POETRY.
IEORACE.—BOOK I., ODE 24.
TO VIRGIL, ON THE DEATH OF QUINCTILIUS.
BLUSH not for tears in ceaseless sorrow shed
For one so loved. Melpomene, inspire The dirge low-breathed, the trembling lyre, And pour from sacred lips the anthem of the dead.
Wrapped in the sleep of death Quinctilins lies. Ah ! when shall spotless Faith, And Truth, and Modesty, and Justice, find A heart so pure, so constant, and so kind ?
He died bewailed by all, but most by thee, My Virgil, who with loving piety Forever dost the gods implore Qainctilins, lent not given, to restore.
Ab, fruitless prayer ! not even thy hallowed tongue, Sweet as the magic lute by Orpheus strung, That charmed the woods, can wake the dead once more, And through cold phantom veins the living current pour.
Hermes, he whose fatal wand Relentless leads the shadowy baud, Mocks at our vows. What then remains ? The strength that Fate itself disdains ; The soul to Fortune's worst resigned ; Tb' unconquered heart, and equal mind.
STEPHEN DE VERE.
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