heroes, and often my fellow-sufferers in greater hardships than these, now drive away your cares with wine: to-morrow we will re-visit the vast ocean."
ODE VIII.
TO LYDIA.
Lydia, I conjure thee[1] by all the powers above, to tell me why you are so intent to ruin Sybaris by inspiring him with love?[2] Why hates he the sunny plain, though inured to bear the dust and heat? Why does he neither, in military accouterments, appear mounted among his equals; nor manage the Gallic steed with bitted reins? Why fears he to touch the yellow Tiber? Why shuns he the oil of the ring more cautiously than viper's blood? Why neither does he, who has often acquired reputation by the quoit,[3] often by the javelin having cleared the mark, any longer appear with arms all black-and-blue by martial exercises? Why is he concealed, as they say the son of the sea-goddess Thetis was, just before the mournful funerals of Troy; lest a manly habit should hurry him to slaughter, and the Lycian troops?
- ↑ This is the usual collocation in adjurations; first the preposition, then the individual entreated, and then the object or deity by whom the adjuration is made, and last the verb. Thus Ναὶ πρὸς σε τῆς σῆς δεξιὰς εὐωλένου, Eurip. Hipp. 605, where Elmsley remarks, "observa syntaxin. Græcis solenne est in juramento aliquid inter Præpositionem et Casum ejus interponere." Virgil, also, has a similar collocation, Æn. iv. 314, "Per ego has lacrymas, dextramque tuam, te." etc. Anthon.
- ↑ Amando has a passive signification, "By being beloved." As in Virgil; Uritque videndo fœmina. Instances of this kind are frequent in the best authors. Dac.
- ↑ The discus was a kind of quoit, very large and heavy, made of wood or stone, but more commonly of iron or brass. It was almost round, and somewhat thicker in the middle than at tiie edges. It was thrown by the sole force of the arm. San.
