25 25 Semper habet; semper pastorum ille audit amores, 35 h Novas incide faces. The bride used to be led home by night, with lit torches before her. These torches were pieces of pine, or other unctuous wood, cut to a point, that they might be the more easily inflamed. The number of torches carried before the bride were five. The ceremony of leading the bride home to her hus. band's house, seems to be accounted so essential a part of the nuptial ceremony, that ducere uxorem often of itself signifies to marry. i These nuts were walnuts. kOeta is a high mountain of Thessaly. 40 45 Jam fragiles poteram a terra contingere ramos. 50 55 1 Extremi Garamantes. The Garamantes were a savage people of Africa, about the Torrid Zone, so that they were thought to live as far to the southward as the earth was habitable. Hence they are called extremi, as Thule, or Schetland, is called ultima. m The story of Medea is here alluded to. Vide the seventh book of Ovid's Metamorphoses. n Arion was a native of Methymna, and the chief musician of his time. He travelled to Italy and Sicily, and acquired consider. able wealth, but on returning to his native country, the sailors in the ship, which was transporting him, conspired to rob him of his Incipe Maenalios mecum, mea tibia, versus. Deferar; extremum hoc munus morientis habeto. 60 Haec Damon vos, quae responderit Alphesiboeus, Dicite, Pierides; non omnia possumus omnes. A. Effer aquam, et molli cinge haec altaria vitta; Verbenasque adole pingues et mascula thura : Conjugis ut magicis sanos avertere sacris Experiar sensus; nihil hic nisi carmina desunt. 65 Ducite ab urbe domum, mea carmina, ducite Daph nin. Carmina vel coelo possunt deducere Lunam; 70 treasure, and determined to murder him, but gave him the choice either to kill himself, or leap into the sea; after being permitted to give them a tune on his harp, he threw himself into the sea, and was taken up by a dolphin, and carried to Tænarus, from whence he travelled by land to Corinth. In confirmation of this story, He. rodotus, who relates this account more at length, says, that there was a brazen statue of a man riding on a dolphin at Tænarus, to be seen in his time. • Mascula thura. The ancients called the best sort of frankincense male. P Circe. An enchantress, who turned the companions of Ulys ses into swine. Ducite ab urbe domum, mea carmina, ducite Daph nin. Terna tibi haec primum triplici diversa colore Licia circumdo, terque haec altaria circum Effigiem duco; numero Deus impare gaudet. 75 Ducite ab urbe domum, mea carmina, ducite Daph nin. Necte tribus nodis ternos, Amarylli, colores; Necte, Amarylli, modo; et, Veneris, dic, vincula necto. Ducite ab urbe domum, mea carmina, ducite Daph nin. Limus ut hic durescit, et haec ut cera liquescit 80 Uno eodemque igni: sic nostro Daphnis amore. nin. Talis amor Daphnin, qualis, cum fessa juvencum 85 Propter aquae rivum viridi procumbit in ulva, Talis amor teneat, nec sit mihi cura mederi. Ducite ab urbe dómum, mea earmina, ducite Daph nin. Has olim exuvias mihi perfidus ille reliquit, Pignora cara sui: quae nunc ego limine in ipso, E 91 ון Ducite ab urbe domum, mea carmina, ducite Daph nin. Has herbas, atque haec Ponto mihi lecta venena, 95 His ego saepe lupum fieri, et se condere sylvis Ducite ab urbe domum, mea carmina, ducite Daph nin. 101 Fer cineres, Amarylli, foras, rivoque fluenti Ducite ab urbe domum, mea carmina, ducite Daph nin. Adspice: corripuit tremulis altaria flammist 105 9 Ponto. A country in Asia Minor, anciently famous for drugs of extraordinary efficacy: this is the signification of venena in this place. • Transque caput jace: ne respexeris. To throw the ashes over their heads, and not look back, was a ceremony often practised by the ancients, in performing their sacrificial rites; and a country superstition amongst us, with regard to salt, is most probably derived from this ancient ceremony. The sudden blazing of fire amongst the embers, was accounted a lucky omen by the ancients. Plutarch relates an accident of this sort, when the virgins were offering sacrifice at the time of Catiline's conspiracy. The Vestal virgins congratulated Terentia on the omen, and directed her to encourage her husband to proceed in his care for the Commonwealth. |