his. The life of the Ceans was characterised by a certain simple and chaste nobility — a Spartan austerity. Pure youths and maidens, until after marriage, drank only water ; and, when life's autumn was gone, and naught remained but a dreary vista of grey hairs and burdensome feebleness, the old men and women would assemble together at a banquet, pledging one another in cups of poisoned wine. What a true sense of dignity and self-respect, the very essence of the fitness of things, does this one tradition not betray ! No drivelling dotage, no senile imbecility, should desecrate the body and soul, whose functions had been entirely and honourably fulfilled. The wine was finished ; why wring out the thick and muddy dregs thereof.^ The play was over ; why wait while the lights went out one by one, at last to be led away perforce ? Death is ugly and unwelcome, come when and xxxii INTRODUCTOR Y NO TE. how he may ; but the people of Ceos saw to it that he should visit them in no ignoble, no repulsive guise. In the sight of Simonides the death most to be desired was that of the patriot fighting for his country, and it is almost solely to this theme — love of country and glorious death in battle — that his lyre was attuned. In his poems that remain to us can be found no single line inspired by love. His voice sounds cold and clear among those of the later poets of the Anthology, like the cry of the war-eagle across the myriad songs of merle and nightingale. The victories of the Athenian army in the Persian wars, the Spartans' triumph in death, were hymned by "pure Simonides." His was the death-chant of the wild swan of ancient Hellas. In method his work is forceful, reticent, and terse; every word, every epithet finely chiselled and direct. His poems of a few lines give the idea of strength and immensity; they are heroic and large, in the same way as a small sculptured figure or a small picture may be if correspondingly perfect in aim and pro- portion. Simonides died at Syracuse, after a long and honourable life, and was buried outside INTRODUCTORY NOTE, xxxiii the gates of the city. His tomb bears this inscription — " Six times and fifty thou the tripod prize, Simonides, didst gain; and dying here In Sicily, thy soul so sweet and wise, To Ceos and to Greece is ever dear." * Of Plato so much has been said, and so well, that it is needless to speak of him here, unless we may note in passing how felicitously Meleager compared his quota of poems in the garland to a golden branch entwined therein. Not less happy is the flower-gatherer's synonym for the songs of Callimachus — "the sweet myrtle, full of sharp honey." Of supposed royal lineage, the acknow- ledged favourite of the Ptolemies, admitted into the famous Pleiad of Alexandria, to but few men of letters has the lot fallen in such brilliant places as to Callimachus, poet and scholar, and the foe of the epic. It was he who bequeathed to us that much-insisted-on aphorism, "a big book is a big evil." And yet he must have been responsible for many such, for, according to Suidas, he wrote over eight hundred books — principally on philology and grammar. The bulk of this his more serious * Sterling's Essays and Tales, p. 234. p. j xxxi V INTRO D UCTOR V NO TE. work has perished (like that of Boccaccio, who vainly desired only to be remembered by the results of his profound historical research), and there remains of him little but epigrams — " slight things, but roses" — which for richness and bril- liancy of style are unsurpassed by any. He was perhaps most successful in elegies ; his lament for his dead friend Heraclitus is as well known as anything in the Anthology, and as fine in senti- ment and treatment. Nowhere is to be felt more distinctly than in this epigram the advantages of the terse vehicle for expression so strongly advocated by Callimachus. His few love songs have a strained and courtly ti?nbre; in one of these he exalts Berenice, sister and queen of Ptolemy Euergetes, to the position of a fourth Grace, even as Theocritus, under the influences of the palace and the city, hymns Arsinoe, who made a like Egyptian marriage. Something of Simonides and something of Theocritus, mingled with an original quality all his own, meet in the miniature idylls, the eulogies of the dead, by Leonidas of Tarentum. To this contemporary of Theocritus, the amatory side of life and art beckoned less imperatively ; more IN TROD UCTOR V NO TE. xxx v apparent to him was the pathetic reverse of the medal, with the rustic toil, or the hard, perilous calling of the fisherman, and, at last, the brown, wrinkled hands crossed in unaccustomed languor, and the eyes closed ; he is, so to put it, the Millet of the Anthology. How easily one may picture from those few- lines telling of the old fisherman's laborious life and tranquil death, the little wattled house upon the shore, among tamarisks and pale sea-grass, with its door unlatched looking upon the blue Mediterranean ! And what charming rustic offer- ings and episodes the Tarentine poet epitomises in a lighter vein ! The anonymous epigram which implores Mother Earth to lie lightly on the hoary head of the old farmer by whom she had been so tenderly tilled and fertilised throughout his long life, reads almost as if it might have been written by Leonidas. There are numbers of these songs " without a master" scattered throughout the Anthology, and many of these are so beautiful that it is even a little sad to see them lying unclaimed, and to know that their authors are deprived of the only immortality they could have been quite certain xxxvi INTRODUCTOR V NOTE, about. All the poets of the Anthology were so essentially human that, despite their remoteness, one cannot help feeling some curiosity as to the parentage of the more beautiful of the nameless epigrams. Who was the inspiration of Ben Jonson — the sender of myrrh to his lady in the hope that by her the perfume itself might gain redoubled sweetness ? Who cried to his dead friend, " I still shall seek thee dead ; from Lethe's "wave drink not tliou forgetfulness— of me ? " And who was the genial philosopher who rallied so gaily his empty flagon — reproaching it with lack of good-fellowship ? But though we may know nothing of these — or, for the greater part, of any of the epigrammatists — a "more than usual" clear record survives of the youthful genius, the early successes, of Arcliias — a Byzantine Chatterton, sans the failure and the tragedy. We are told by Cicero, his friend and master, in a discourse entitled ;pro Archia^ how, before Archias had reached his seventeenth year, the cities of Asia, Italy, and Greece alike contended for the honour of becoming his I NT ROD UCTOR V NO TE. xxxvii dwelling-place. Spending much of his life at Rome, and being invested with all the rights of a Roman citizen, Archias repaid her generous adoption and the enthusiasm of her people by being, as it were, her poet-laureate, celebrating her victories and her heroes, her wealth and her achievements. It is not a little hard to realise that it was on the verses of Archias that Cicero based his own hopes of posthumous fame ; whereas, were it not for Cicero's pro Archia — that eloquent defence of his friend — nothing would be known of Archias beyond the few epigrams which bear his name in the Anthology. Remarkable for the purity and elegance of his style, Archias was a veritable petit-inaitre of letters, even showing his dexterity by giving sometimes as many as four different renderings of a single genre-subject so slight as, for example, the votive offerings of three brothers — a hunter, a fowler, and a fisherman — who pray that earth, air, and water each may prove alike propitious to their various callings. Yet the Sea-Dirge, breathing all the old Greek fear and hatred of the sea, is as impressive as pathetic ; and how fresh and graceful is this epigram of winged Love, so aptly rendered by Jean Doublet — xxxviii INTROD UCTOR V NO TE, " Que veut dire Catin, cette fuite frivole? Crois-tu que TAmour ne te puisse attraper ? Tu vas a pied, et ce Dieu vole : Penses-tu pouvoir echapper ? " Passing over six centuries, we come to the group of poets who flourished under Justinian. Of Paulus Silentiarius we know nothing, except that he was a court functionary, whose duty (as implied by his title) possibly comprised that of imposing silence when it seemed proper. As to Argentarius, who, judging from the style and tone of his verses, would seem almost to have belonged to this period, we are even more in the dark, for of him there remains absolutely no record. His epigrams are brilliantly beautiful, as are also those of Agathias and Rufinus, the last entirely pagan poets of Asiatic Greece (for was not Palladas half overshadowed by Christian coldness and austerity.?). The principal collection of Agathias' love lyrics, entitled Laurel Leaves^ is, unhappily, lost. Longfellow, in his diary, speaks of the Anthology, with its fading garlands, its flickering love-lamps, as one of the saddest of books. Surely it is also one of the most entirely human. It expresses so INTRO D UCTOR Y NO TE. xxxix keenly, so pathetically, the great universal clinging to life, to love, to human intercourse and loving- kindliness, to the pleasant light of the sun ; it shadows forth with a calm, tearless pathos the dusky inevitable path that must be trod by all, " You cannot miss it though you shut your eyes." In the Anthology, as in life itself, jest and earnest, love and anger, joy and sorrow, jostle one another in motley array ; and through it all — across the waste — amid the roses — stalks Death eternal and implacable. " Into the night go one and all," and they are gone, these dead poets, where only Night may know the way they went ; yet their voices come to us over the abyss, skilled fingers wake again to the sweet phrases of old time their long-forsaken lyres. The violets of Meleager blossom still, almost as fresh and fragrant as when he plucked them in his dewy Tyrian garden to weave among the roses of Sappho the lilies of Anyte. Here, as in the orchard of Alcinous, " grow tall trees blossoming, pear trees and pomegranates, and apple trees with bright fruit, and sweet figs, and olives in their bloom. The fruit of these trees xl INTRO D UCTOR V NO TE. never perisheth, neither faileth, winter or summer, enduring all the year through. Evermore the west wind blowing brings some fruits to birth and ripens others. Pear upon pear waxes old, and apple on apple ; yea, and cluster ripens upon cluster of the grape, and fig on fig." GRAHAM R. TOMSON. SELECTIONS FROM THE GREEK ANTHOLOGY. ■ La vie est brfeve, Un peu d'amour, Un peu de reve, Et puis— bonjour ! La vie est vaine, Un peu d'espoir, Un peu de haine Etpuis— bonsoir !' SELECTIONS FRO^[ THE GREEK ANTHOLOGY. Agathias. Since she was watched and could not kiss me closely Divine Rhodanthe cast her maiden zone From off her waist, and holding it thus loosely By the one end, she put a kiss thereon ; Then I — Love's stream as through a channel taking — My lips upon the other end did press And drew the kisses in, while ceaseless making, Thus from afar, reply to her caress. So the sweet girdle did beguile our pain, Being a ferry for our kisses twain. Alma StretteU. 613 AGATHIAS, iN. »". lo J Agathias. No wine for me ! — Nay, an it be thy will, Kiss first the goblet — I will drink my fill : How may I, when thy lips have touched it, dare Be sober still, and that sweet draught forswear : For the cup steers the kiss from thee to me. And tells me all the bliss it won of thee. Willia7?i M. Hardins^e, AGATHIAS. Agathias. Rhodanthe. Weepi.vg and wakeful all the night I lie, And with the dawn the grace of sleep is near, But swallows flit about me with their cry, And banish drowsihead and bring the tear. Mine eyes must still be weeping, for the dear Thought of Rhodanthe stirs in memory; Ye chattering foes have done ! it was not I Who silenced Philomel : go, seek the sheer Clefts of the hills, and wail for Itylus Or clamour from the hoopoe's craggy nest, But let sweet sleep an hour abide with us, Perchance a dream may come, and we be blest, A dream may make Rhodanthe piteous, And bring us to that haven of her breast. Andrew Lang, 4 AGATHIAS. Agathlas. Vintage Song. Tread we thine infinite treasure, lacchus, the vintage sweet ! Weave we the Bacchic measure with paces of wildering feet. Down flows the vast clear stream, and the ivy-wood bowls, as they float O'er the surging nectar, seem each like a fairy boat. Close we stand as we drink and pledge in the glowing wine — No warm Naiad, I think, need kiss in your cup or mine ! See, o'er the wine- press bending, the maiden Roseflower beams — Splendour of loveliness sending that dazzles the flood with its gleams. Captive the hearts of us all ! straightway no man that is here But is bound to Bacchus in thrall — to Paphia in bondage dear. Cruel — for while at our feet he revels in bountiful rain, Longing most fleet — most sweet — is all she gives for our pain. William M. Hardinge, AGATHIAS. Agathias. *'Why sad?" '-'I am in love." "With whom?' "A maid." •• Lovely, I trust." " So I myself persuade." "Where met ye? " " Feasting, 'neath a gay alcove I saw her sit, and felt that I must love." " How wooest thou?" " I scorn not any shifts, But mo.st confide in flatteries and in gifts." "Thy suit is honourable? " "No." "A wife Thou'lt make the fair at last? " "Not for my life. She has not got one single groat to tell." "Thou dost not love who reasonest so well." Richard GarnctL AGATHIAS. Ao^athias. o Be not too timorous, youth, nor strive to merit Thy mistress' favour by a broken spirit ; Lift up thine eyes, boldly thy fair survey ; Vea, turn them, now and then, the other way : For woman, though with glee abashing pride, Delights not less the abject to deride ; And best may he subdue her to his bent "Who is both humble and impertinent. Richard Garnett. AGATHIAS. Agathlas. She, who but late in beauty's flower was seen, Proud of her auburn curls and noble mien — Who froze my hopes and triumph'u in my fears, Now sheds her graces in the waste of years. Changed to unlovely is that breast of snow, And dimm'd her eye, and wrinkled is her brow ; And querulous the voice by time repress'd, Whose artless music stole me from my rest. Age gives redress to love ; and silvery hair And earlier wrinkles brand the haughty fair. Jiobe? t Biafid. AG AT HI AS. Agathias. Not such your burden, happy youths, as ours — Poor women-children nurtured daintily — ■ For ye have comrades when ill-fortune lours. To hearten you with talk and company ; And ye have games for solace, and may roam Along the streets and see the painters' shows. But woe betide us if we stir from home — • And there our thoughts are dull enough, God knows 1 William M. Hardinge, AG AT HI AS. Agathias. Why shrink from death, the parent of repose, The cure of sickness and all human woes ? As through the tribes of men he speeds his way, Once, and but once, his visit he will pay ; Whilst pale diseases, harbingers of pain, Close on each other crowd, an endless train. W. Shepherd. lo AGATHIAS. Agathias. I, Bacchanal Eurynome, to roam The mountain wont, and bulls to overcome, Who rent the lion, and with wild delight Tossed the fierce head that could no more affriglit, Now to thee, Bacchus (pardon !), all on fire With Venus, and forsaking thy desire, Suspend my clubs, and ivy- wreaths that graced My wrists resign, with gold to be replaced. Richard Garnett. AGATHIAS. Cf. Agathlas. My wreath, my hair, my girdle gratefully To Venus, Pallas, Dian offered be, By whose concurring favour I enjoy My wedded bliss, my chastity, my boy. Richard Gariiett. 12 AGATHIAS. f r\ n'f'.^'i Agathias. My partridge, wand'rer from the hills forlorn, Thy house, light -woven of the willow-bough No more, thou patient one, shall know thee now ; And in the radiance of the bright-eyed morn Shalt stretch and stir thy sun-kissed wings no more. A cat struck off thy head — but all the rest From out the glutton's envious grasp I tore ! Now may the earth lie heavy — so 'twere best — Upon thee, and not lightly, so that she May ne'er drag forth these poor remains of thee. Alma StrettelL AGATHIAS 13 Agathias. To A Cat which had Killed a Favourite Bird. O CAT in semblance, but in heart akin To canine raveners, whose ways are sin \ Still at my hearth a guest tlicu dar'st to be ? Unwhipt of Justice, hast no dread of me ? Or deem'st the sly allurements shall avail Of purring throat and undulating tail ? No ! as to pacify Patroclus dead Twelve Trojans by Pelides' sentence bled, So shall thy blood appease the feathery shade. And for one guiltless life ?hall nine be paid. RicJuird Garnet f. 14 AGATHIAS. c /^,/v tf^ Agathias. Satyr, whose listening ear so low is bent Breathes with spontaneous strain thine instrument? Smiling and silent thou remainest bound In silvery fetters of delightful sound ; For sure that lifelike figure here doth dwell Fixed not by Painting's, but by Music's spell Richard Garnett. AGIS, IS Agls. His nets and snares the fowler Meidon gives, And bird-limed rods, the tools by which he lives : The humble gift more liberal wouldst thou see ; Send him, great Phoebus, more prosperity. Richard Garnett. l6 ALC^US OF MESSENE. Alcaeus of Messene. Thy tomb no purple clusters rise to grace, But thorns and briers choke the fearful place ; There herbs malign and bitter fruits supply Unwholesome juices to the passer-by. And as, Hipponax, near thy tomb he goes, Shuddering he turns and prays for thy repose. Rohert Bland. ANACREON. n Anacreon. Cupid, in a bed of roses Sleeping, chanced to be stung Of a bee that lay among The flowers where he himself reposes ; And thus to his mother weeping Told that he this wound did take Of a little winged snake, As he lay securely sleeping. Cytherea smiling said That ** if so great sorrow spring From a silly bee's weak sting As should make thee thus dismay'd, What anguish feel they, think'st thou, and what pain, Whom thine empoison'd arrows cause complain ? " From Thomas Bate son's Second Set of Madrigals y l6i8. 614 1 8 A NACRE ON: Anacreon. Love once among the roses Perceived a bee reposing, And wondered what the beast was, And touched it, so it stung him. Sorely his finger smarted, And bitterly he greeted, And wrung his hands together ; And half he ran, half fluttered To Cytherea's bosom, Unto his fair, sweet mother. Loud sobbed he, '* Ai ! ai ! mother Olola ! I am murdered ! Olola ! it has killed me ! A small brown snake with winglets, Which men the honey-bee call, Bit me!" But Cytherea Said, laughing, " Ah, my baby, If bees' stings hurt so sorely. Bethink thee what the smart is Of those, Love, whom thou piercest." Sir Edwht Arnold. ANONYMOUS. 19 Anonymous. Yea, cast me trom heights of the mountains to deeps of the ocean, Let the thunderbolt strike me ; o'erwhelm me with fire or with snow ! Since him whom Love's burden halh crushed, and whom Eros hath broken, Not even the swift-winged lightnings of Zeus can overthrow ! Alma StrettelL 20 ANONYMOUS. Anonymous. While yei the grapes were green, thou didst refuse me, When they were ripe, didst proudly pass me by ; But do not grudge me still a single cluster, Now that the grapes are withering and dry. Alma Streitell. ANONYMOUS. 21 Anonymous. I SEND thee myrrh, not that thou mayest be By it perfumed, but it perfumed by thee. Richard Gartittl. 23 ANONYMOUS. Anonymous. I SEND to thee sweet myrrh, thereby favouring it, not thee, Since even the perfume by thy touch yet more perfumed may be Alma Strettell, ANONYMOUS. 23 Anonymous. Whether I find thee bright with fair, Or still as bright with raven hair ; With equal grace thy tresses shine, Ah, queen, and Love will dwell divine In these thy locks, on that far day, When gold or sable turns to grey ! Andrew Lain 24 ANONYMOUS. Anonymous. It's oh I to be a wild wind — when my lady's in the sun — ■ She'd just unbind her neckerchief, and take me breathing in. It's oh ! to be a red rose— just a faintly blushing one— So she'd pull me with her hand and to her snowy breast I'd win. William M. Hardinge, ANONYMOUS. 25 Anonymous. Now drink and be merry, for what is the morrow, or what the to-come ? There is no one that knoweth indeed ; why labour or haste or take thought ? Eat, indulge as thou canst, give and take, consider the things of to-day ; The to-be is, in sooth, no wise far from the not-to-be mystery-fraught : As the turn of a balance is Life — art thou first in the race, all is thine ; O mortal, but shouldest thou die, another hath all and thou naught. A^ma StrettelL 26 ANONYMOUS (OR ^ SOP US), Anonymous (or ^sopus). Life, save by Death, how shall we fly from thee? Thy cares are legion, hard to escape or bear. Thy natural beauties, stars, and earth, and sea, The circling sun and moon, indeed, are fair ; The rest is pain and fear and discontent. And if some little joy to man be sent, Yet must he surely in return await A nemesis, a joy-avenging fate. Alma St ret tell. ^■JVO.VVJ/Ol/S. 27 Anonymous. A PINE by tempests bruised and broken sore, Why do ye make a ship of me — ill-starred, Already shipwrecked of the winds on shore ? A/jua St jet tell. 28 ANONYMOUS, Anonymous. Si jeunesse savait et si vieillesse pouvait ! Poor in my youth, and in life's later scenes Rich to no end, I curse my natal hour, "Who nought enjoyed while young, denied the means And nought when old enjoy'd, denied the power. W. Cowpen ANONYMOUS. 29 Anonymous. Long Nature travailed, till at last she bore Homer : then ceased from bearing evermore. Goldwin Smith ANONYMOUS, Anonymous. Response of the Pythian Priestess. To the pure precincts of Apollo's portal, Come, pure in heart, and touch the lustral wave One drop sufficeth for the sinless mortal; All else, e'en ocean's billows cannot lave. J. E. Sandys. ANONYMOUS, 31 Anonymous. The Venus of Cnidos, by Praxitelks. To Paris, at the dread command of Jove, To Adon, at the soft behest of Love, Fair Venus gave her limbs disrobed to see ; But at whose voice, Praxiteles, to thee? Richard Garnett. 32 ANONYMOUS. Anonymous. After many a dusty mile, Wanderer, linger here awhile ; Stretch your limbs in this long grass ; Through these pines a wind shall pass That shall cool you with its wing ; Grasshoppers shall shout and sing ; While the shepherd on the hill, Near a fountain warbling still, Modulates, when noon is mute, Summer songs along his flute ; Underneath a spreading tree. None so easy-limbed as he, Sheltered from the dog-star's heat. Rest ; and then, on freshened feet. You shall pass the forest through. It is Pan that counsels you. Edmund Gosse. ANONYMOUS. 33 Anonymous. The Birthplace of Homer. Wert thou born at Chios ? No. Then at Smyrna ? 'Twas not so. Then thy natal planet shone O'er Cyme or o'er Colophon ? Neither that is true nor this. Thou art, then, from Salamis ? Nay ! I was not cradled there. Where then, Homer ? tell us where ! Grant that I reply not. Why ? If I told my birthplace, I To those other towns mi^ht grow Less a favourite than a foe. Edmund Gosse. 615 34 ANONYMOUS. Anonymous. Supposed to be on the ruins of Berytus, destroyed by Tryphon, King of Syria, B.C. 140. Stay not your course, O mariners, tor me, Nor furl your sails — is not my harbour dry ? Nought but one vast, forsaken tomb am I ! But steer for other lands, from sorrow free, Where by a happier and more prosp'rous shore, Your anchor ye may drop and rest your oar. Thus will the Gods of hospitality, Thus wills Poseidon — who may dare rebel ? Then, wanderers by sea and land — farewell ! Abna StrettelL ANONYMOUS. 35 Anonymous. What churl, by evil chance or fell design, Plucked this unmellowed cluster from the vine. And flung it reckless on the road to lie Half-eaten, trampled of each passer-by ? Lycurgus' doom, avenging Bacchus, be His, who slew gladness in its infancy, Crushing what, spared for some auspicious day, Had Song inspired, or Sorrow chased away. Richard Game it. 36 ANONYMOUS. Anonymous. Shepherd, if thirst oppress thee while thy flock Thou lead'st at noon by this Arcadian spring ; Here freely drink thy fill, and freely bring Around my Naiads all thy fleecy stock. But in the water wash not ; lest thou feel Loathing, and strange antipathy to wine; Such power it hath to make thee hate the vine, E'er since my fount did Proetus' daughters heal : For here Melampus bathed them, here he cast A spell to purge their madness off, and hold The secret taint ; what time from Argos old To rough Arcadia's mountain heights he past. Crowe. ANONYMOUS, 37 Anonymous. Straight is the way to Acheron, Whether the spirit's race is run From Athens or from Meroe : Weep not, far off from home to die ; The wind doth blow in every sky, That wafts us to that doleful sea. J. A. SymofidSf M.D. 38 ANONYMOUS. Anonymous. Dear Earth, take old Aniyntas to thy breast, And for his toils not thankless give him rest. On thee 'twas his the olive-stem to rear ; His with the mantling vine to grace the year j Through him thy furrows teem'd with plenty; he Fill'd with rich streams each herb and fruit for thee. For this lie lightly on his hoary head, And with thy choicest spring-flowers deck his bed. Fr. Wrangham, ANONVMOUS. 39 Anonymous. May many a flower, O Vibius, bedeck thy burial-place, Nor bramble rude, nor hurtful weed, the chosen spot deface ; Uut may the soft narcissus bloom upon the new-raised mound, \Vith marjoram, and violets, and roses all around. H. IVeliesley, 40 ANONYMOUS, Anonymous. This stone, beloved Sabinus, on thy grave Memorial small of our great love shall be. I still shall seek thee lost ; Irom Lethe's wave, Oh. drink not thou forgetfulness of me. Goldivin Smith. ANONYMOUS. 41 Anonymous. Eagle ! why soarest thou above the tomb ? To what sublime and starry paven home Floatest thou ? I am the image of swift Plato's spirit, Ascending heaven : Athens doth inherit His corpse below. Shelley. 42 ANONYMOUS. Anonymous. Whose tomb I am, O mariner, do not thou ask of me ; Only be it thy lot to find a less tempestuous sea. Ahfia S tret tell. ANONYMOUS. 43 Anonymous. Oh I Death, untouch'd by ruth, unmoved by prayer ! Ah ! could'st thou not our young Call^eschrus spare ? The joy of all that pretty babe will be In realms below ; but sad at heart are we. Goldwin Smith. 44 ANONYMOUS (OR CALLIMACHUS ?). Anonymous (or Callimachus ?). Dead I my firstborn ? no ! to a better country departed, Living in happy islands that know no maid so light- hearted. There thou goest rejoicing along the Elysian pasture — Soft the flowers around thee — away from every disaster. Winter nor chills thee, nor summer burns, nor sickness makes sorry ; Thou nor hungerest more nor thirstest, and robbed of its glory Seems to thee now this life of ours, for thou dwellest securely — Innocent, there where the rays of Olympus enhallow thee purely 1 William M. Hardinge. ANONYMOUS. 45 Anonymous, On One who died i.\ a Tomb. Worn with old age and penury, nor thence Rescued by any man's beneficence, Into this tomb with tottering steps I past, And hardly here found leave to rest at last. Usage for most doth after death provide Interment ; I was buried ere I died. Richard Gamett 46 ANONYMOUS. Anonymous. Having but little eaten, drunk but little, And deeply suffered — after weary waiting, At last now I am dead. Ye all are coming Surely to this. Alma Si ret tell. ANONYMOUS. 47 Anonymous. On a Max killed by a RobbeR; and by him BURIED. Life thou hast taken from me, and instead A tomb, O robber, thou hast given me. Thou dost not bury me, but only hide. May such a tomb as this thy portion be ! Alma Strettcll^ 48 ANONYMOUS. Anonymous. Dion of Tarsus, here I lie, who sixty years have seen. I was not ever wed, and would my father had not been 1 Altfia Streitell, ANONYMOUS. 49 Anonymous. Weep, Ileraclitus, more than when alive; For life is now more piteous than before. More than of old yourself to laughter give, Democritus ; the times ask laughter more. Looking to both a medium care I'll try, How I may laugh with one, with th' other cry. George Biirges. 616 50 ANONYMOUS. Anonymous. Epitaph on Achilles. This mound the Achaeans reared — Achilles' tomb — P'or terror to the Trojans yet to be, Leans seaward, that his mighty spirit whom Sea Thetis bore may hear its dirge of the sea. Williajn M. Haniinge. ANONYMOUS. 51 Anonymous. Fortune and Hope, adieu ! I've found my port. Too long your dupe, be others now your sport. Ano7iy}noiis. ANTIPAJER OF BYZANTIUM. Antipater of Byzantium. Wide-spreading oak, with drooping branches green, Thou shadowy dome — fair leaves, that kindly screen From burning noonday heat, a deeper shade Than tiled roofs that hand of man hath made ; Home of the cricket, shelter of the dove, Stretching thy boughs to airy heights above, Beneath thy leafy crown I lay me down ; Now from the piercing sunbeams that I flee. Oh, shelter me ! Alma Strettell. ANTIPATER OF SIDON. 53 'f Antipater of Sidon. On a Temple to the Ocean-Nymphs near the Ruins of Corinth. ^YHERE is thy crown of beauty, Dorian maid, Corinth, thy towers, thy wealth, of old uplaid ? Gone are thy fanes, thy palaces, thy proud Sisyphian dames, — thy once unnumbered crowd. O ill-starred city, War hath reft away Thine all ; no relic of thee lives to-day. Only, like sea-birds that outlast the storm, We, Ocean-Nymphs, yet haunt thy ruined form. Lewis Campbell. 54 ANTIPA TER OF SIDON. Antlpater of Sidon. A Dead Plane Overgrown by a Vine, She whose weak growth I did erewhile sustain, Makes a rich vine of me a withered plane. Wrapped in her mantling leaves profusely strown, I scarce perceive that I have lost my own. From her, O youth, whom early love endears, Expect the solace of declining years. Richard Gariiett. ANTIPATER. 55 Antipater. One heifer and one fleecy sheep Were Aristeides' scanty store j With this poor wealth he strove to keep Grim pinching hunger from his door. Yet strove in vain : a wolf the one And labour pains the other slew, And left the herdsman, all undone, His loss of livelihood to rue. Poor wretch ! The thong, which lately bound His wallet, round his neck he tied. And near his cabin, where the sound No more was heard of lowing, died. Charles Whibley. 56 ANTIPATER OF SWON. Antlpater of Sidon. The Sea-Vf.nus. Not vnst this shrine, where by wet sand I sit Ruling the sea that surges up to it ; But dear, for much I love submissive sea. And much the mariner preserved by me : Entreat her then, whose smile thy speed can prove On the wild waves of Ocean and of Love. Richard Garnett. ANTIPAIER, Antlpater. The Limit of Life. Thirty-six is the term that the prophets assign, And the students of stars, to the years that are mine Nay, let thirty suffice, for the man who hath passed Thirty years is a Nestor, and he died at last ! Aiidreiv Lans. 58 ANTIPATER OF SIDON. Antipater of Siclon. Three maidens, Pallas, give their gifts to thee. The slender woof can they like spiders spin, Demo her basket brings, Arsinoe The distaff whence the thread falls fine and thin, And Bacchylis the shuttle that doth sing A busy nightingale among the thread, For pure, and far from every shameful thing. These maidens maidenly would win their bread ! Atiiirezv Lanj'. ANTIPATER OF SI DON. 59 Antlpater of Sidon. Honey and milk we sacrifice to thee, Kind Hermes, inexpensive Deity. But Hercules demands a sheep each day For holding — as he says — the wolf at bay. Imports it much, meek browsers of the sod, Whether the beast devour you, or the God ? Richard Gar net L 6o AMI PATER OF SIDON. Antlpater of Sidon. As the war-trumpet drowns the rustic flute, So when your lyre is heard all strings are mute : Not vain the labour of those clustering bees Who on your infant lips spread honey-dew ; Witness great Pan who hymned your melodies, Pindar, forgetful of his pipes for you. J, Addington Symonds. ANT IP A lER OF SI DON. 6i Antipater of Sidon. Sappho. Sappho thou coverest, iEolian land ! The Muse who died, Who with the deathless Muses, hand in hand, Sang, side by side ! Sappho, at once of Cypris and of Love The child and care ; Sappho, that those immortal garlands wove For the Muses' hair ! Sappho, the joy of Hellas, and thy crown, — Ye Sisters dread, ^Vho spin for mortals from the distaff down The threefold thread, Why span ye not for her unending days, Unsetting sun. For her who wrought the imperishable lays Of Helicon? Andrew Lang. 62 AN TIP A TER OF SI DON. Antipater of Sldon. Erinna. Brief is Erinna's song, her lowly lay, Yet there the Muses sing ; Therefore her memory doth not pass away, Hid by Night's shadowy wing ! But we, — new countless poets, — heaped and hurled All in oblivion lie ; Better the swan's chant than a windy world Of rooks in the April sky ! Andrew La7iz. ANTIPATER OF SI DON. Antipater of Siclon. This tomb be thine, Anacreon ; all around Let ivy wreath, let flowerets deck the ground, And from its earth, enrich'd with such a prize. Let wells of milk and streams of wine arise. So will thine ashes yet a pleasure know ; If any pleasure reach the shades below. Anon. {Spectator). 64 ANTJPHILUS. Antlphllus. The Prophet. I KNEW it in your childish grace, The magic of Desire, " Who lives," I said, " will see that tace Set all the world on fire ! " They mocked, but Time has brought to pass The saying over-true. Prophet and martyr, now alas ! I burn — for truth and you ! Andrew Lanor. ANTIPHJLUS. Antiphilus. Pretty one, stay for me ! What may thy sweet name be ? Where may one have — ah speak ! — a sight of thee? I'll give thee all thou wilt ; — but wherefore, say, Dost not reply? Where dost thou live then? Nay, Some one I'll send with thee to see the way ! — Thou art not yet another's, surely no? — Proud one, good-bye then ! So, Wilt thou not even say good-bye? Well, go ! But often, often shalt thou find me by, I've tamed more stubborn ones than thou art, ay ! So, lady, now — good-bye. Alma St ret tell. 617 66 ANTiPHILUS, Antlphllus. The Tankard Misapplied. Formed to contain warm draughts of well-spiced ale For Western Dionysus' wassail-feast, Who crammed my sides with corn? Whence could prevail Such envy of my Bacchic bliss ? how fail Fit vessels for pale Ceres and her priest ? Both powers are wronged : Bacchus is robbed, and She Dishonoured in her temperate dignity. Lewis Campbell, ANllPHILUS, 6/ Antlphilus. EuEULE, craving Heaven's will to know, Would poise a pebble. Wished she to hear no, The stone was ponderous past all belief; If yes, 'twas lighter than a withered leaf. And did the divination prove at fault, " Phoebus," she'd say, " thou art not worth thy salt. Richard Garnet t. 68 ANYTES. C(iuv,^j Anytes. To shaggy Pan, and all the Wood-Nymphs fair, Fast by the rock this grateful offering stands, A shepherd's gift — to those who gave him there Rest, when he fainted in the sultry air ; And reached him sweetest water with their hands. John William Burgon. APOLLONWAS. 69 Apollonidas. Bee-keeping Cleiton seeks, great Pan, thy dome, Fraught with a mass of golden honeycomb, From flowery meads, where erst its sweets were bred, Browsed by the airy flock unshepherded. Be the brisk swarms innumerable made. And all their store ambrosia, by thy aid ! Richard Garnett. ^o MARCUS ARGENTARIUS. li- Marcus Argentarius. Rich, thou hadst many lovers ; — poor, hast none, So surely want extinguishes the flame. And she who call'd thee once her pretty one, And her Adonis, now inquires thy name. Where wast thou born, Sosicrates, and where In what strange country can thy parents live, Who seem'st, by thy complaints, not yet aware That want's a crime no woman can forgive ? \V. Cozvter. MARCUS ARGENTARIUS. 71 [fli'fJi I Marcus Argentarius. Thou art in danger, Cincius, on my word, To die ere ihou hast lived, which were absurd. Open thy ears to song, thy throat to wine. Thy arms unto that pretty wife of thine. Philosophy, I have nowise forgot, Is deathless, but philosophers are not. Richard Garnett. 72 MARCUS ARGENTARIUS. Marcus Argentarlus. Call it not love when the delighted eye Is lured by charms into captivity ; But when wild fires for weak attractions waste : To pine for beauty is not love but taste. Richard Gai ncit. MARCUS ARGENTARIU5. 73 r. Marcus Argentarlus. Warble no more thy mellow melody, Sweet Blackbird, from that knotty oaken tree, But where the clambering vine her tendril weaves, Come winging to the hospitable eaves, And chant uncaged, for that, thy race's foe, Fosters the birdlime-bearing mistletoe ; But this the purple grape, so duly thine, For Minstrelsy should ne'er be scant of Wine. Richard GarneiL 74 MARCUS ARGENTARIUS. Marcus ArQ^entarlus. o Deeply this seal is graven to declare Love drawn by lions, a submissive pair. The lash falls lightly on their necks, their pace The curb controls, strength gives itself to grace. When lions tamed to Cupid's yoke I see, I quake to think what he can do with me. Richard Gameit. MARCUS ARGENTARIUS. 7 5 ((^.>^t\ Marcus Argentarius. t5 Feasting I watch with westward-lcoking eye The flashing constellations' pageantry. Solemn and splendid ; then anon I wreathe Tvly hair, and warbling to my harp I breathe My full heart forth, and know the heavens look down Pleased, for they also have their Lyre and Crown. Richard Gamett. 76 ARCH IAS. Archias. O LITTLE Love, in very sooth too fiercely shootest thou ! At least, then, spend thine arrows all on me, me only now ; Vea, smite and strike me down alone, that when the time shall be That thou would'st pierce some other breast, no dart be left to thee. Alma St ret tell. ARCHIAS OF BYZANTIUM. 77 Archias of Byzantium. Sea Dirge. Crushed by the waves upon the crag was I, Who still must hear these waves among the dead, Breaking and brawling on the promontory, Sleepless ; and sleepless is my weary head ! For me did strangers bury on the coast Within the hateful hearing of the deep. Nor Death, that lulleth all, can lull my ghost, One sleepless soul among the souls that sleep ! Andrew Latiz- 78 ASCLEPIADES. Asclepiades. Didyme's eyes have ravished me — alack and well-a- day ! As wax before the fire before her I melt, charms, away. Though she be black, what matters it? Coal, too, is black, yet glows When once it burns, as brightly as the chalice of a rose. Alma Strettelh ASCLEPIAUES. 79 f«-'7.J Asclepiacles. O Garlan-ds, hanging by these doors, now stay, Nor from your leaves too quickly shake away My dew of tears. (How many such, ah me ! A lover's eyes must shed !) But when the opening of these doors ye see, Let slowly drop my rain upon her head, That so her golden hair may drink more deep Those tears that I did weep. Alma SirctleU. 8o ASCLEPIADES. Asclepiades. To A Girl. Believe me, love, it is not good To hoard a mortal maidenhood ; In Hades thou wilt never find, Maiden, a lover to thy mind ; Love's for the living ! presently Ashes and dust in death are we ! Andrew Lafig. ASCLEPIADES. fr Asclepiades. Tumultuous sea, whose wrath and foam are spent So nigh to Eumares' worn monument ; Spare if thou wilt and shatter if thou must. For nothing shalt thou find but bones and dust. Richard Garfietf. 6iS 82 BACCHYLIDES, Bacchylldes. To Zephyr, most propitious of all airs, Eudemus on his land erects this fane : Zephyr, kind help, who hasted at his prayers, To winnow from the stalks the ripened grain. H. Welleshy. BIANOR. %z Bianor. I MOURNED for dead Theonoe, But hope sprung up around our child And so my deepest grief beguiled. Now envious Fate hath snatched from me This too. O babe, my last one, thou Hast even thyself deceived me now ! Then hear this prayer, Persephone, Wrung from a father's agony ! And lay the babe to rest On his dead mother's breast. Alma St ret tell. 84 BIANOR OF BITHYNIA. Bianor of Bithynia. A Macedonian tomb doth cover thee ; But blasted by the thunderbolt of heaven, Thou hast cast off all taint of earthly dust; For from the radiance of the sky, his throne, Zeus hath thrice flashed his lightning down on thee, Euripides, and purified thy tomb Of every vestige of mortality. Jhfia St re (tell. BIANOR OF BITHYNIA. 85 Bianor of Bithynia. Thebes is the tomb Wherein the sons of QEdipus are buried. Yet even the tomb, the all destroying, knew them, And feels within, their living wars roll on. Yea, even Hades' might could not subdue them. And unappeased, they fight in Acheron. Their very grave, with enmity still shaken — Fire against fire — their hatred hath confest. O children most unhappy ! who have taken Relentless swords, that will not let you rest. Alma St ret tell. 86 BION. Blon. The Boy and Love. A FOWLER, while yet a boy, was hunting birds in a woodland glade, and there he saw the winged Love, perched on a box-tree bough. And when he beheld him, he rejoiced, so big the bird seemed to him, and he put together all his rods at once, and lay in wait for Love, that kept hopping, now here, now there. And the boy, being angered that his toil was endless, cast down his fowling gear, and went to the old husbandman that had taught him this art, and told him all, and showed him Love on his perch. But the old man, smiling, shook his head, and answered the lad, " Pursue this chase no longer, and go not after this bird. Nay, flee far from him. 'Tis an evil creature. Thou wilt be happy, so long as thou dost not catch him, but if thou comestto the measure of manhood, this bird that flees there now, and hops away, will come uncalled, and of a sudden, and settle on thy head." Andrew Lanjr. BION. 87 Blon. I DREAMT I saw great Venus by me stand, Leading a nodding infant by the hand; And that she said to me familiarly— " Take Love, and teach him how to play to me." She vanish'd then. And I, poor fool, must turn To teach the boy, as if he wish'd to learn. I taught him all the pastoral songs I knew And used to sing ; and I inform'd him too, How Pan found out the pipe, Pallas the flute, Phoebus the lyre, and Mercury the lute. But not a jot for all my words cared he, But lo ! fell singing his love-songs to me ; And told me of the loves of gods and men, And of his mother's doings ; and so then I forgot all I taught him for my part, But what he taught me, I learnt all by heart. Leisih Hunti CALLIMACHUS, Calllmachus. Such sleep, Canopion, on thine eyelids wait, As sits on his, now shivering at thy gate. Such sleep, thou false one, as thou bid'st him prove. Who vainly sues thy stony breast to move. Not e'en a shade of pity thou'lt bestow. Others may weep to see me suffer so ; But thou — not e'en a shade. Oh cruel fair ! Be this remember'd with thy first grey hair. John Hermann Merivale. CALLIMACHUS. 89 Callimachus. The hunter, Epicydes, will not spare To follow on the trace of fawn and hare Through snow and frost, so long as still they fly ; But if one say " 'Tis hit," he passes by. Even so my love, winged for no willing prize, Follows what flees, and flees what fallen lies. Richard Gartjcit. 90 CALLIMACHUS, Calllmachus. I, Nautilus, of late the Zephyr's shell, Come, Venus, in thy treasury to dwell, Selene's gift, the first her youth has made. No more shall I, my living canvas spread, Skim the rough sea before the impelling gale. Or oar it with my feet, when calms prevail ; No more my pearly home shall be possest By thee, intruding Halcyon, for a nest ; For, to lulls' strand by billows borne. Thy shrine, Arsinoe, henceforth I adorn ; But Clinias' daughter prosper thou, for she Skilful in Smyrna's art, hath polished me. Richard Gantett, CA LLIMA CH US. 9 1 Calllmachus. E?7re' Tis 'Hpd/fXetre, rebv [xopov. One told me, Heraclitus, of thy fate; He brought me tears, he brought me memories, Alas, my Carian friend, how oft, how late, We twain have talked the sun adown the skies. And somewhere thou art dust without a date ! But of thy songs Death maketh not his prize, In Death's despite, that stealeth all, they wait, The new year's nightingale that never dies ! Andrew Lansr. 92 CALLIMACHUS. Calli macnus. Now would to God swift ships had ne'er been made ! Then, Sopolis, we had not mourned thy shade — Dear son of Diocleides seaward sent ! Now somewhere in deep seas thy corse is tost Hither and thither — and for whom we lost We find thy name and empty monument, William M. Hardin^c. CALLIMACHUS. 93 Callimachus. For Crethis' store of tales and pleasant chat Oft sigh the Samian maidens, missing that Which cheered their tasks, but she, beyond their call, Sleeps here the sleep that must be slept by all. Richard Garnett. 94 CALLIMACHUS. Calllmachus. Stranger, whoe'er thou art, found stranded here, O'er thee Leontichus heaped up this grave, Whilst at his own hard lot he dropped a tear : He too, a restless sea-bird, roams the wave. H. WeUesley. CARPHYLLIDAS. 95 Carphyllidas. Lament not, wayfarer, that passest by my tomb; not even in death have I any cause for tears. Children's children do I leave : with one wife was I blessed, whose years were as my own. Three sons I gave in marriage, and oft have I rocked their children on my breast. Nor death nor sickness of one of them all have I bewailed, but they have given me due rites of funeral, and sent me to sleep the sleep delectable, in the land of the leal. Andrew Lans:. 96 CRINAGORAS. Crinagoras. Children of spring, but now in wintry snow We purple roses for Callista blow. Duteous we smile upon thy natal morn ; Thy bridal bed to-morrow we adorn. Oh ! sweeter far to bloom our little day, Wreath'd in thy hair, than wait the sunny May. Robert Bland. CRINAGORAS. 97 Crinagoras. O HAPPY swain, I would that unto me Who roamed rude Ocean, the felicity Of shepherd's crook and carol had been known Ere yet I came a corpse by Eurus blown To these delightful shores where thou, most blest, Thy snowy flock serenely pasturest. Richard Garnett. 619 98 CRINAGORAS. Crinagoras. Full oft of old the islands changed their name, And took new titles from some heir of fame ; Then dread not ye the wrath of gods above, But change your own and be the "Isles of Love." For Love's own name and shape the infant bore, Whom late we buried on your sandy shore. Break softly there, thou never-weary wave, And earth, lie lightly on his little grave. John William Biirgon. DAMOCHARIS THE GRAMMARIAN. 99 Damocharis the Grammarian. Upon a Small Bath. Why should little things be blamed 'i Little things for grace are famed. Love, the winged and the wild, Love is but a little child. Thomas Percival Rosters. lOO DIOTIMUS Diotimus. On a Statue OF Artemis Chase. READY FOR THE I AM Artemis, as ye may know. That the craftsman who wrought me Did purpose to sh ow me, the daughter of Zeus and no | other, The virgin's bold aspect proclaims. One would say of a surety That all the whole earth was a hunting-ground only for 1 me. Alma Strettell. DIOriMUS (OR LEONIDAS), loi Diotimus (or Leonidas). The hapless cattle from the hill-side came, Late, and self-herded, beaten on by snow, But ah, the herdsman sleepeth, where the flame Of heaven beneath the oak-tree laid him low. Andrew Lang. ERINNA. Erin na. My funeral-shaft, and marble shapes that dwell Beside it, and sad urn, receptacle Of all I am, salute who seek my tomb, If from my own, or other cities come ; And say to them, a bride I hither came, Tenos my country, Baucis was my name. Say also, this inscription for her friend Erinna, handmaid of the Muses, penned. Richard Garnett. EVEN us. 103 Evenus. On the Swallow, Attic maid ! with honey fed, Bear'st thou to thy callow brood Yonder locust from the mead, Destined their delicious food ? Ye have kindred voices clear, Ye alike unfold the wing, Migrate hither, sojourn here, Both attendant on the spring. Ah ! for pity drop the prize ; Let it not with truth be said, That a songster gasps and dies. That a songster may be fed. W, Cowper. I04 HEGESIPPUS. Hegesippus. This statue at the meeting of three ways A maiden, still beneath her father's roof, Agelocheia, did to Dian raise ; Who, while her busy fingers plied the woof, Appear'd before her in a sudden blaze. C. Merivale. HERACLETUS. 105 Heracletus. I WHO have laid me here among the dead Am Aretemias, to Euphron wed; As lovely twins were taken from my side, I, by the Fates' allotment, sank and died, One leaving, to console my husband's grief, One bringing hither, for my own relief. Richard Garnett. to6 HERACLETUS. Heracletus. Keep off, keep off thy hand, O husbandman, Nor through this grave's quiet dust thy plough- share drive ; These very sods have once been mourned upon, And on such ground no crop will ever thrive, Nor corn spring up with green feathery ears. From earth that has been watered by such tears. Alma Strettell. HYBRIAS THE CRETAN. 107 Hybrias the Cretan. My spear, my sword, my shaggy shield — With these I till, with these I sow ; With these I reap my harvest field, — No other wealth the gods bestow : With these I plant the fertile vine ; With these I press the luscious wine. My spear, my sword, my shaggy shield I They make me lord of all below, — For those who dread my spear to wield, Before my shaggy shield must bow. Their fields, their vineyards, they resign. And all that cowards have is mine. John Leyden. io8 ION. Ion. Hail, dear Euripides, for whom a bed In black-leaved vales Pierian is spread : Dead though thou art, yet know thy fame shall be. Like Homer's, green through all eternity. J. Addington Symonds. ISIDORUS. 109 Isidorus. On a Fowler. With reeds and bird-lime from the desert air Eumelus gather'd free, though scanty, fare. No lordly patron's hand he deign'd to kiss ; Nor luxury knew, save liberty, nor bliss. Thrice thirty years he lived, and to his heirs His reeds bequeath'd, his bird-lime, and his snares. W. Coivper. no JULIANUS ANTECESSOR. Julianus Antecessor. Stay in town, little wight, Safe at home : If you roam, The cranes who delight Upon pigmies to sup, Will gobble you up. Slay at home. // Wellesley. JULIAN OF EGYPT. iii Julian of Egypt. As a rosy wreath I bound, 'Mongst the roses Love I found : Swift I seized his pinions fast, And in wine the wanton cast. Taking then the laughing cup, Swift I drank the wanton up. Now with ever-tickling wings Up and down my breast he springs. Addison. 112 JULIAN OF EGYPT. Julian of Egypt. Last night, while I was weaving posies, I found a Love among the roses ; I took him by the wings and bound him ; Then in a bowl of wine I drowned him ; I drank the wine ; but since that minute My breast feels, tingling, Love within it. Edmund Gosse. JULIAN OF EGYPT. 113 Julian of Egypt. On Democritus. Plu'io, receive the sage, whose ghost Is wafted to thy gloomy shore ; One laughing spirit seeks the coast, Where never smile was seen before. John Hermann Merivale. 620 114 JULIAN OF EGYPT. Julian of Egypt. Cruel is death. Nay, kind. He that is ta'en Was old in wisdom, though his years were few ; Life's pleasure he has lost ; escaped life's pain ; Nor wedded joys nor wedded sorrows knew. Goldwin Smith. JULIA N OF EG YPT, 115 Julian of Egypt. Oft have I sung — now from the tomb I cry — Drink, ere enveloped in this dust you lie. H. WellesUy. ii6 LEONIDAS OF ALEXANDRIA. Leonldas of Alexandria. To A Swallow Building on a Statue of Medea. Build not, fond swallow, on that breast of stone ; Will she preserve thy brood who slew her own ? Richard Garnett. LEONIDAS OF ALEXANDRIA. 117 Leonldas of Alexandria. Menodotis's portrait here is kept; Most odd it is How very like to all the world, except Menedotis. Richard Garnett. Ii8 LEONIDAS OF TARENTUM. Leonldas of Tarentum. 'Tis time to sail — the swallow's note is heard, Who chattering down the soft west wind is come, The fields are all aflower, the waves are dumb Which erst the winnowing blast of winter stirred. Loose cable, friend, and bid your anchor rise, Crowd all your canvas at Priapus' best. Who tells you from your harbours — *' Now 'twere best. Sailor, to sail upon your merchandise." William M. Hardinge. LEON IDAS OF TAREXTUM. 119 Leonidas of Tarentum. Fair Kypris, rising from her mother's breast, Her beauty with the salt sea foam aglow, Apelles saw and bade the loveliest Vision of joy upon his canvas grow. A living form, which seems to breathe and move ! She draws her taper fingers through her hair ; In her calm eye shines soft the light of love ; Her quince-shaped breasts her wondrous charms declare. Then, then Athena and great Hera yield Confessing, " Zeus, for her we quit the field." Charles Whibley. I20 LEONIDAS OF TARENTUAL Leonldas of Tarentum. A Fig-Tree. Democritus fig-loving shouldst thou see, Bear him this message, traveller, from me : The luscious fruit, maturely beautiful. Weighs upon me, and waits for him to cull ; But fence is none ; so, if he wish to taste, 'Tis fit that thou and he should both make haste. Richard Garneit. LEONID AS OF TARENTUM. Leonidas of Tarentum. Not solely from the summer's sultry heat Seek I in shady glades a cool retreat, And sip up dew, and utter from the pine Music unbought, the traveller's joy and mine : But on the shining point of Pallas' spear I perch a warlike grasshopper ; for dear As I to Muses, is to me the maid Whose skill inventive first the flute essayed. Richard Gar net t 22 LEONIDAS OF TARENTUM. Leonidas of Tarentu m. They say that I am small and frail, And cannot live in stormy seas ; It may be so ; yet every sail Makes shipwreck in the swelling breeze. Not strength nor size can then hold fast ; But Fortune's favour, Heaven's decree : Let others trust in oar and mast ; But may the gods take care of me. C. Merivale, LEONID AS OF TAREM'UM. 123 Leonidas of Tarentuin. Venus, at Rhode's prayer this stick, and the- Sandals, the spoil of sage Posochares ; This dirty leather flask, this wallet torn, Suffer thy sanctuary to adorn : Trophies not rich but glorious, for they prove Philosophy's subjection unto Love. Richard Garnet t. 124 LEONID AS OF TARENTUM. Leonidas of Tarentum. With courage seek the kingdom of the dead ; The path before you lies, It is not hard to find, nor tread ; No rocks to climb, no lanes to thread ; But broad, and straight, and even still, And ever gently slopes down-hill ; You cannot miss it, though you shut your eyes. C. Merivale. LEONID AS OF 7ARENTVM. Leonldas of Tarentum. The Tomb of Crethon. I y\M the tomb of Crethon ; here you read His name ; himself is number'd with the dead ; Who once had wealth not less than Gyges' gold : Who once was rich in stable, stall, and fold ; Who once was blest above all living men — • With lands, how narrow now, how ample then : John He r via II n MerivaU. 126 LEONID AS OF TARENTUM. Leonldas of Tarentum. Shepherds that on this mountain ridge abide, Tending your goats and fleecy flocks alway, A little favour, but most grateful, pay Cleitagoras, nor be the boon denied ! For sake of mother earth, and by the bride Of Hades under earth, let sheep, I pray, Bleat near me, and the shepherd softly play From the scarred rock across the pasture wide. Ah ! but, in early spring, cull meadowsweet, Neighbour, and weave a garland for my tomb ; And with ewe's milk be the stone edge bedewed When the lambs play about their mother's feet. So shall you honour well the shades, from whom Are thanks — and from the dead is gratitude. William M. Hardinge. LEON ID AS OF TARENTUM. 127 Leonidas of Tarentum. The Fisherman. Theris the old, the waves that harvested, More keen than birds that labour in the sea, With spear and net, by shore and rocky bed Not with the well-manned galley, laboured he ; Him not the Star of Storms, nor sudden sweep Of wind with all his years hath smitten and bent. But in his hut of reeds he fell asleep, As fades a lamp when all the oil is spent : This tomb nor wife nor children raised, but we His fellow-toilers, fishers of the sea. Andrezv Lang. LEON/DAS OF TARENTUM. Leonidas of Tarcntum. The Spinning Woman, Morning and evening, sleep she drove away, Old Platthis, — warding hunger from the door, And still to wheel and distaff hummed her lay Hard by the gates of Eld, and bent and hoar : Plying her loom until the dawn was grey, The long course of Athene did she tread : With withered hand by withered knee she spun Sufficient for the loom of goodly thread. Till all her work and all her days were done. And in her eightieth year she saw the wave Of Acheron, — old Platthis, — kind and brave. Andrew Lang. LEON IDAS OF TARENTUM. 129 Leonidas of Tarentum. Unnumbered were the ages past, O man, Before thy day began. Unnumbered, too, the ages yet shall be, That Hades hath for thee. What store of life, then, doth to thee remain ? Scarce as it were a grain ! Scanty thy life and short— nor mayest thou Even enjoy it now ; For it is hateful, and its poisoned breath More dire than loathed death. Then scorn this stormy life of thine and shun — As I indeed have done, I, Pheido, son of Krita — and like me, Seek the still haven of tranquillity, The haven of dark Hades' silent sea. Alma Sir et tell. 621 I30 LUC I AN. Lucian. "Plain Living and High Thinking." Stern Cynicus doth war austerely wage With endive, lentils, chicory, and sage ; Which shouldst thou thoughtless proffer, "Wretch," saith he, " Wouldst thou corrupt my life's simplicity? " Yet is not his simplicity so great But that he can digest a pomegranate ; And peaches, he esteems, right well agree With Spartan fare and sound philosophy. Richard Garnett, LUCIAN. 131 Lucian. A Field. Cleon's I was, to Cleitophon was sold ; Another's soon ; soon will another hold ^Vhat each calls his; but the pure truth to say, Fortune's I am and I shall be alway. Richard Gamed. 132 LUCIAN. Lu Clan. Priaptjs, by devout Actemon placed Protector of his garden's weedy waste, Warns all disposed to search its bounds for pelf That there is nought to steal except himself. Richard Garnett. LUCIAN. 133 Lucian. Poseidon, and all Ocean-deities, Lucillius, 'scaped from shipwreck on the seas, Doth dedicate to ye who bade him live His hair, for nothing else is left to give. Richard Gamett. 134 LUCIAN. I.ucian. A CHILD of five short years, unknown to woe, Callimachus my name, I rest below. Mourn not my fate. If few the joys of life. Few were its ills, its conflicts ; brief its strife. 77io/yias Farley. LUCIA N. Lucian, All mortal things from mortals glide, And they from all that doth abide. Richard Gar, :36 LUCILLIUS. Luclllius. Eros, I pray thee to remove Or else divide my pain ; Either forbid me more to love, Oi make me loved again Richard Garnett. LUCILLIUS. 137 Lucillius. They call thee rich ; I deem thee poor ; Since, if thou clarest not use thy store, But savest only for thine heirs, The treasure is not thine, but theirs. W. Cowper. 138 LUCILLIUS, Lucillius. They say that thou dost tinge (O monstrous lie ! ■ The hair that thou so raven-black didst buy. Richard Garnett. LUCILLIUS. 139 LucilliLis. Poor Cleon out of envy died, His brother thief to see Nail'd near him to be crucitied Upon a higher tree. Francis Hods'soii. I40 L UCILLIUS. Luclllius. Upon those who are ever Ailing. Far happier are the dead, methinks, than they Who look for death, and fear it every day. W. Cowper, MACEDONIUS. 141 Macedonius. They gather in the vintage year by year, And one who cuts the clusters, if he find Some wayward tendril, is not wroth, I trow. Thee too, thou rosy-armed one, thee, my dear. My heart's delight, in mine embrace I bind With tender fetters, and so gather now Love's vintage in. I care not, neither stay For summers or for springs to come, since thou To me art full of loveliness alway. So be thou ever young and full of grace ; But should I chance to find athwart thy face Some slanting wrinkle — it shall never move me, Because I love thee ! Alma Streitell, 142 MACEDONIUS, Macedonius. Thou art come ! long-desired yet scarcely hoped-for ! And my thoughts are amazed with dread surprise. I tremble, the deeps of my heart are shaken As the frenzied tempests of passion rise. My soul in the tide of Love is drowning — To me that am shipwrecked, show forth thy grace, Oh save me, receive me, and give me shelter Within the harbour of thine embrace. Alma S tret tell. MACEDONIUS. 143 Macedonius. OiN A Mercenary Beauty. Golden the hive, and yet 'tis true Bees wrought it not from gold, but dew. Dewy thy kiss, and yet 'tis told Its birth is not from dew, but gold. Richard Garjieti. 144 MACEDONIUS, Macedonius. All hail, Remembrance and Forgetfulness ! Trace, Memory, trace whate'er is sweet or kind When friends forsake us or misfortunes press, Oblivion, rase the record from our mind. Robert Bland, MACCIUS. 145 Maccius. Thou god, with airy footfall quickly leaping, Thou treader of the wine-press, hither come. And lead our merry work at night-time, dipping Thy light foot in the snowy grape-juice foam. With garment girt above thy nimble knee, Come, cheer the dances on in praise of thee ; Then draw the stream of sweetly-murm'ring wine Into our vats, O blessed one — and thine The shaggiest he-goat of our herds shall be, And barley-cakes, prepared right daintily. Alma Strettell. 622 146 MACCIUS. Maccius. PriapuS; whom the fisherman's belief Holds patron of the rock and ragged reef, This crab, which in his wicker lost its way, Paris devotes to thee — that is to say, The shell — for all the rest he did presume In his own hungry entrails to entomb. If thou desirest to partake his dish Henceforward, let him henceforth catch more fish. Richard Garnett. MARIANUS SCHOLASTICUS. 147 Marlanus Scholasticus. On a Bath. Once on a time Love bathed his mother here. First heating with his torch the waters clear, Lo from her goddess form what dews distil ! And wake fresh odours in the mingling rill ! E'en now, such roseate fumes ascend, you'd swear That golden Venus still was bathing there. H. Wellesley, 148 MARIAAUS SCHOLASTICUS. Marlanus Scholasticus. From the "Passionate Pilgrim." The little Love-god, lying once asleep. Laid by his side his heart, in flaming brand, Whilst many Nymphs, that vow'd chaste life to keep. Came tripping by ; but in her maiden hand The fairest votary took up that fire, Which many legions of true hearts had warm'd ; And so the General of hot desire Was sleeping by a virgin hand disarm'd. This brand she quenched in a cool well by. Which from Love's fire took heat perpetual, Growing a bath, and healthful remedy For men diseased. But I, my mistress' thrall. Came there for cure ; and this by that I prove, Love's fire heats water; water cools not love. Shakespeare (?) MELEAGER. 149 Meleager. Spring. Now Winter's winds are banished from the sky. Gay laughs the blushing face of flowery Spring: Now lays the land her duskier raiment by And dons her grass-green vest, for signal why Young plants may choose themselves apparelling. Now, drinking tender dews of generous morn, The meadows break into their summer smile, The rose unfolds her leaves : and glad, the while, In far-ofif hills the shepherd winds his horn, And his white brede the goatherd's heart beguile. Now sail the sailors over billowing seas While careless Zephyr fills the canvas fair. And singing crowds with dances debonair Praise Dionysus for the grapes' increase — The berried iv}' twisted in their hair. I50 ME LE ACER. Forth from the rotting hide now bees are come — Deft craftsmen working well and warily — And in the hive they settle, while they ply Fresh -flowing waxen store, with busy hum, And small pierced cells for their sweet industry. Now shrilleth clear each several bird his note, The Halcyon charms the wave that knows no gale, About our eaves the swallow tells her tale, Along the river banks the swan, afloat. And down the woodland glades the nightingale. Now tendrils curl and earth bursts forth anew— Now shepherd's pipe and fleecy flocks are gay — Now sailors sail, and Bacchus gets his due — Now wild birds chirp and bees their toil pursue — Sing, poet, thou — and sing thy best for May ! William M, Hardinge^ M RLE ACER. 151 Meleager. Spring. Now the bright crocus flames, and nov/ The slim narcissus takes the rain, And, straying o'er the mountain's brow, The daffodilies bud again. The thousand blossoms wax and wane On wold, and heath, and fragrant bough, But fairer than the flowers art thou, Than any growth of hill or plain. Ve gardens cast your leafy crown, That my Love's feet may tread it down, Like lilies on the lilies set ; My Love, whose lips are softer far Than drowsy poppy petals are, And sweeter than the violet ! Andrew Lan^. 152 MELEAGER. Meleager. Now the white iris blossoms, and the rain-loving narcissus, And now again the lily, the mountain-roaming, blows. Now too, the flower of lovers, the crown of all the spring-time, Zenophila the winsome, doth blossom with the rose. O meadows, wherefore vainly in your radiant garlands laugh ye ? Since fairer is the maiden than any flower that grows 1 Alma Sir eft ell. MELEAGER, iS3 Meleager. Now will I weave white violets, daffodils With myrtle spray, And lily bells that trembling laughter fills, And the sweet crocus gay : With these blue hyacinth, and the lover's rose That she may wear — My sun-maiden — each scented flower that blows Upon her scented hair. WilliajH M. Hardinge. 154 MELEAGER. Meleager. To THE Ships. O GENTLE ships that skim the seas, And cleave the strait where Helle fell, Catch in your sails the Northern breeze, And speed to Cos where she doth dwell, My Love, and see you greet her well ! And if she looks across the blue, Speak, gentle ships, and tell her true '* He comes, for Love hath brought him back No sailor, on the landward tack." If thus, oh gentle ships, ye do. Then may ye win the fairest gales, And swifter speed across the blue. While Zeus breathes friendly on your sails. Andrew Lang, MELEAGER. 155 Meleager. I CRY you Love— at earliest break of clay But now, even now, his wings the wanderer spread And passed away, Leaving his empty bed. Ho 1 ye that meet the boy— for such is he, Full of sweet tears and wit ; a fickle sprite Laughing and free, With wings and quiver bright ! Yet know I not on whom to father Love — For earth denies the wanton child his name, And air above, And the broad sea the same. With each and all he lives at feud. Beware Lest, while I speak, he cast A dainty snare Over your hearts at last. But see ! his hiding-place, his very self. Close to my hand, behold, the archer lies A laughing elf Within my lady's eyes. William M. Hardinge. 156 MELEAGER. Meleager. Eros is missing. In the early morn Forth from his bed the rascal took his flight. Sweet are his tears ; his smile is touched with scorn- A nimble-tongued, swift-footed, fearless ^rite ! And he is winged ; his hands a quiver bear. What father 'twas begot him none can tell. '* He is not mine," Earth, Air, and Sea declare. That he's a foe to all, I know full well. So keep good watch : beware his snare's embrace ; Even now his toils may in thy pathway lie. But look, who's that ? Ah, there's his hiding-place ! I see him, bow and all, in Chloe's eye. Charles Whiblcy. MELEAGER. 157 Meleager. Cupid in Love. Why weep'st thou, Eros, heart-seducer, say ? Why are ihy bow and arrows cast away ? Why droop thy wings thus rueful? Ha ! I see. Doris has made a prisoner of thee ; And now instructs thee by thy proper smart How very mischievous a thing thou art. Richard Garjiett. 158 MELEAGER. Meleager. If thou too oft dost burn the soul that hovers About thy flame with moth-like flutterings, At last she will take flight, O Love — remember, Cruel one that thou art, she too has wings ! Alma Strettell. MELEAGER, 159 Meleager. Love brought by night a vision to my bed, One that still wore the vesture of a child But eighteen years of age — who sweetly smiled Till of the lovely form false hopes were bred And keen embraces wild. Ah 1 for the lost desire that haunts me yet, Till mine eyes fail in sleep that finds no more That fleeting ghost ! Oh, lovelorn heart, give o'cr- Cease thy vain dreams of beauty's warmth— forget The face thou longest for ! William M. Hardinze. i6o MELEAGER. Mel eager. Ah ! now remember ! yes, now remember How this good word in the good days I said : "Beauty is sweetest — beauty is fleetest, Not the swiftest bird in air Is a swifter passenger." Lo ! now to earth your beauty flowers are shed ! William M. Hardinge. MELEAGER. i6i Meleager. O Star, and Moon, so fair to lovers shining, And Night, and thou, melodious instrument, Comrade of midnight songs and revelry — Say, shall I find my am'rous fair reclining Alone, and making to her lamp lament, Or will some other her companion be ? Oh, then these suppliant garlands, sorrow-freighted, Withered by tears, I'll hang beside her gate, And write these words, these only words, above : " Kypris, to thee Meleager the ill-fated, Initiate of thy sports, doth dedicate These spoils of passion, wreckage of his love." Alma Strettell. 623 i62 MELEAGER. Mel eager. I PRAY thee, Moon, whose venerable eye Beholds all secrets both of earth and sky, If, at this hour nocturnal, one be prest To that most fair and false deceiver's breast, Endymion's sleep be his, nor do thou, Moon, Awake him as thou didst Endymion. Richard Garjiett. MELEAGER. 163 Meleager. Fair herald of the morning's trade, Come, Phosphor, with the ray Of Hesper soon, to lead her back WTiom now thou lead'st away. Richard Garnet L i64 MELEAGER. Meleager. Thou sleep'st, soft silken flower. Would I were Sleep, For ever on those lids my watch to keep. So should I have thee all my own ; nor he, Who seals Jove's wakeful eyes, my rival be. Johtt Hermann Merivale. MELEAGER. 165 Meleager. Ringlets, that with clustering shade The snow-white brows of Demo braid ; Sandals, that with strict embrace Heliodora's ankles grace ; Portal of Timarion's bower. Besprent with many a fragrant shower ; Lovely smiles that lurking lie In Anticleia's sun-bright eye ; Roses, fresh, in earliest bloom, That Dorothea's breast perfume — No more Love's golden quivers hold Their feather'd arrows, as of old ; But every sharp and winged dart Has found a quiver in my heart. John He/ maun MerivaJe. 1 66 MELEAGER. Meleager. The cup rejoiceth and is sweet ; it saith, the caubC is this— Zenophila's soft-prattling lip hath touched it, like a kiss. Oh, happy cup ! — Her lips to mine thus pressing, would that she Might at one single breath drink cut the very soul of me. Ahna StrettelL MELEAGER. 167 Meleager. Say to Lycsenis, Dorcas, what you're bid. Your love's proved false : false love can't long be hid. . . . Tell her so, Dorcas — see ! and then again A second and a third time, Dorcas, plain. Run, don't delay, but fly! stay — Dorcas — stay! Don't hurr)% Dorcas, till I've said my say. Add to the former words . . . (that's foolish 1) No. Say nothing, then, but this — yes, all. Now go. Be sure and tell her all. But why send you, Dorcas — when here I am and coming too? William M. Hardins^e. i68 MELEAGER. Meleag-er. O Love that flew so lightly to my heart, Why arc thy wings so feeble to depart ? Richard Garnett. MELEAGER. 169 Mel eager. Why, bee, thy flowers forsaking, dost thou rove And light upon the bosom of my love? Wouldst, honey-hoarding sting-bearer, express That plenteous sweets, and much of bitterness, That bosom stores ? If such thine errand, flee Back to thy hive, too long 'tis known to me. Richard Game it. I70 MELEAGER. Meleager. Fly swiftly, Gnat, and find Zenophile, And breathe into her ear this word from me, "Sleepless thy lover waits, and thou canst lie Asleep?" Fly swiftly, mimic minstrel, fly: But see that none of slumber thou bereave Save her. This labour if thou dost achieve, A lion's hide thy body shall adorn, And in thy talons shall a club be borne. Richard Garuett. MELEAGER. 171 Meleager. To A Locust. Charmer of longing — counsellor of sleep ! The cornfield's chorister Whose wings to music whirr — Come, mimic lute, my soul in songs to steep, Brush tiny foot and wing In tender musicking : Come ! out of sleepless care my heart uplift, Locust, and set love free With your shrill minstrelsy. And, in the morning, I will give for gift A fresh green leek to you And kissing drops of dew. William M. Hardim^c. 172 MELEAGER. Meleager. On a Pet Leveret. Torn from my mother's breast was I while yet A feeble, unsuspecting leveret, But Phanion's arms soon taught me to forget My loss, her nimble, frisky, long-eared pet. What lavish fare her fondness did provide ! Alas ! it was too lavish, and I died. But she inters me here, her couch beside, And in her dreams her playmate I abide. Richard Garnett. MELEAGER. 173 Meleager. On a Portrait. Ah ! who hath shown my lady unto me, Her very self, as if she spake? Who brought to me one of the Graces three For friendship's sake ? Full surely brings he me a joyful thing, And for his grace the grace of thanks I bring. V/illiain M. Hardin^e. 174 MELEAGER. Meleager. While heavenly fire consumed his Theban dame, A Naiad caught young Bacchus from the flame, And dipp'd him burning in her purest lymph. Still, still he loves the sea-maid's crystal urn, And when his native fires infiiriate burn, He bathes him in the fountain of the Nymph. T. Moore. MELEAGER. 175 Meleager. On Niobe and her Children. Daughter of Tantalus ! hearken my words — a message to mourn — Hear from my lips the pitiful tale of thy woe ! Loosen thine hair, poor mother, that baredst in deity's scorn jNIany a boy fur Phcebus to mark with his bow. Now not a son is left thee. Fresh horror ! for what do I see? Out and alas ! a slaughter that spares not the maid. One in the arms of her mother, and one as she clings to lier knee, One on the ground, and one at the breast unafraid ; One faces death with a shudder erect ; one bends on the dart ; Last, there is one that looks on the daylight alone. Niobe, she that erewhile loved boasting, with fear at her heart Stands yet quick — a breathing mother of stone. William M. Hardinge, [76 MELEAGER, Meleager. Pericles, Archias' son ! To thee they place — For witness of thy prowess in the chase — My column, on whose stone the sculptor sets Thy horse, thy dog, thy spears, thy hunting-nets Mounted on stakes, and eke the stakes alone — Ah God ! ah God ! — for all are only stone ! At twenty years thou sleep'st death's sleep profound, All undisturbed by beasts that prowl around. Williain M. Hardiii^e. MELEAGER. 177 Meleager. O Earth, thou universal mother, hail ! On him, who erst did burden thee but lightly, iEsigenes, do thou lie lightly now. Alma Strcttell. 624 178 MELEAGER, Meleager. Clearista. For Death, not for Love, hast thou Loosened thy zone ! Fkites filled thy bower, but now Morning brings moan ! Maids round thy bridal bed Hushed are in gloom, Torches to Love that led Light to the tomb. Andreiv Lan^. MELEAGER. 179 Meleager. Heliodore. Pour wine, and cry, again, again, again ! To Heliodore I And mingle the sweet word we call in vain, With that ye pour ! And bring to me the wreath of yesterday, That's dank with myrrh ; HesterncB roses, ah, my friends, but they Remember her ! Lo, the kind roses loved of lovers weep, As who repine. For if on any breast they see her sleep, It is not mine 1 Andrew Lain i8o MELEAGER. Meleager. Tears, even far beneath the earth I send thee, O Heliodore — bitter tears I pour ; Tokens of love, in Hades to attend thee. And on thy tomb, where I have mourned so sore, I offer — as libations poured above — Memories of our kindness and our love, O thou, among the dead beloved even, Meleager sorely, sorely wails for thee ; Vain homage, empty prayers to Hades given ! Ah, where may now my mourned-for blossom be? Hades hath ravished, ravished it away, And dust defiles my blooming flower to-day. O Earth, all nourishing, to thee I make My supplication — her I weep for take, And gently fold her in thine arms, to rest. Mother, against thy breast. Alma Strettell. MELEAGER. i8i Meleager. Of Himself. Tyre brought me up, who born in thee had been, Assyrian Athens, city Gadarene ; My name is Meleager, Eucrates My sire, my skill with graceful strains to please ; My Syrian lineage do not discommend. One world have all, one origin, one end ; Stricken in years, I yet can touch the string. And this unto the tomb, my neighbour, sing ; Salute my garrulous old age, and be Thine own what now thou honourest in me. Richard Gartiett. i82 MELEAGER. Meleager. Of his Death. Ah ! Love, my Master, hear me swear By all the locks of Timo's hair, By Demo, and that fragrant spell Wherewith her body doth enchant Such dreams as drowsy lovers haunt, By Ilias' mirth delectable. And by the lamp that sheds his light On love and lovers all the night, By those, ah Love, I swear that thou Hast left me but one breath, and now Upon my lips it fluttereth, Yet this I'll yield, my latest breath, Even this, oh Love, for thee to Death ! Andrew Lang, MNASALCAS. 183 Mnasalcas. Vine that, not tarrying till the storm bereaves, Strew'st on autumnal air thy glorious leaves, Reserve them for her couch whom I await ; Bacchus was ever Venus' willing mate. Richard Gartictt. i84 MNASALCAS, Mnasalcas. The crooked bow and arrow-spending case Promachus hangs up in this holy place, Phoebus, to thee. The shafts remain apart For each is buried in a foenian's heart. Richard Garnett. MNASALCAS. 185 Mnasalcas. Here let us from the low- washed beach behold Sea-born Cythera's venerable fane; And fountains, fringed with shady poplars old, Where dip their wings the golden Halcyon train. John Hermann Mcrivale. i86 MNASALCAS. Mnasalcas. Epitaph on a Fowler. Now may the swiftly-winging bird return, And sit in peace upon this pleasant plane ; Pimander now is ashes in his urn, Nor here will lift his limy rods again. Richard Garnett. MOSCHUS. 187 Moschus. Pan loved his neighbour Echo ; Echo loved A gamesome Satyr ; he by her unmoved, Loved only Lyde ; thus through Echo, Pan, Lyde, and Satyr, Love his circle ran. Thus all, while their true lover's hearts they grieved, Were scorned in turn, and what they gave received. O all Love's scorners, learn this lesson true : Be kind to Love that he be kind to you. Eni£s£ Mjers. l88 MOSCHUS. Moschus. Leaving his torch and his arrows, a wallet strung on his back, One day came the mischievous Love god to follow the plough-share's track : And he chose him a staff for his driving, and yoked him | a sturdy steer, And sowed in the furrows the grain to the Mother of Earth most dear. Then he said, looking up to the sky : '' Father Zeus, to my harvest be good, Lest I yoke that bull to my plough that Europa once rode thro' the flood ! " Ernest Myers, MOSCHUS. 189 Moschus. Would that my father had taught me the craft of a keeper of sheep, For so in the shade of the elm-tree, or under the rocks on the steep, "Piping on reeds I had sat, and had lulled my sorrow to sleep. Ernest Myers. TQc NICARCHUS, NIcarchus. (Uncertain.) She that of old spun with Athene wise, Nicarete, Hath burned her looms and webs in sacrifice, Cypris, to thee ! " Begone !" she cries, "ye starveling works that wasted Our flower in spring," And garlands hath she ta'en, and lyre, and hasted With them that sing : And merrily she lives in love and pleasure. And still a tithe Of all her gain she vows, in honest measure. To Cypris blithe ! Andrew Lang, NICARCHUS. 191 NIcarchus. A STARRY seer's oracular abodes One sought, to know if he should sail for Rhode?, When thus the sage, " I rede thee, let thy ship Be new, and choose the summer for thy trip ; Safe then thou'It leave, and safe regain this spot, If those confounded pirates catch thee not." Richard Gamett. 192 NICARCHUS, Nicarchus. The screech-owl sings ; death follows at her cries : Demophilus strikes up ; the screech-owl dies. H. Wellesley. PALLADAS. 193 Palladas. This life a theatre we well may call, Where every actor must perform with art, Or laugh it through, and make a farce of all, Or learn to bear with grace his tragic part. Robert Bland. 625 194 PALLADAS. Palladas. On an Inanimate Actress. Thou hast a score of parts not good, But two divinely shown : Thy Daphne a true piece of wood, Thy Niobe a stone. Richard Garnctt. PALLADAS. 195 Palladas. Pity, says the Theban bard, From ray wishes I discard ; Envy, let me rather be, Rather far, a theme for thee. Pity to distress is shown ; Envy to the great alone. So the Theban. But to shine Less conspicuous be mine. I prefer the golden mean, Pomp and penury between. For alarm and peril wait Ever on the loftiest state ; And the lowest to the end Obloquy and scorn attend. W. Cowper. 196 PALLADAS. Palladas. Naked to earth was I brought — naked to earth I descend. Why should I labour for nought, seeing how naked the end? William M. Harditis'e. PALLADAS. 197 Palladas. Naked I stepped upon the earth— again, naked below the earth I shall descend, Why do I toil and trouble, seeing full well how barren and how naked is the end ? Alma Strettell. 198 PALLADAS. Palladas. Breathing the thin breath through our nostrils. *we Live, and a little space the sunlight see — Even all that live— each being an instrument To which the generous air its life has lent. If with the hand one quench our draught of breath, He sends the stark soul shuddering down to death. We that are nothing on our pride are fed, Seeing, but for a little air, we are as dead. William M. Hardinge. PALLADAS. 199 Palladas. WakIxVG we burst, at each return of morn, From death's dull fetters and again are born. No longer ours the moments that have past ; To a new remnant of our lives we haste. Call not the hours thine own, that made thee grey, That left their wrinkles, and have fled away ; The past no more shall yield thee ill or good, Gone to the silent times beyond the flood. Robert Blattd. 200 PALLADAS. Palladas. In tears I came to life, in tears I leave it, Nought have I found but tears in all life's day ! O tearful race of mortals ! piteous, feeble — Swept toward the grave, to crumble there away Alma St ret tell. PALLADAS. 20 1 Palladas. Why toil in vain, O man, thy soul disquieting? Fate's slave from birth thou art, without release. Suffer it thus— with destiny contend not ; To love thy lot — this is to love thy peace. Nay, better — strive to wrest, in fate's despite, Some sweetness from thy life, some soul's delight. Alma Strettell. 202 PAMPHILUS. Pamphilus. No longer nestling the green leaves among, Dost thou trill forth a sweet, melodious song, Tuneful cicada ! Thee despite thy strain, Some wanton urchin's outspread palm hath slain ! Edward Stokes. PANCRATES. 203 Pancrates. These tongs and pincers, and this hammer stout. Polycrates in Vulcan's temple lays, Toiling with which, he barr'd grim hunger out, Nor vainly strove his children's lot to raise. C. Merivale 204 PA UL US SILENTIARIUS, Paulus Silentiarius. No garland needs the rose, and thou, my fair, No jewelled nets or broidered veils dost need ; Pearls with thy skin may not compare indeed, Nor gold add radiance to thy flowing hair. The Indian hyacinth hath a dusky splendour, But duller than thine eyes' dark, lustrous sheen ; Thy bearing — honey-sweet, harmonious, tender- Is as the girdle of the Paphian Queen. By these I am undone — Thine eyes do soothe alone And save me from despair. For sweet hope lingers there. Alma Streitell. PAULUS SILENTIARIUS. 205 Paulus Silentlarlus. Say, why perfume thy hands or curl thy hair, Why clip thy nails, or robes of purple wear, Since lovely Rhodope no more is by ? Nay, with these eyes that on fair Rhodope May look no longer, neither will I see The radiance of the dawn upon the sky. Alma Sir et tell. 2o6 PAULUS SILENTIARIUS, Paulus Silentiarius. Cleophantis. Cleophantis is late and the third lamp I lighted, In the socket is sobbing and wasting away, Ah, would that the flame of the heart unrequited Might fade with the love lamp, and die ere the day ! Ah, would that I burned not in fruitless desires, Lo ! by Cypris she swore that e'er Hesper began To flood the soft night with his amorous fires. She would come, but she recks not of God nor of man! Andrew Lansr. PA UL US SILENT I A RIUS. 207 Paulus Silentiarius. A Late Convert. I THAT in youth had never been The servant of the Paphian Queen, I that in youth had never felt The shafts of Eros pierce and melt, Cypris ! in later age, half grey, I bow the neck to thee to-day. Pallas, that was my lady, thou Dost more triumphant vanquish now, Than when thou gainedst, over seas, The apple of the Hesperides. Andrciv Lang, 2o8 PA UL US SILENTIARIUS. Paulus Silentiarlus. The Offering to Lais. These withered rendings of brow-wreathing rose ; These shattered cups, where no more foams and flows Wine's strength ; this tress of myrrh-anointed hair ; Lais, from Anaxagoras' despair Take, laid in dust before thee, emblems fit Of his desire, and what he had from it. For, at thy gate with friends much revelling. No word, no look, no promise could he wring From thee, and with a curse doth now depart, Leaving these spoils of broken health and heart. Richard Garnett. PAULUS SILENTIARIUS. 209 Paulus Silentiarius. A WITCHING smile my Eumenis endears, But mightier is the magic of her tears. But yesterday, from some unthought-of cloud, Came sudden gusts of sobs, her head was bowed Low on my neck, and from her eyes' eclipse Tears mingled with the meeting of our lips. Why dost thou weep? Lest thou shouldst len me, dear. It was a lie, but one I loved to hear. Richard Garrietf. 626 2IO PAULUS SILENTIARIUS. Paiilus Silentiarius. Come, sitting by this tesselated board, Essay the joys its clattering dice afford. But not elated, or dejected be. If high or low the cast vouchsafed to thee. By throws the thoughts not seldom we descry, And wisdom's depth is fathomed by a die. Richard Garnett. PAULUS SILENTIARIUS. Paulus Silentlarius. Daphnis the piper, trembling 'neath the load Of years, this crook, his feeble hand no more Had force to wield, to Pan, the shepherd's god, Here offers up ; his shepherd labours o'er. His pipe he still can sweetly sound ; and still Strong is his voice, although his body's weak ; But look ye, swains, yon wolves upon the hill Ne'er of my feebleness o'erhear ye speak. Goldwin Smith. 212 PA ULUS SILENTIARIUS. Paulus Silentlarlus. My name, my country, what are they to thee ? What, whether proud or base my pedigree ? Perhaps I far surpass'd all other men ; Perhaps I fell below them all. What then ? Suffice it, stranger, that thou seest a tomb. Thou know'st its use. It hides — no matter whom. W. Cowper. PHILIP PUS, 213 Philippus. Here brazen beaks, the galley's harness, lie, Trophies of Actium's famed victory, But bees have built within the hollow arms, With honey filled, and blithe with buzzing swarms Emblem of Caesar's sway, that, calm and wise. Culls fruits of peace from arms of enemies. Richard Garneif. 214 PHILIPPUS. Phillppus. To Hermes, guardian of each gainful trade, This offering from the fisher's stores be made : My net, that hath so many a fish undone ; Reed, hair, and hook, three stratagems in one ; The lead that weights, the cork that buoys the line, The wicker-woven basket-trap ; in fine, All wiles I used the unwary fish to hem. And all the colds I caught in catching them, Richard Garnet L PHILODEMUS OF GADARA. Philodemus of Gadara. Not yet the season of bare stems for flowers, Nor yet wine-hued the grape cluster, which now Puts forth its maiden charms— but these the hours When little Loves prepare them each his bow, Lusidice, and smoke from embers lours — Poor lovers I and thou ! Ere the dart speed, a hasty flight be ours, For soon the world will be ablaze, I trow. William M. Hardingc 2i6 PHILODEMUS OF GADARA. Philodemus of Gadara. To-morrow, dearest Piso, one will come To lead thee to a philosophic home, Where, Epicurus's disciples, we Observe our master's anniversary. Song have we, and sincerity of soul, But look not, Piso, for the Chian bowl, Or sumptuous dishes, or aught exquisite. Except thine own urbanity and wit. Richa?'d Garnelt. PHILODEMUS OF GADARA. 217 Philodemus of Gadara. Shine forth, night-wandering, horned, and vigilant queen, Through the sky lattice shoot thy silver sheen ; Illume Callistion : for a goddess may Gaze on a pair of lovers while they play. Thou enviest her and me, I know, fair Moon, For thou didst once burn for Endymion. J. Addington Symotids. 2i8 PHILODEMUS OF GADARA. Philodemus of Gadara. Phil^NIOn's figure's naught, but crisp her brown Hair as the parsley ; and her cheek is down ; Music her voice ; all grants she, nought demands ; Wherefore, great Venus, firm my purpose stands To love her ever ; or until I find Another even more unto my mind. Richard Garnett, PHILODEMUS OF GADARA. 219 Philodemus of Gadara. The Age of Wisdom. •'I HAVE loved!" "And who hath not?" "Have revelled ! " " And who Is untaught in the rites of the revel ? " " Xay, more, I've been frenzied ! " "And who but God taught thee to do What thou didst? " " Well, 'tis gone, and the love- locks are hoar ! " " The grey locks are heralds of wisdom, we played In the season for play, it is over and past ; And now that it's ended, let's all undismayed. Take the teaching of Time, and be sober at last ! " Andrew Lans:. 220 PLA TO, Plato. O THAT my spirit were yon Heaven of light Which gazes on thee with its thousand eyes ! Shelley, PLATO. 221 Plato. Thou eyest the stars, my Star ? that mine might be Yon host of starry eyes to bend on thee ! Richard Garnett. 222 PLA TO, Plato. Up at the stars thou art gazing, O love ! would I might be Heaven, that with thousand eyes I might look back on thee. E. Parker, PLA TO. 223 Plato. To a thick wood we came ; and there we found Young Love, as ruddy apples fair to see, And fast in slumber's softest shackles bound. Nor bow nor quiver full of shafts had he ; For they were hanging on the green-wood tree. The boy himself, with rose-leaves cradled round, Lay smiling, as he slept, with half-closed lip. Whose juice nectareous oft the brown bee stoop'd to sip. Goldwin Smith. 224 PL A TO. Plato. Peace, wooded crags, and gushings from the hill Of streams, and many-bleating flocks be still : For Pan is piping here with mellow strength, Framing his moist lip to the various length Of fitted reeds, while round him dancing move The river's nymphs, the Dryads of the grove. Richard Garnett. PLATO. 225 Plato. Lais, now old, that erst all-tempting lass, To Goddess Venus consecrates her glass ; For she herself hath now no use of one, No dimpled cheeks hath she to gaze upon : She cannot see her springtide damask grace, Nor dare she look upon her winter face. From Orlando Gibbons First Set of Madrigals, 161 2. 627 226 PLA TO, Plato. The Offering of Lais. Venus, from Lais, once as fair as thou, Receive this mirror, useless to me now ; For what despoiling Time hath made of me I will not, what he marred I cannot, see. Richard Game ft. PLATO. 227 Plato. On a Gem engraved with a Herd of Cattle. Can mortal skill, unaided, serve to place A herd so numerous in such narrow space ? Can mortal be the kine I here behold Grazing on gems within a fence of gold ? Richard Garuett. 228 PLATO, Plato. Naiads, your frog, hoarse minstrel of a strain Aquatic, leaping lover of the rain, Imaged in brass, I dedicate, well pleased. To ye, in gratitude for thirst appeased. Faint was I wandering, when the welcome croak Loud from a nigh sequestered hollow broke. And, following the inviting voice, I found The twinkling spring clear-welling from the ground. Richard Garnett. PLA TO. 229 Plato. To Stella. Thou wert the morning star among the living, Ere thy fair light had fled ; Now, having died, thou art as Hesperus, giving New splendour to the dead. ShelUy. 230 PLA TO. Plato. For Dion, the Tyrant of Syracuse. Weeping the lot of the Ilian women — for Hecuba weeping — This was the weft of the Fates spun on the day they were born. Ah ! but from thee, my Dion, thy sacrifice gratefully keeping, Wide was the hope that the gods, quenching thine honours, have torn. Thou, while thy citizens praise thee, in the glades of thy land liest sleeping, Dion, desire of whose love wilders my senses forlorn. William M. Hardinge. PLATO (O 231 Plato (?) Eretrians of Euboean race, Near Susa lies our resting-place Alas, and well-a-day ! how far From our own land our bodies are LtTLvis CampbfU. 332 PLA TO. Plato. Far from the deep roar of the ^gean main, Here lie we in the midst of Media's plain. Farewell, great Fatherland ! Farewell to thee, Euboea's neighbour, Athens 1 Farewell, Sea ! Charles Whibley. PLATO. 233 Plato. Me whom to land the pitying billow bore, It stripped not of the humble dress I wore ; But he who found me dead did not disdain Such great pollution for such little gain. May the filched garment cleave unto his shade, And Minos see him in my spoils arrayed ! Richard Garnett. 234 JULIUS POLY.IlNUS. Julius Polyasnus. Hope steals our time away ; Man's latest morn Finds him devising many a deed unborn. Lewis Campbell. POM PEJUS, THE YOUNGER. Pompelus, the Younger. Lais. Lais, that bloomed for all the world's delight, Crowned with all love-lilies, the fair and dear, Sleeps in the destined sleep, nor knows the flight Of Helios, the gold-reined charioteer : Revel and kiss, and love and hate, — one night Darkens, that never lamp of love may cheer ! Andreiv Lang. 236 POSEIDIPPUS. Poseldippus. Show me some path of life ! the market-place Breeds only quarrel and hard bargainings, Staying at home unending worry brings, Of working in the fields one tires apace, "Who goes to sea a constant dread must face, And, if one travel, fears for precious things Torment — if one has none, the lacking stings — So, rich or poor, hard is the traveller's case. Married, what care ! single, what loneliness ! Children bring sorrow — blank the childless life ; Foolish is youth, and old age listless quite. Here lies the only choice, I must confess — Not to be born into this world of strife. Or straight to die, having but beheld the light* William M. ffardin^ei PTOLEMY. 237 Ptolemy. r, RAPT in scrutiny as Night unbars The thick and mazy glories of the stars, Though earth on Earth, no more am linked to her. But sit in Jove's own hall a banqueter. Richard Garneit. 238 PTOLEMY. Ptolemy. Though I may know myself mortal, the thing of a moment, Yet when I gaze on the stars, thronging their circled course. Then I no longer touch earth, but with Zeus in the heavens Take my fill of divine ambrosia, the food of the gods, Alina Strettell. RHIANUS. 239 Rhianus. Dexionica with a limed thread Her snare beneath a verdant plane-tree spread, And caught a blackbird by the quivering wing. Oh, god of Love, oh, Graces flowering fair, I would that I a thrush or blackbird were; So in her grasp to breathe my murmur'd cries, And shed a sweet tear from my silent eyes. Ellon. 240 RHIANUS. Rhianus. I, ACHRYLIS the priestess, wont to be First in the frantic rites of Cybele, Showering my tress where many a piny torch Blazed on the yelling train, here at the porch Of her rude mountain-shrine my hair suspend, For here exhausted frenzy found an end. Richard Garncit. RUFJNUS. 241 Rufinus. Golden Eyes. All, Golden Eyes, to win you yet, I bring mine April coronet The lovely blossoms of the spring. For you I weave, to you I bring : These roses with the lilies wet, The dewy dark -eyed violet, Narcissus, and the wind-flower wet, Wilt thou disdain mine offering, Ah, Golden Eyes? Crowned with thy lover's flowers, forget The pride wherein thy heart is set, For thou, like these or anything, Hast but thine hour of blossoming. Thy spring, and then — the long regret, Ah, Golden Eyes ! Audreiv Lang. 628 242 RUFJNUS, Rufinus. Rhodope. Thou hast Hera's eyes, thou hast Pallas' hands, And the feet of the Queen of the yellow sands. Thou hast beautiful Aphrodite's breast, Thou art made of each goddess's lovehest ! Happy is he who sees thy face, Happy who hears thy words of grace, And he that shall kiss thee is half divine, But a god who shall win that heart of thine ! Andrew Lang: RUFINUS. 243 Rufinus. All of thee I love, but only thine ungoverned eyes I hate, For they take delight in looking upon men I execrate ! Alma Strettelh 244 RUFINUS. Rufinus. Rhodope queens it by her beauty's sway ; And whensoe'er I give her a "Good-day," Only with haughty glances greeteth me. When by her door I bind my garlands sweet, She doth but cast them under her proud feet, Trampling, in sooth, upon them angrily. O pitiless old age, O wrinkles, haste ! Come quicker, quicker yet, perchance at least Ye may prevail and soften Rhodope. Alma Strettelh RUFINUS. 245 Rufinus. Ah! where is now Praxiteles? and where the hands of Heraclite That wrought of old such images as made the marble breathe delight? Who now shall forge the ambrosial hair, the burning glance of Melite, Or teach the carven stone how fair the splendours of her body be? Brave sculptors ! would that it were mine to bid you at a lover's nod For such a beauty raise a shrine, as for the statue of a god ! William M. Hardinge. 246 RUFINUS. Rufinus. Pallas with golden-sandal'd Hera gazed On Moeonis, till both cried out amazed — "Once to the shepherd-judge our charms we bared ; Twice 'tis not well to be less fair declared." H. Wellesley. RUFJAUS. 247 Rufin us. Did I not warn thee, Prodice, that time Would soon divide thee from the youthful throng Feed on the blooming damask of thy prime, And scatter wrinkles, as he pass'd along? The hour is come. For who with amorous song Now woos thy smile, or celebrates thy bloom ? See from thy presence how the gay and young Retiring turn, and shrink as from the tomb. Robert Bland. 248 SAPPHO. Sappho. This oar and net, and fisher's wicker snare, Themiscus placed above his buried son ; Memorials of the lot in life he bare, The hard and needy life of Pelagon. Elton. SIMAIIAS. 249 Simmias. Feebly her arms the dying Gorgo laid Upon her mother's neck, and weeping said — " Stay with my sire ; and bear instead of me A happier child, thine age's prop to be." Goldiuin Smith. 250 SIM MI AS, Simmias. Tenderly, ivy, on Sophocles' grave -right tenderly— twine Garlanding over the mound network of delicate green. | Everywhere flourish the flower of the rose, and the clusterin g vine Pour out its branches around, wet with their glistering sheen. All for the sake of the wisdom and grace it was his to combine J Priest of the gay and profound, sweetest of singers terrene. William M. Hardinge, SIM ON IDES. 251 SImonides. C^LIA and Lyce, once to lovers known, To Venus vow'd a portrait and a zone. Oh ! wandering god of trade ! thy purse can tell Both whence the zone and whence the portrait fell. John Herviann Merivale, 252 SIMONIDES. SImonides. A POOR man, not a Croesus, here lies dead, And small the sepulchre befitting me : Gorgippus I, who knew no marriage-bed, Before I wedded pale Persephone. /. Sterling, SIMONIDES. 253 Simonides. At Dirphys' foot we fell ; and o'er us here, Beside Euripus' shore, this mound was piled : Not undeserved ; for youth to us was dear, And that we lost in battle's tempest wild. /. Sterling, 254 SIMONIDES. Simonides. O STRANGER, bring the Spartans word, that here, Obedient thus to their command, we lie. Alma Strettell. SIMON IDES. 255 Simonldes. O Sparta, Country ! we are those that strove For fair Thyrea ; we, three hundred, fought Equally matched, the sons of Inachus. Where first our foot we planted, there we stood. And turning back no glance, unshaken died. The honoured shield of bold Othryadas, In blood upon it written, bears these words : "Thyrea is the Spartans', mighty Zeus ! " And if one Argive have escaped from death, A son of craven Adrastus he must be ; Since for the sons of Sparta, not to die, Nay, but to flee, is death. Alma StretteU, 256 SIMONWES. SImonides. Unquenchable glory ye cast round your well-beloved country, The while round yourselves ye have cast the dusk cloud of Death's night; Yet dying ye died not, for glorious honour doth crown you With homage, and lead you from Hades* dark house to the light. Ahna Sirettell, SOPHOCLES. 257 Sophocles. 'TwiXT good and ill my wavering fortune see Swayed in capricious instability, Most like the Moon, whose ceaseless wax and wane Cannot two nights the self-same form retain : Viewless at first, then a dim streak revealed, Then slow augmenting to an argent shield ; And when at length to fair perfection brought, Diminishing and dwindling quite to nought. Richard Garnett. 629 258 THEOCRITUS. Theocritus. Priapus. When thou hast turned yonder lane, goatherd, where the oak-trees are, thou wilt find an image of fig-tree wood, newly carven ; three legged it is, the bark still covers it, and it is earless withal, yet meet for the arts of Cypris. A right holy precinct runs round it, and a ceaseless stream that falleth from the rocks on every side is green with laurels, and myrtles, and fragrant cypress. And all around the place that child of the grape, the vine, doth flourish with its tendrils, and the merles in spring with their sweet songs pour forth their wood-notes wild, and the brown nightingales reply with their complaints, pouring from their bills the honey- sweet song. There, prithee, sit down and pray to gracious Priapus, that I may be delivered from my love of Daphnis, and say that instantly thereon I will sacrifice a fair kid. But if he refuse, ah then, should I win Daphnis' love, I would fain sacrifice three victims, — and offer a calf, a shaggy he-goat, and a lamb that I keep in the stall, and oh that graciously the god may hear my prayer. Andrew Lang, THEOCRITUS, 259 Theocritus. The Rural Concert. An, in the Muses' name, wilt thou play me some sweet air on the double flute, and I will take up the harp, and touch a note, and the neat-herd Daphnis will charm us the while, breathing music into his wax bound pipe. And beside this rugged oak behind the cave will we stand, and rob the goat-foot Pan of his repose. 26o THEOCRITUS. Theocritus. For a Herdsman's Offering. Daphnis, the white-limbed Daphnis, that pipes on his fair flute the pastoral strains, offered to Pan these gifts, — his pierced reed-pipes, his crook, a javelin keen, a fawn-skin, and the scrip wherein he was wont, on a time, to carry the apples of Love. Andrew Lans". THEOCRITUS. 261 Theocritus. For a Rustic Altar. These dew-drenched roses and that tufted thyme are offered to the ladies of Helicon. And the dark-leaved laurels are thine, oh Pythian Pcean, since the rock of Delphi hare this leafage to thine honour. The altar this white-horned goat shall stain with blood, this goat that browses on the tips of the terebinth boughs. Andreiu Lang. 262 THEOCRITUS. Theocritus. For a Statue of Asclepius. Even to Miletus he hath come, the son of Psean, to dwell with one that is a healer of all sickness, with Nicias, who ever approaches him day by day with sacrifices, and hath let carve this statue out of fragrant cedar- wood ; and to Eetion he promised a high guerdon for his skill of hand : on this work Eetion has put forth all his craft. Andrew Lang, THEOCRITUS. 263 Theocritus. For a Statue of Aphrodite. This is Cypris, — not she of the people ; nay, venerate the goddess by her name — the Heavenly Aphrodite. The statue is the offering of chaste Chrysogone, even in the house of Amphicles, whose children and whose life were hers! And always year by year went well with them, who began each year with thy worship, Lady, for mortals who care for the Immortals have themselves thereby the better fortune. Andrew Lang, THEOCRITUS. Theocritus. For a Statue of Anacreon. Mark well this statue, stranger, and say, when thou hast returned to thy home, " In Teos I beheld the statue of Anacreon, who surely excelled all the singers of times past." And if thou dost add that he delighted in the young, thou wilt truly paint all the man. Andrew Lang. THEOCRITUS. 265 Theocritus. The Statue of Archilochus. Stay, and behold Archilochus, him of old time, the maker of the iambics, whose myriad fame has passed westward, ay, and towards the dawning day. Surely the Muses loved him, yea, and the Delian Apollo, so practised and so skilled he grew in forging song, and chanting to the lyre. Andreixi Lang. 266 THEOCRITUS, Theocritus. For a Picture. Thou sleepest on the leaf strewn ground, oh Daphnis, resting thy weary limbs, and the stakes of thy nets are newly fastened on the hills. But Pan is on thy track, and Priapus, with the golden ivy wreath twined round his winsome head, — both are leaping at one bound into thy cavern. Nay, flee them, flee, shake off" thy slumber, shake off" the heavy sleep that is falling upon thee. Andrew Lang. THEOCRITUS. 267 Theocritus. The Death of Cleomcus. Man, husband thy life, nor go voyaging out of season, for brief are the days of men ! Unhappy Cleonicus, ihou wert eager to win rich Thasus, from Coelo- Syria sail- ing with thy merchandise, — with thy merchandise, oh Cleonicus, at the setting of the Pleiades didst thou cross the sea, — and didst sink with the sinking Pleiades ? Andrew Lang. 268 THEOCRITUS. Theocritus. Was life on land not short enough for thee, But, Cleonicus, thou must tempt the sea ? To Thasus, bringing wealth of Syrian wares, Sailing thou earnest with the wintry stars ; And when the Pleiades merged their sevenfold gem, Thou sankest to the grey abyss with them. Richard Gariiett. THEOCRITUS. 269 Theocritus. The Dead are beyond Hope. Ah, hapless Thyrsis, where is thy gain, shouldst thou lament till thy two eyes are consumed with tears? She has passed away, — the kid, the youngling beautiful, — she has passed away to Hades. Yea, the jaws of the fierce wolf have closed on her, and now the hounds are baying, but what avail they when nor bone nor cinder is left of her that is departed ? Andre-i> Lang. 270 THEOCRITUS. Theocritus. Wayfarer, I shall know whether thou dost reverence the good, or whether the coward is held by thee in the same esteem. "Hail to this tomb," thou wilt say, for light it lies above the holy head of Eurymedon. Andrew Laitsr. THEOCRITUS. 271 Theocritus. The Grave of Eurymedon. An infant son didst thou leave behind, and in the flower of thine own age didst die, Eurymedon, and \\m this tomb. For thee a throne is set among men made perfect, but thy son the citizens will hold in honour, remembering the excellence of his father. And?'tiu Lane. 272 THEOCRITUS. Theocritus. Orthon's Grave. Stranger, the Syracusan Orthon lays this behest on thee : go never abroad in thy cups on a night of storm. For thus did I come by my end, and far from my rich fatherland I lie, clothed on with alien soil. Andreiv Lans. THEOCRITUS. 273 Theocritus. The Grave of Cleita. The little Medeus has raised this tomb by the wayside to the memory of his Thracian nurse, and has added the inscription — HERE LIES CLEITA. The woman will have this recompense for all her careful nurture of the boy,— and why? — because she was service- able even to the end. Andrew Latig. 630 274 THEOCRITUS. Theocritus. The Grave of Eusthenes. This is the memorial stone of Eusthenes, the sage ; a physiognomist was he, and skilled to read the very spirit in the eyes. Nobly have his friends buried him— a stranger in a strange land — and most dear was he, yea, to the makers of song. All his dues in death has the sage, and, though he was no great one, 'tis plain he had friends to care for him. Andrew Lang, THEODORIDAS. 27$ Theodoridas. A SHIPWRECKED sailor, buried on this coast, Bids you set sail. Full many a gallant ship, when we were lost, Weathered the gale. H. IVelksley. 276 ZONAS. Aonas. Thou who to Hades, o'er yon reedy mere Thy sorrow-freighted boat of death dost steer, Now to the son of Cinyras, a mild And pitying hand do thou stretch forth, what time Down thy steep ladder's pathway he shall climb. Receive him, O black Charon, I implore ; For see, his sandals still trip up the child. And yet with naked feet he feareth sore To tread the cold sand of that further shore. Alma Strettell. ZONAS. 277 Zonas. Accept a grave in these deserted sands, That on thy head I strew with pious hands ; For to these wintry crags no mother bears The decent rites, or mourns thee with her tears. Yet, on the frowning promontory laid, Some pious dues, Alexis, please thy shade. A little sand beside the sounding wave, Moisten'd with flowing tears, shall be thy grave Robert Bland. Printed by Walter Scott, Felling, Nexccastle-on-Tyne. THE CAMELOT SERIES. CLOTH, CUT OR UNCUT EDGES. New ComprehensiYe Edition of Favourite Prose Works Edited by ERNEST HUYS. In SHILLING Monthly Volumes, Crown Svo. VOLUMES ALREADY lS;iiJED. Romance of King Arthur Thoreau's "vValden. ' Confessions of an English Opium-Eater. Landor's Conversations. Plutarch's Lives. Browne's Religlo Medici. Essays and Letters of P. B. Shelley. Prose Writings of Swift. My Study Windows. Great English Painters, Lord Byron's Letters. Essays hy Leigh Hunt. Longfellow's Prose. Great Musical Composers Riarcus Aurelius. Specimen Days in America. 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The English reading public will be introduced to an entirely new series of works by one who is probably the greatest living master of fiction in Europe. To those unfamiliar witli the charm of Russian fiction, and especially Avith the works of Count Tolstoi, these volumes will come as a new revelation of power. The folloioing Volumes are already issued— A RUSSIAN PROPRIETOR. THE COSSACKS: A TALE OF THE CAUCASUS IN THE YEAR 1 85 2. IVAN ILYITCH, and other stories. THE INVADERS, and other stories. MY RELIGION. LIFE. MY CONFESSION. CHILDHOOD, BOYHOOD, YOUTH. THE PHYSIOLOGY OF WAR. ANNA KAREN IN A. (2 Vols.) WHAT TO DO? Ready SeiJtember 2ath. WAR AND PEACE. (4 Vols.) others to follow. London : Walter Scott, 24 Warw'ck Lane. VOLS. I. TO XXII. NOW READY. RE-ISSUE IN MONTHLY VOLUMES, ONE SHILLING EACH, STRONGLY BOUND IN CLOTH, Uniform in size and style wiiJi the Cafjielot Series, V/ILSON'S TALES OF THE BORDERS AND OF SCOTLAND : HISTORICAL, TRADITIONARY, AND IMAGINATIVE. Revised by ALEXANDER LEIGHTOX. Xo collection of tales published in a serial form ever enjoyed so great a popularity as " The Tales of the Borders ; " and the secret of their success lies in the fact that they are stories in the truest sense of the word, illustrating in a frraphic and natural style the manners and customs, trials and sorrows, sins and backslidings, of the men and women of whom they treat. The heroes and heroines of these admirable stories belong to every rank of life, from the king and noble to the humble peasant. The Scotsman says :— " Those who have read the tales in the unwieldy tomes in which they are to be found in the libraries will welcome the publication of this neat, handy, and well- printed edition." The Dundre Aciv rtiser says :—" Considering how attractive are thes^e tales, whether regarded as illustrating Scottish life, or as entertaininsr items of romance, there can be no doubt of their continued popularity. ^Ve last read them in volumes the size of a family J5ihle, and we are glad to have an opportunity to renew our acquaintance with them in a form so much more handy and elegant." EACH VOLUME COMPLETE IN ITSELF, Small Crown 8vo. Printed on Antique Laid Paper. Cloth Elegant, Gilt Edges, Price 3/6. Summer Legends. By RUDOLPH BAUMBACH. TRANSLATED BY MRS. HELEN B. DOLE. This is a collection of charming fanciful stories translated from the German. In Germany they have enjoyed remarkable popularity, a large number of editions having been sold. Rudolph Baumbach deals with a wonderland which is all his own, though he suggests Hans Andersen in his simplicity of treatment, and Heine in his delicacy, grace, and humour. These are stories which will appeal vividly to the childish imagination, while the older reader will discern the satirical or humorous application that underlies them. London : Walter Scott, 24 Warwick Lane. ^ Q) ^ 00 rt 00 ii_ glg 1 J CO (0 O o V ^ S *i .2 •Ea:i>-<^ ^ t<'-< 5 alifc IBR Lot RNI E 2 O-J o>0 o<5 J 1 mo o sSiffi i •^r Uni e Driv NGEL 2 .2 CVJ ig;< iS SOUT LOS .2 CO in c >- CO ^ < Q) <^r=- "" p .^■:^:W'r-r'^T: