Translations from Horace and Adrian [pp. 712-714]

SOUTHERN LITERARY MESSENGER.
For the Southern Literary Messenger.
The following translations pretend to no other merit
than fidelity. The only aim of the translator has been
to give as literal a version as the genius of the languages
would permit. He has not presumed to blend his own
with the pure conception of his author, or to obscure
with ornament the inimitable beauty of his chaste, unaffected expression; he regrets that the necessity of a
measure has obliged him more than once perhaps, to
expand a thought whose concentration he admired:the sin, however, was involuntary.
Lib. 1. Ode v. Ad Pyrrham.
Quis multa gracilis te puer in rosa
Perfusus in liquidis urget odoribus
Grato, Pyrrha, sub antro?
Cui flavam religas comam,
Simplex munditiis? heu! quoties fidem,
Mutatosque Deos flebit, et aspera
Nigris aquora ventis
Emirabitur insolens,
Qui nunc te fruitur credulus aurea:
CLui semper vacuam, semper amabilem
Sperat, nescius aurae
Fallacis! miseri, quibus
Intenta nites. Me tabula sacer
Votiva paries indicat uvida
Suspendisse potenti
Vestimenta maris Deo.
Translation.
What slender youth whom liquid odors lave,
Courts thee on roses in some pleasant cave
Pyrrha?-for whom with care
Bind'st thou thy yellow hair
Plain in thy neatness? Oft alas! shall he
On faith and changed Gods complain, and sea
Rough with black tempests ire
Unwonted shall admire!
Who now enjoys thee credulous-all gold —
For him still vacant, lovely to behold
Hopes thee: of treacherous breeze
Unmindful. Hapless these
To whom untried thou seemest dazzling fair.
Me Neptune's walls, with tablet vowed, declare
My shipwrecked weeds unwrung
To the sea's potent God to have hung.
Adrianus ad Animulam.
Animula, vagula, blandula;
Hospes, comesque corporis!
Quo nunc abibis in loco
Pallidula, rigida, nudula?
Nec ut soles dabis jocos.
Translation.
Little rambling, coaxing sprite,
Tenant and comrade of this clay,
Into what distant regions say
Pale, naked, cold, wingst thou thy flight?
Nor wilt thou joke as wont in former day.
Lib. 1. Ode xxxv. Ad Fortunam.
0 Diva, gratum qusa regis Antium,
Prasens vel imo tollere de gradu
Mortale corpus, vel superbos
Vertere funeribus triumphos:
Te pauper ambit solicita prece
Ruris colonus; te dominam equoris,
C uicunque Bithyna lacessit
Carpathium pelagus caring.
Te Dacus asper, te profugi Scythwe,
Urbesque, gentesque, et Latium ferox,
Regumque matres barbarorum, et
Purpurei metuunt tyranni,
Injurioso ne pede proruas
Stantem columnam; neu populus frequens
Ad arma cessantes ad arma
Concitet, imperiumque frangat.
Te semper anteit saeva Necessitas,
Clavos trabales et cuneos manu
Gestans ahena; nec severus
Uncus abest, liquidumque plumbum.
Te Spes, et albo rara Fides colit
Velata panno, nec comitem abnegat,
Utcunque mutata potentes
Veste domos inimica linquis.
At vulgus infidum, et meretrix retro
Perjura cedit: diffugiunt cadis
Cum faece siccatis amici,
Ferre jugum pariter dolosi.
Serves iturum Caesarem in ultimos
Orbis Britannos, et juvenum recens
Examen Eois timendum
Partibus, Oceanoque Rubro.
Eheu! cicatricum et sceleris pudet,
Fratrumque: quid nos dura refugimus
,Etas? quid intactumrn nefasti
Liquimus? unde manum juventus
Metu Deorum continuit? quibus
Pepercit aris? 0! utinam nova
Incude diffingas retusum in
Massagetas Arabasque ferrum.
Translation. To Fortune.
Goddess whose mandate lovely Antium sways,
Prompt at thy will from humblest grade to raise
Weak mortals, or proud triumphs turn
To the sad funeral urn!
Thee the poor rustic sues with anxious prayer:
Thee, Arbitress of Ocean all revere,
Who with Bithynian keel adventurous brave
The rough Carpathian wave.
Thee wandering Scythians, thee the Dacian boor
Cities and nations, Latium fierce adore:
Mothers of barbarous kings grow pale,
Tyrants in purple quail
Lest with insulting foot thou spurn'st their proud,
Unshaken column: lest th' assembled crowd
Laggards to arms, to arms should wake,
And their dominion break.
Ruthless Necessity before thy band
Forever walks in her resistless hand
Wedges and spikes: the hook severe
And molten lead are near.
Thee Hope attends, and spotless Faith so rare,
Robed in pure white: nor these depart whene'er,
With vestments chanlged and hostile lower,
Thou leav'st th' abodes of power.
But shrink the faithless herd and perjured queen:
Friends too skulk off, the casks drained dry, unseen:
Too treacherous equally to brook
Adversity's hard yoke.
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