The Book
of the
Epodes of Horace.
ODE I.
TO MÆCENAS.
Thou wilt go,[1] my friend Mæcenas, with Liburian[2] galleys among the towering forts of ships, ready at thine own [hazard] to undergo any of Cæsar’s dangers. What shall I do? To whom life may be agreeable, if you survive; but, if otherwise, burdensome. Whether shall I, at your command, pursue my ease, which can not be pleasing unless in your company? Or shall I endure this toil with such a courage, as becomes uneffeminate men to bear? I will bear it? and with an intrepid soul follow you, either through the summits of the Alps, and the inhospitable Caucus, or to the furthest western bay. You may ask how I, unwarlike and infirm, can assist your labors by mine? While I am your companion, I shall be in less anxiety, which takes possession of the absent in a greater measure. As the bird, that has unfledged young, is
- ↑ Ibis. As soon as Mæcenas had received orders to hold himself in readiness to go aboard the fleet of Octavius, he imparted the news to Horace, and at the same time declared to him, that he would not permit him to make this voyage with him.
This ode was written in 723, and it shows, through the whole, a disinterested affection and gratitude. San. - ↑ Liburnis. Plutarch, speaking of this battle, says, that when one of Antony's ships was surrounded by four or five Liburnian galleys, it looked like an assault of a town. Florus, describing the vessels of Antony, says, that they had from six to nine rowers to every oar; that they carried towers and bridges of such prodigious height, as to look like castles and towns: that the seas groaned beneath their weight, and the winds labored to push them forward. Horace calls these towers propugnacula navium, and Virgil calls the vessels which bore them turritas puppæ, towered ships. Ed. Dublin.
