Her supple waist, her arm from Venus came,
Hebe her nose and lip confess,
And, looking in her eyes, you guess
Her name.
THE NAMELESS CHARM.
(Expanded from an Epigram of Piron.)
Stella, 'tis not your dainty head,
Your artless look, I own;
'Tis not your dear coquettish tread,
Or this, or that, alone;
Nor is it all your gifts combined;
'Tis something in your face,—
The untranslated, undefined,
Uncertainty of grace,
That taught the Boy on Ida's hill
To whom the meed was due;
All three have equal charms—but still
This one I give it to!
TO PHIDYLE.
(HOR. III., 23.)
Incense, and flesh of swine, and this year's grain,
At the new moon, with suppliant hands, bestow,
O rustic Phidyle! So naught shall know
Thy crops of blight, thy vine of Afric bane,
And hale the nurslings of thy flock remain
Through the sick apple-tide. Fit victims grow
'Twixt holm and oak upon the Algid snow,
Or Alban grass, that with their necks must stain
The Pontiff's axe: to thee can scarce avail
Thy modest gods with much slain to assail,
Whom myrtle crowns and rosemary can please.
Lay on the altar a hand pure of fault;
More than rich gifts the Powers it shall appease,
Though pious but with meal and crackling salt.