Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

And nymphs, that glance ethereal blue,
Disporting tread the mountain-dew;
Propitious, oh! receive my sighs,
Which, burning with entreaty, rise;
That thou wilt whisper, to the breast
Of her I love, thy soft behest;
And counsel her to learn from thee
The lesson thou hast taught to me.
Ah! if my heart no flattery tell,
Thou'lt own I've learned that lesson
well!

ODE LXXVI.1

SPIRIT of Love! whose tresses shine
Along the breeze, in golden twine,
Come, within a fragrant cloud,
Blushing with light, thy votary shroud;
And, on those wings that sparkling play,
Waft, oh! waft me hence away!
Love! my soul is full of thee,
Alive to all thy luxury.

But she, the nymph for whom I glow,
The pretty Lesbian, mocks my woe;
Smiles at the hoar and silvered hues
Which Time upon my forehead strews.
Alas! I fear she keeps her charms
In store for younger, happier arms!

ODE LXXVII.2
HITHER, gentle Muse of mine,
Come and teach thy votary old
Many a golden hymn divine,
For the nymph with vest of gold.

This fragment, which is extant in Athenæus (Barnes, 101), is supposed, on the authority of Chamæleon, to have been addressed to Sappho. We have also a stanza attributed to her, which some romancers have supposed to be her answer to Anacreon. Mais par malheur (as Bayle says) Sappho vint au monde environ cent ou six vingts ans avant Anacréon.' Nouvelles de la Rép. des Lett. tom. ii. de Novembre 1684. The following is her fragment, the compliment of which is very finely imagined; she supposes that the Muse has dictated the verses of Anacreon:

Κεινον, ω χρυσοθρονε Μουσ', ενισπες
Ύμνον, εκ της καλλιγυναικός εσθλας
Τηϊος χώρας ὃν αείδε τερπνως
Πρεσβυς αγαυος.

Ch Muse! who sitt'st on golden throne,
Full many a hymn of dulcet tone
The Teinn sage is taught by thee;

[blocks in formation]

But, goddess, from thy throne of gold,
The sweetest hymn thou'st ever told,

He lately learned and sang for me.

2 This is formed of the 124th and 119th fragments in Barnes, both of which are to be found in Scaliger's Poetics.

De Pauw thinks that those detached lines and couplets, which Scaliger has adduced as examples in his Poetics, are by no means authentic, but of his own fabrication.

3 This is generally inserted among the remains of Alcæus. Some, however, have attributed it to Anacreon. See our poet's 22nd ode, and the notes.

* See Barnes, 173. This fragment, to which I have taken the liberty of adding a turn not to be found in the original, is cited by Lucian in his little essay on the Gallic Hercules.

5 Barnes, 125. This, if I remember right, is in Scaliger's Poetics. Gail has omitted it in his collection of fragments.

LET me resign a wretched breath,
Since now remains to me
No other balm than kindly death,
To soothe my misery!1

I KNOW thou lov'st a brimming measure,
And art a kindly, cordial host;
But let me fill and drink at pleasure,
Thus I enjoy the goblet most."

I FEAR that love disturbs my rest,
Yet feel not love's impassioned care;
I think there's madness in my breast,
Yet cannot find that madness there! 3

FROM dread Leucadia's frowning steep
I'll plunge into the whitening deep,
And there I'll float, to waves resigned,
For love intoxicates my mind !+

Mix me, child, a cup divine,
Crystal water, ruby wine:
Weave the frontlet, richly flushing,
O'er my wintry temples blushing.
Mix the brimmer-love and I
Shall no more the gauntlet try,
Here-upon this holy bowl,
I surrender all my soul !5

Among the Epigrams of the Anthologia there are some panegyrics on Anacreon, which I had translated, and originally intended as a kind of Coronis to this work; but I found, upon consideration, that they wanted variety: a frequent recurrence of the same thought, within the limits of an epigram, to which they are confined, would render a collection of them rather uninteresting. I shall take the liberty, however, of subjoining a few, that I may not appear to have totally neglected those elegant tributes to the reputation of Anacreon. The four epigrams which I give are imputed to Antipater Sidonius. They are rendered, perhaps, with too much freedom; but, designing a translation of all that are on the subject, I imagined it was necessary to enliven their uniformity by sometimes indulging in the liberties of paraphrase.

[blocks in formation]

But wine shall gush in every rill,
And every fount be milky showers.
Thus, shade of him whom Nature
taught

To tune his lyre and soul to pleasure,
Who gave to love his warmest thought,
Who gave to love his fondest mea-

sure !

Thus, after death, if spirits feel, Thou mayst, from odours round thee streaming,

A pulse of past enjoyment steal,

And yet, oh bard! thou art not mute in death,

Still, still we catch thy lyre's delicious breath ;2

And still thy songs of soft Bathylla Green as the ivy round the mouldering bloom,

tomb!

Nor yet has death obscured thy fire of
love,

Still, still it lights thee through the
Elysian grove :

And dreams are thine that bless the
elect alone,

And live again in blissful dreaming! And Venus calls thee, even in death,

[blocks in formation]

Εύδει, χη παιδων ζωρότατη μανιη. Ακμην λειριοεντι μελίζεται αμφι Βαθυλλῳ. Ιμερα και κισσου λευκος όδωδε λιθος. Ουδ' Αΐδης σοι ερωτας απεσβεσεν εν δ' Αχέροντος

Ων, όλος ωδινεις Κυπριδι θερμότερη HERE sleeps Anacreon, in this ivied shade;

Here, mute in death, the Teian swan is laid.l

Cold, cold the heart, which lived but to respire

A

All the voluptuous frenzy of desire!

1 Tius Horace of Pindar:

Multa Dircæum levat aura cycnum.

A swan was the hieroglyphical emblem of a poet. Anacreon has been called the swan of Teos by another of his eulogists:

Εν τοις μελιχροις Ίμεροισι συντροφον
Λυαίος Ανακρέοντα, Τηίον κυκνον,
Έσφηλας ύγρῃ νεκταρος μεληδονῃ.
Ευγενους, Ανθολογ.
God of the grape! thou hast betrayed,
In wine's bewildering dream,
The fairest swan that ever played
Along the Muse's stream!

The Teian, nursed with all those honeyed boys,
The young Desires, light Loves, and rose-lipped
Joys!

2 Thus Simonides, speaking of our poet :
Μολπης δ' ου ληθη μελιτερπεος, αλλ' ετι κείνο
Βάρβιτον ουδε θανων εύνασεν ειν αϊδη.
Σιμωνίδου, Ανθολογ.

her own !

[blocks in formation]

Σπεισον εμη σποδιῃ, σπεισον λανος, οφρα Ετ τι τοι εκ βιβλων ηλθεν εμων οφελος,

κεν οινῳ

Οστεα γήθησε ταμα νοτιζομενα, Ὡς ὁ Διονυσου μεμελημένος ουασε κώμος Ως ὁ φιλακρητου συντροφος ἁρμονίης, Μηδε καταφθιμενος Βακχου διχα τούτον

ὑποισω

Τον γενεη μεροπων χωρον οφειλομενον On stranger ! if Anacreon's shell Has ever taught thy heart to swell1 With passion's throb or pleasure's sigh, In pity turn, as wandering nigh,

Nor yet are all his numbers mute,

Though dark within the tomb he lies;
But living still, his amorous lute

With sleepless animation sighs! This is the famous Simonides, whom Plato styled 'divine,' though Le Fevre, in his Poetes Grecs, supposes that the epigrams under his name are all falsely imputed. The most considerable of his remains is a satirical poem upon women, preserved by Stobaeus, ψογος γυναικών.

We may judge from the lines I have just quoted, and the import of the epigram before us, that the works of Anacreon were perfect in the times of Simonides and Antipater. Obsopœus the commentator here appears to exult in their the bishops and patriarchs, he adds, nec sane id destruction; and telling us they were burned by necquicquam fecerunt,' attributing to this outrage an effect which it could never produce.

3 The spirit of Anacreon utters these verses from the tomb, somewhat mutatus ab illo,' at least in simplicity of expression.

4 We may guess from the words εκ βιβλων

And drop thy goblet's richest tear,1
In exquisite libation here!
So shall my sleeping ashes thrill
With visions of enjoyment still.
I cannot even in death resign
The festal joys that once were mine,
When Harmony pursued my ways,
And Bacchus wantoned to my lays.2
Oh! if delight could charm no more,
If all the goblet's bliss were o'er,
When fate had once our doom decreed,
Then dying would be death indeed!
Nor could I think, unblest by wine,
Divinity itself divine !

Του αυτού, εις τον αυτόν.

Εύδεις εν φθιμενοισιν, Ανακρεον, εσθλα

πονήσας,

Εύδει δ ̓ ἡ γλυκερη νυκτίλαλος κιθαρα,

Euov, that Anacreon was not merely a writer of billets-doux, as some French critics have called him. Amongst these, Le Fevre, with all his professed admiration, has given our poct a character by no means of an elevated cast:

Aussi c'est pour cela que la postérité
L'a toujours justement d'âge en âge chanté
Comme un franc goguenard, ami de goinfrerie,
Ami de billets-doux et de badinerie.

See the verses prefixed to his Poètes Grecs. This is unlike the language of Theocritus, to whom Anacreon is indebted for the following simple culogium:

Εις Ανακρέοντος ανδριάντα.
Θασαι τον ανδριαντα τουτον, ω ξενε,
Σπουδα, και λεγ', επαν ες οικον ελθῃς
Ανακρέοντος εικον' ειδον εν Τεω.

Των προσθ' ει τι περισσον ῳδοποιων.
Προσθείς δε χώτι τοις νεοισιν άδετο,
Έρεις ατρεκεως όλον τον ανδρα.

UPON THE STATUE OF ANACREON.

Stranger! who near this statue chance to roam,
Let it awhile your studious eyes engage;
And you may say, returning to your home,
'I've seen the image of the Teian sage,
Best of the bards who deck the Muse's page.
Then, if you add, "That striplings loved him well,'
You tell them all he was, and aptly tell.

The simplicity of this inscription has always delighted me; I have given it, I believe, as literally as a verse translation will allow.

1 Thus Simonides, in another of his epitaphs on our poet :

Και μιν αει τεγγοι νοτερη δροσος, ὡς ὁ γεραιος Λαρότερον μαλακων έπνεεν εκ στομάτων.

Εύδει και Σμέρδις, το Ποθών εα, ᾧ συ μελισδων

Βαρβιτ', ανεκρουον νεκταρ εναρμόνιον. Ηϊθεου γαρ Ερωτος εφυς σκοπος ες δε σε

μουνον

Τοξα τε και σκολιας ειχεν ἑκηβολίας.

AT length thy golden hours have winged their flight,

And drowsy death that eyelid steepeth;

Thy harp, that whispered through each lingering night,

Now mutely in oblivion sleepeth!

She, too, for whom that heart profusely shed

The purest nectar of its numbers, 4 She, the young spring of thy desires, has fled,5

And with her blest Anacreon slumbers!

Let vines, in clustering beauty wreathed,
Drop all their treasures on his head,
Whose lips a dew of sweetness breathed,
Richer than vine hath ever shed!

2 The original here is corrupted, the line as o Διονυσου is unintelligible.

Brunck's emendation improves the sense, but I doubt if it can be commended for elegance. He reads the line thus:

ὡς ὁ Διωνύσοιο λελασμένος ούποτε κωμων. See Brunck, Analecta Veter. Poet. Græc. vol. ii. 3 In another of these poems, the nightlyspeaking lyre' of the bard is not allowed to be silent even after his death.

·

Ως ὁ φιλάκρητος τε και οινοβαρες φιλοκωμος
Παννύχιος κρονοι* την φιλοπαιδα χελυν.
Σιμωνίδου, εις Ανακρέοντα.

To beauty's smile and wine's delight,
To joys he loved on earth so well,
Still shall his spirit, all the night,
Attune the wild aërial shell!

4 Thus, says Brunck, in the prologue to the Satires of Persius:

Cantare credas Pegaseium nectar. 'Melos' is the usual reading in this line, and Casaubon has defended it; but ‘nectar,' I think, is much more spirited.

5 The original, To IIo0wv cap, is beautiful. We regret that such praise should be lavished so preposterously, and feel that the poet's mistress, Eurypyle, would have deserved it better. Her name has been told us by Meleager, as already quoted, and in another epigram by Antipater:

*Brunck has κρούων; but κρουοι, the common reading, better suits a detached quotation.

Farewell! thou hadst a pulse for every | And every woman found in thee a

dart

That Love could scatter from his quiver;

Υγρα δε δερκομένοισιν εν ομμασιν ουλον αείδοις,
Αιθύσσων λιπαρες ανθος ύπερθε κόμης,
Με προς Ευρυπυλην τετραμμένος . . . .

Long may the nymph around thee play,
Eurypyle, thy soul's desire!
Basking her beauties in the ray

That lights thine eyes' dissolving fire!
Sing of her smile's bewitching power,

Her every grace that warms and blesses;
Sing of her brow's luxuriant flower,

The beaming glory of her tresses.

The expression here, aveos koμns, 'the flower of the hair,' is borrowed from Anacreon himself, as appears by a fragment of the poet preserved in Stobæus: Απεκειρας δ' άπαλης αμωμον ανθος.

This couplet is not otherwise warranted by the original, than as it dilates the thought which Antipater has figuratively expressed:

heart, 1

Which thou, with all thy soul, didst give her!

Τον δε γυνακειων μελέων πλέξαντα ποτ' ῳδας, Ηδυν Ανακρείοντα,* Τέως εις ̔Ελλαδ' ανήγεν, Συμποσιων ερεθισμα, γυναικων ηπεροπευμα. Critias, of Athens, pays a tribute to the legiti mate gallantry of Anacreon, calling him, with elegant concisenes, γυναικών ηπεροπευμα,

Teos gave to Greece her treasure,
Sage Anacreon, sage in loving;
Fondly weaving lays of pleasure
For the maids who blushed approving!
Oh! in nightly banquets sporting,

Where's the guest could ever fly him?
Oh! with love's seduction courting,

Wheres the nymph could e'er deny him?

*Thus Scaliger, in his dedicatory verses to Ronsard:

Blandus, suaviloquus, dulcis Anacreon.

« AnteriorContinuar »