HORACE I, 27.

In maudlin spite let Thracians fight
Above their bowls of liquor,
But such as we, when on a spree,
Should never bawl and bicker!
These angry words and clashing swords
Are quite de trop, I'm thinking;
Brace up, my boys, and hush your noise,
And drown your wrath in drinking.
Aha, 'tis fine—this mellow wine
With which our host would dope us!
Now let us hear what pretty dear
Entangles him of Opus.
I see you blush—nay, comrades, hush!
Come, friend, though they despise you,
Tell me the name of that fair dame—
Perchance I may advise you.
O wretched youth! and is it truth
You love that fickle lady?
I, doting dunce, courted her once,
And she is reckoned shady!

HEINE'S "WIDOW OR DAUGHTER."

Shall I woo the one or the other?
Both attract me—more's the pity!
Pretty is the widowed mother,
And the daughter, too, is pretty.
When I see that maiden shrinking,
By the gods, I swear I'll get 'er!
But, anon, I fall to thinking
That the mother'll suit me better!
So, like any idiot ass—
Hungry for the fragrant fodder,
Placed between two bales of grass,
Lo, I doubt, delay, and dodder!

HORACE II, 20.

Maecenas, I propose to fly
To realms beyond these human portals;
No common things shall be my wings,
But such as sprout upon immortals.
Of lowly birth, once shed of earth,
Your Horace, precious (so you've told him),
Shall soar away—no tomb of clay
Nor Stygian prison house shall hold him.
Upon my skin feathers begin
To warn the songster of his fleeting;
But never mind—I leave behind
Songs all the world shall keep repeating.
Lo, Boston girls with corkscrew curls,
And husky westerns, wild and woolly,
And southern climes shall vaunt my rhymes—
And all profess to know me fully.
Methinks the west shall know me best
And therefore hold my memory dearer,
For by that lake a bard shall make
My subtle, hidden meanings clearer.
So cherished, I shall never die—
Pray, therefore, spare your dolesome praises,
Your elegies and plaintive cries,
For I shall fertilize no daisies!