ostendant, haec sola novam iactantia sortem
humanos properant imitari flumina mores.
celsa dehinc patulum prospectans Narnia campum 515
regali calcatur equo, rarique coloris
non procul amnis abest, urbi qui nominis auctor:
ilice sub densa silvis artatus opacis
“Now, O Rome, lead forth the chorus that shall hymn a contest of such high renown and let thy best genius with all its eloquence voice the well-merited praises of my foster parent.”
So spake he and, issuing from the walls of old Ravenna, advanced his standards. He crossed the mouths of the Po and left behind him that river harbour[38] where, in fixed succession, in flows the foaming main and bears up the vessels that ride there at anchor on forward and backward flowing stream, and again deserts the waveless shore, like moon-led tides upon the marge of Ocean. Next he comes to the old city of Fortune’s Temple that bids him glad welcome and from its height looks down upon Metaurus threading its rocky valley where an arch, tunnelled through the living rock, affords a path through the mountain’s very heart, rising above the temple of Jove and the dizzy altars set up by the shepherds of the Apennines. ’Twas thy good pleasure, too, to visit Clitumnus’ wave,[39] beloved of them that triumph, for thence do victors get them white-coated animals for sacrifice at Rome. Thou markest well also the stream’s strange property, flowing gently on when one approaches with silent step, but swirling and eddying should one hasten with louder utterance; and while it is the common nature of water to mirror the exact image of the body it alone boasts the strange power that it mimics not human form but human character. Next thy royal charger treads the streets of Narnia, looking out from its eminence upon the plain below: not far therefrom flows the strange-coloured stream which gives the town its name, its sulphurous waters
[38] Classis Portus, a harbour formed by means of the Fossa Augusta which led the southern arm of the Po to Ravenna. It was in existence in 38 B.C. (App. B.C. v. 78, 80) and held 250 ships (Jordanes, Get. 150; cf. Pliny, H.N. iii. 119; Sid. Apol. Epp. i. 5. 5).