This ode, as Longepierre obferves, is in the fame ftyle as the two preceding, and the next enfuing. There is a fragment of Bacchylides remaining, which has great affinity to these four, but chiefly to this very ode. Γλυκει αναγκη σευόμενα κυλικών Πυροφοροι δε κατ' αιγληνία Ως πινον]ος ὁρμαινεί κέαρ. Warm with wine we win renown, Ver. 25. The ancients, to give us an idea of month perfectly agreeable, generally reprefente it by the lips of perfuafion. Anthol. B. 7. Καλλος έχεις Κυπριδος, Πειθώς σομα σομα και ακμ Ειακρίνων ωρών. Perfuafion's lips, and Cyprian charms are your's, And the fresh beauty of the vernal hours. Ver. 3c. The Greek is, Avydyw, that is, marble from Lygdos, a place in the island of Paros, famo for the finest marble. Trapp. Ver. 33, 34. Ovid has a fimilar paffage in t first book of the Metamorphofes, V. 500. -laudat digitofque manufque, Brachiaque, et nudos mediâ plus parte lacertos; Si qua latent meliora putat.— He view'd Her taper fingers, and her panting breast; He praises all he fees, and for the reft, Believes the beauties yet unfeen are best. Dryd this colour Myrrheus," Myrrheum nodo cohibere erinem," book 3, ode 14. On which an antient critic remarks, "Colorem myrrheum in crinibus hodie quoque dicunt qui medius eft "inter flavum et nigrum:"-Even at this day they call that hair of a myrrh colour, which is between black and yellow. Ovid defcribes the colour of his mistress's hair thus, Amor. l. 1. eleg. 14. Nec tamen ater erat, nec erat color aureis illis; Ver. 9, 10. Petronius says, “Crines ingenio fuo "flexi, per totos fe humeros effuderant.:"-Her hair, negligently floating where it pleased, diffused itfelf over her shoulders. Ver. 23. Meleager, as Longepierre observes, calls his mistress nav godor writus, The Sweet Rofe of Paffion. Anthologia. Ver. 43, 44. The poet could not give us a more perfect idea of the beauty of this young Samian: He tells the painter, "If he would draw a good likeness of Bathyllus, he must copy the portrait of Apollo, the most beautiful of the gods, and if he would make a good picture of "Apollo, he muft paint Bathyllus." Ver. 45. Bathyllus had a celebrated ftatue erected to his honour at Samos by Polycrates. See Apuleius. Ver. 12. Iphytus was the fon of Eurytus king of Oechalia, and flain by Hercules, who carried off his bow. Ver. 15. When the armour of Achilles was adjudged to Ulyffes, Ajax was fo enraged at the affront, that he ran mad; and falling upon a flock of fheep, which he took for fo many Grecians, firft flew them, and then himself. Homer celebrates his fhield for its extraordinary fize. Iliad, Book 7. Huge was its orb, with seven thick folds o'ers caft Of tough bull-hides; of solid brass the last. Crete's hundred cities pour forth all her fons. And ninety cities crown the fea-born ifle. B. 19. Therefore, it is probable, that in the time of the Trojan war it had no more than ninety cities, but a hundred in the days of Homer. ODE XXXIII. Ver. 5. It was an opinion generally received among the ancients, that fwallows, and feveral other birds croffed the fea, on the approach of winter. in fearch of warmer climates. Thus Virgil, Æneid 6. v. 311. Quàm multæ glomerantur aves, ubi frigidus annus Thick as the feather'd flocks in close array, Pitt. Others thought they hid themselves in the clefts of the rocks. Thus Ovid," Cum glaciantur aquæ, fcopulis fe condit hirundo." Fecklinius, in his book " De Aëris et Elementi defectu, et vitâ fub aquis," affures us, that fwallows retire to the bottom of the water during the winter; and that it is common for the fishermen on the coafts of the Baltic to take them in their nets in large knots, clinging together by their bills and claws; and that, upon their being brought into a warm room, they will feparate, and begin to flutter about as in fpring. Kercher, in his book "De mundo fubterraneo," affirms the fame, and that in the northern countries they hide themfelves under ground in the winter, whence they are often dug out. Longepierre. Ver. 6. Memphis was a city fituated on the Nile, a little below Delta, and the refidence of the kings of Egypt. By the Nile, Anacreon means Ethiopia, whence that river derives its fource. Ver. 8. Anacreon is not fingular in representing Cupid as a bird, and with propriety, because he is furnished with wings, and his flight is furprifingly rapid. Bion fpeaks of love as a bird: See his fecond Idyllium. Ver. 5. The expreffion in Greek is extremely delicate and happy. The waves of the fea are mollifed into tranquillity: Απαλύνεται γαλην.. Every letter, every fyllable, is as liquid and fmooth as the calm he defcribes. A famous old Scotch bishop, Gawin Douglas, in his Defcription of May, feems to have had this paffage in view. For to behald it was an glore to fe The ftabyllit wyndys and the calmyt fe, The foft feffoun, the firmament ferene, The loune illuminate are, and firth amene. Ver. 3. Anacreon is not the only one who af ferts, that Bacchus is the best friend to the mufes If, as Horace fays, you give credit to old Cratinus the comic Greek poet, " Nulla placere diu, nec vi. vere carmina poffunt. Quæ fcribuntur aquæ potoribus." "No verses long can please, or long can "live, which water-drinkers write." There is an epigram in the first book of the Anthologia, which begins thus : Theocritus has imitated this beautiful Ode in his nineteenth Idyllium. Το κλιπίαν ποτ' Ερωτα, κ. τ. λ. As Cupid once, the flyeft rogue alive, Ver. 13. Madam Dacier fays, that Anacreon makes Cupid fpeak in this manner, because, according to the Pagan theology, the language of the gods was different from that of men: but, as Longepierre ingeniously obferves, to render a paffage of this nature learned, is to make it obfcure; for nothing can be more natural to imagine, than that an infant, who had heard of the flinging of ferpents, when he found himself stung by a little creature, he hardly knew what, fhould immediately think it one. The labourers might call it a bee, if they pleased; his pain and fright made him perfift that it was a ferpent. ODE XLI. Ver. 3, 4. Tibullus fays the fame : L. 1. Ecl. 7. Ver. 8. Madam Dacier fuppofes this to be the paffage on which the opinion, that the graces were the daughters of Bacchus and Venus, was founded. Ver. 16. Macedonius, in an epigram in the first book of the Anthologia, C. 25. fays, that to banish care was a precept of Anacreon's. Την γαρ Ανακρέοντος εν πραπίδεσσι φυλασσω Παρφασίην, ότι δει φροντίδα μη κατέχειν. For ftill I hold Anacreon's rule the best, Ver. 19, 20. Anacreon is not fingular in enforcing the neceflity of enjoying life from the brevity and uncertainty of it. Rufinus has an epigram in the feventh book of the Anthologia, Epis gram 143, to this purpose: Let us, my friend, in joy refine, Bathe, crown our brows, and quaff the wine: And Martial, Non eft, crede mihi, fapienti dicere,' Vicam ;' Sera nimis vita eft craftina, vive hodie. "I'll live to-morrow," 'tis not wife to say: 'Twill be too late to-morrow---live to day. ODE XLII. Ver. 13, 14. Thus our poet in his feventh epi gram fays, I ne'er can think his converfation good, Ver. 19. The Greek is, Brov novo prowμry. Anacreon esteemed tranquillity the happiett ingre dient of life: Thus, Ode 39th, he praises the ληνην βιοτε, - -Life's rural fcene, Sweet, fequefter'd, and ferene. ODE XLIIL Ver. 4, 5. Dew is the nourishment of grafhoppers. Thus Virgil, Eclogue §. ver. 77. Dumque thymo pafcentur apes, dum rore cicadæ. Bees feed on thyme, and grafhoppers on dew. The Greek poets alfo defcribe the grafhopper as a mufical infect. Thus Theocritus, Idyll. I. -Τεττιγος έπει τυγε φέρτερον άδεις. Thy fong is sweeter than the grafhopper's. Antipater, in an epigram of the Anthologia, Book 1. fays, Αρκει Τεττιγάς μεθυσαὶ δροσος, αλλα πιο Ver. 15. Ælian, writing against those who eat grafhoppers, fays, They are ignorant how much they offend the mufes, the daughters of Jupiter. Whence it appears, that these animals were esteemed facred to the muses, and the eating of them accounted an impiety. The following is a tranfla." tion of an epigram from the first book of the Anthologia, chap. 33. containing a beautiful complaint of a grafhopper against that practice. Τίπτε με τον, κ. τ. λ. Why do ye, fwains, a grafhopper pursue, I charm them in the foreft, hill, or dale, Ver. 23. The Athenians called themselves Tys, grathoppers, and fome of them wore little grafhoppers of gold in their hair, as badges of honour, to diftinguish them from others of later duration; and likewife as a memorial that they were born of the earth like those infects. Ver. 25, 26. Homer represents the gods as free from blood. Speaking of Venus wounded, book 5. he fays, From the clear vein a stream immortal flow'd, ODE XLIV. Pope. Nothing can be more politely imagined than this ode, nor more courtly than the turn of it. Behold, fays Madam Dacier, one of the finest and moft gallant odes of antiquity; and if fhe, for whom it was compofed, was as beautiful, all Greece could produce nothing more charming. ODE XLV. Monf. Le Fevre was fo tranfported with this ode, that he could not forbear crying out, Felix, ah! nimium felix, cui carmine tali John Addifon. Ver. 2. Lemnos was an ifland of the Ægean Sea facred to Vulcan, who in the first book of the Tad, gives an account of Jupiter's throwing him down from heaven, and his fall upon that iland: |