The Elegies of Tibullus | Page 8

well! Not the least hint of scandal
shall be made. For I will send them far away, to tell In some quite

distant street their amorous trade.
All this a god decrees; a sibyl wise In prophet-song did this to me
proclaim; Who when Bellona kindles in her eyes, Fears neither twisted
scourge nor scorching flame.
Then with a battle-axe herself will scar Her own wild arms, and
sprinkle on the ground Blood, for Bellona's emblems of wild war,
Swift-flowing from the bosom's gaping wound.
A barb of iron rankles in her breast, As thus she chants the god's
command to all: "Oh, spare a beauty by true love possessed, Lest some
vast after-woe upon thee fall!
"For shouldst thou win her, all thy power will fail, As from this wound
flows forth the fatal gore, Or as these ashes cast upon the gale, Are
scattered far and kindled never more."
And, O my Delia, the fierce prophetess Told dreadful things that on thy
head should fall:-- I know not what they were--but none the less I pray
my darling may escape them all.
Not for thyself do I forgive thee, no! 'Tis thy sweet mother all my wrath
disarms,-- That precious creature, who would come and go, And lead
thee through the darkness to my arms.
Though great the peril, oft the silent dame Would join our hands
together, and all night Wait watching on the threshold till I came, Nor
ever failed to know my steps aright.
Long be thy life! dear, kind and faithful heart! Would it were possible
my life's whole year Were at the friendly hearth-stone where thou art!
'Tis for thy sake I hold thy daughter dear.
Be what she will, she is not less thy child. Oh, teach her to be chaste!
Though well she knows No free-born fillet binds her tresses wild Nor
Roman stole around her ankles flows!
My lot is servile too. Whate'er I see Of beauty brings her to my fevered
eye. If I should be accused of crime, or be Dragged up the steep street,
by the hair, to die:--
Even then there were no fear that I should lay Rude hands on thee my
sweet! for if o'erswayed By such blind frenzy in an evil day, I should
bewail the hour my hands were made.
Yet would I have thee chaste and constant be, Not with a fearful but a
faithful heart; And that in thy fond breast the love of me Burn but more
fondly when we live apart.

She who was never faithful to a friend Will come to age and misery,
and wind With tremulous ringer from her distaff's end The
ever-twisting wool; and she will bind
Upon her moving looms the finished thread, Or clean and pick the long
skeins white as snow. And all her fickle gallants when they wed, Will
say, "That old one well deserves her woe."
Venus from heaven will note her flowing tear: "I smile not on the
faithless," she will say. Her curse on others fall! O, Delia dear! Let us
teach true love to grow old and gray!

ELEGY THE EIGHTH
MESSALA
The Fatal Sisters did this day ordain, Reeling threads no god can rend,
Foretelling to this man should bend The tribes of Acquitaine; And
'neath his legions' yoke Th' impetuous torrent Atur glide subdued. All
was accomplished as the Fates bespoke; His triumph then ensued: The
Roman youth, exulting from afar, Acclaimed his mighty deeds, And
watched the fettered chieftains filing by, While, drawn by snow-white
steeds, Messala followed on his ivory car, Laurelled and lifted high!
Not without me this glory and renown! Let Pyrenees my boast attest!
Tarbella, little mountain-town, Cold Ocean rolling in the utmost West,
Arar, Garonne, and rushing Rhone, Will bear me witness due; And
valleys broad the blond Carnutes own, By Liger darkly blue. I saw the
Cydnus flow, Winding on in ever-tranquil mood, And from his awful
peak, in cloud and snow, Cold Taurus o'er his wild Cilicians' brood. I
saw through thronged streets unmolested flying Th' inviolate white
dove of Palestine; I looked on Tyrian towers, by soundless waters lying,
Whence Tyrians first were masters of the brine. The flooding Nile I
knew; What time hot Sirius glows, And Egypt's thirsty field the
covering deluge knows; But whence the wonder flows, O Father Nile!
no mortal e'er did view. Along thy bank not any prayer is made To Jove
for fruitful showers. On thee they call! Or in sepulchral shade, The
life-reviving, sky-descended powers Of bright Osiris hail,-- While,
wildly chanting, the barbaric choir, With timbrels and strange fire,
Their Memphian bull bewail.
Osiris did the plough bestow, And first with iron urged the yielding
ground. He taught mankind good seed to throw In furrows all untried;

He