plows the Carpathian Sea[1] with the Bithynian[2] vessel, importunes thee as mistress of the ocean. Thee the rough Dacian,[3] thee the wandering Scythians, and cities, and nations, and warlike Latium also, and the mothers of barbarian kings, and tyrants clad in purple, fear. Spurn not with destructive foot that column which now stands firm, nor let popular tumult rouse those, who now rest quiet, to arms–to arms–and break the empire. Necessity, thy minister, always marches before thee, holding in her brazen hand huge spikes and wedges, nor is the unyielding clamp absent, nor the melted lead. Thee Hope reverences, and rare Fidelity robed in a white garment; nor does she refuse to bear thee company,[4] howsoever in wrath thou change thy robe, and abandon the houses of the powerful. But the faithless crowd [of companions], and the perjured harlot draw back. Friends, too faithless to bear equally the yoke of adversity, when casks are exhausted, very dregs and all, fly off. Preserve thou Cæsar, who is meditating an expedition against the Britons, the furthest people in the world, and also the new levy of youths to be dreaded by the Eastern regions,[5] and the Red Sea. Alas! I am ashamed of our scars, and our wickedness, and of brethren. What have we, a hardened age, avoided? What have we in our impiety left unviolated! From what have our youth restrained their hands, out of reverence to the gods? What altars have they spared? O mayest thou forge anew our blunted swords on a different anvil against the Massagetæ and Arabians.
- ↑ The Carpathian Sea, so called from Carpathus, an isle between Rhodes and Crete, which usually retaineth its ancient name. Watson.
- ↑ Bithynia, a country of Asia the Less, next to Troas, over against Thrace, and, as is supposed, planted by Thracians; whence Xenophon calls it Thracia Asiatica. Watson.
- ↑ Dacia was a country of Hungary beyond the Danube.
- ↑ Nec comitem abnegat] se, ut Ter. Enn. 2, 3, 84, "facile ut eunucho probes," i.e. te Ovid. A.A. i. 127, "Si qua repugnarat nimium comitemque negarat," se. Orelli.
- ↑ Eois timendum. In the end of the year 727, Ælius Gallus marched with an army to succeed Cornelius in the government of Egypt, and as he wanted a fleet for his expedition against the Arabians, he ordered a number of ships to be built in the ports of the Red Sea. As this army alarmed all the countries of the East, so the Romans had the greatest expectations that it would revenge all the insults which the republic had received from the Parthians. San.
