ODE XIV. COUNT me, on the summer trees, Every wave that sinks to sleep; The poet, in this catalogue of his mistresses, means nothing more, than, by a lively hyperbole, to inform us, that his heart, unfettered by any one object, was warm with devotion towards the sex in general. Cowley is indebted to this ode for the hint of his ballad, called “ The Chronicle;” and the learned Menage has imitated it in a Greek Anacreontic, which has so much ease and spirit, that the reader may not be displeased at seeing it here : — ΠΡΟΣ ΒΙΩΝΑ. Ει αλσεων τα φύλλα, Δυνη, Βίων, αριθμειν. Κορην, γυναικα, Χηραν, Σμικρην, Μεσην, Μεγιστην, Λευκην τε και Μελαιναν, Ορειάδας, Ναπαιας, Then, when you have number'd these Billowy tides and leafy trees, Νηρηΐδας τε πασας Ο σος φίλος φίλησε. Παντων κόρος μεν εστιν. Αυτην νεων Ερωτων, Χρυσην, καλην, γλυκείαν, Ερασμίαν, ποθεινην, Αει μονην φιλησαι Tell the foliage of the woods, Naiads, Nereids, nymphs of fountains, Count me all the flames I prove, Nay, I'll grant you fifteen more. Count me, on the summer trees, Every leaf, &c.] This figure is called, by rhetoricians, the Impossible (aduvatov), and is very frequently made use of in poetry. The amatory writers have exhausted a world of imagery by it, to express the infinite number of kisses which they require from the lips of their mistresses: in this Catullus led the way. -Quam sidera multa, cum tacet nox, Furtivos hominum vident amores; Tam te basia multa basiare Vesano satis, et super, Catullo est: As many stellar eyes of light, As through the silent waste of night, Upon those dew-bright lips I'll number; No tongue shall blab the sum, but mine; Carm. 7. In the fam'd Corinthian grove, Where such countless wantons rove, Chains, by which my heart is bound; Many bloom in Lesbos' isle; Rhodes a pretty swarm can boast; Caria too contains a host. Sum them all-of brown and fair You may count two thousand there. Corinth was very In the fam'd Corinthian grove, Where such countless wantons rove, &c.] famous for the beauty and number of its courtezans. Venus was the deity principally worshipped by the people, and their constant prayer was, that the gods should increase the number of her worshippers. We may perceive from the application of the verb kopivia(ew, in Aristophanes, that the lubricity of the Corinthians had become proverbial. There, indeed, are nymphs divine, Dangerous to a soul like mine!] "With justice has the poet attributed beauty to the women of Greece." Degen. M. de Pauw, the author of Dissertations upon the Greeks, is of a different opinion; he thinks, that by a capricious partiality of nature, the other sex had all the beauty; and by this supposition endeavours to account for a very singular depravation of instinct among that people. What, you stare? I pray you, peace! Have I told you all my flames, 'Mong the amorous Syrian dames? Or the nymphs, who blushing sweet Still in clusters, still remain Gades' warm, desiring train; Gades' warm, desiring train;] The Gaditanian girls were like the Baladières of India, whose dances are thus described by a French author: "Les danses sont presque toutes des pantomimes d'amour; le plan, le dessein, les attitudes, les mesures, les sons et les cadences de ces ballets, tout respire cette passion et en exprime les voluptés et les fureurs."— Histoire du Commerce des Europ. dans les deux Indes. Raynal. The music of the Gaditanian females had all the voluptuous character of their dancing, as appears from Martial: : Cantica qui Nili, qui Gaditana susurrat. Lib. iii. epig. 63. Lodovico Ariosto had this ode of our bard in his mind, when he wrote his poem "De diversis amoribus." See the Anthologia Italorum. |