ODE XXXIX.

How I love the festive boy,
Tripping through the dance of joy!
How I love the mellow sage,

Smiling through the veil of age!
And whene'er this man of years
In the dance of joy appears,

Snows may o'er his head be flung,

But his heart

his heart is young.

Snows may o'er his head be flung,

But his heart - his heart is young.] Saint Pavin makes the same distinction in a sonnet to a young girl.

Je sais bien que les destinées
Ont mal compassée nos années;
Ne regardez que mon amour;
Peut-être en serez vous émue.
Il est jeune et n'est que du jour,
Belle Iris, que je vous ai vu.

Fair and young thou bloomest now,
And I full many a year have told;
But read the heart and not the brow,
Thou shalt not find my love is old.
My love's a child; and thou canst say
How much his little age may be,
For he was born the very day

When first I set my eyes on thee!

ODE XL.

I KNOW that Heaven hath sent me here,
To run this moral life's career;

The scenes which I have journeyed o'er,
Return no more alas! no more;
And all the path I've yet to go,

I neither know nor ask to know.
Away, then, wizard Care, nor think
Thy fetters round this soul to link;
Never can heart that feels with me
Descend to be a slave to thee!

Never can heart that feels with me

Descend to be a slave to thee!] Longepierre quotes here an epigram from the Anthologia, on account of the similarity of a particular phrase. Though by no means anacreontic, it is marked by an interesting simplicity which has induced me to paraphrase it, and may atone for its intrusion.

Ελπις και συ τυχη μεγα χαιρετε. τον λιμεν εὗρον.
Ουδεν εμοι χ' ὑμιν, παιζετε τους μετ' εμε.

At length to Fortune, and to you,
Delusive Hope! a last adieu.

And oh before the vital thrill,
Which trembles at my heart, is still,
I'll gather Joy's luxuriant flowers,
And gild with bliss my fading hours;
Bacchus shall bid my winter bloom,
And Venus dance me to the tomb!

The charm that once beguil'd is o'er,
And I have reach'd my destin'd shore.
Away, away, your flattering arts
May now betray some simpler hearts,
And you will smile at their believing,

And they shall weep at your deceiving!

Bacchus shall bid my winter bloom,

And Venus dance me to the tomb !] The same commentator has quoted an epitaph, written upon our poet by Julian, in which he makes him promulgate the precepts of good fellowship even from the tomb.

Πολλακι μεν τοδ αεισα, και εκ τυμβου δε βοησω,

Πίνετε, πριν ταυτην αμφιβαλησθε κονιν.

This lesson oft in life I sung,

66

And from my grave I still shall cry,

Drink, mortal, drink, while time is young,

Ere death has made thee cold as I."

ODE XLI.

WHEN Spring adorns the dewy scene,
How sweet to walk the velvet green,
And hear the west wind's gentle sighs,
As o'er the scented mead it flies!

How sweet to mark the pouting vine,
Ready to burst in tears of wine;

And with some maid, who breathes but love,
To walk, at noontide, through the grove,

Or sit in some cool, green recess —
Oh, is not this true happiness?

And with some maid, who breathes but love,

To walk, at noontide, through the grove,] Thus Horace:

Quid habes illius, illius

Quæ spirabat amores,

Quæ me surpuerat mihi.

Lib. iv. Carm. 13.

And does there then remain but this,
And hast thou lost each rosy ray
Of her, who breath'd the soul of bliss,
And stole me from myself away?

ODE XLII.

YES, be the glorious revel mine,
Where humour sparkles from the wine.
Around me, let the youthful choir
Respond to my enlivening lyre;
And while the red cup foams along,
Mingle in soul as well as song.

The character of Anacreon is here very strikingly depicted. His love of social, harmonised pleasures, is expressed with a warmth, amiable and endearing. Among the epigrams imputed to Anacreon is the following; it is the only one worth translation, and it breathes the same sentiments with this ode:

Ου φιλος, ὡς κρητηρι παρα πλεω οινοποτάζων,

Νεικεα και πολεμον δακρυόεντα λεγει.

Αλλ' όστις Μουσεων τε, και αγλαα δωρ' Αφροδιτης
Συμμισγων, ερατης μνησκεται ευφροσυνης.

When to the lip the brimming cup is prest,
And hearts are all afloat upon its stream,
Then banish from my board th' unpolish'd guest,
Who makes the feats of war his barbarous theme.
But bring the man, who o'er his goblet wreathes
The Muse's laurel with the Cyprian flower;
Oh! give me him, whose soul expansive breathes
And blends refinement with the social hour.