[18] Carm. Bur., p. 200.
[19] Ibid., p. 231.
[20] Ibid., p. 121.
[21] Ibid., p. 135.
[22] Carm. Bur., p. 145.
[23] Ibid., p. 230.
XI.
The drinking-songs are equally spontaneous and fresh. Anacreon pales before the brilliancy of the Archipoeta when wine is in his veins, and the fountain of the Bacchic chant swells with gushes of strongly emphasised bold double rhymes, each throbbing like a man's firm stroke upon the strings of lyres. A fine audacity breathes through the praises of the wine-god, sometimes rising to lyric rapture, sometimes sinking to parody and innuendo, but always carrying the bard on rolling wheels along the paths of song. The reality of the inspiration is indubitable. These Bacchanalian choruses have been indited in the tavern, with a crowd of topers round the poet, with the rattle of the dice-box ringing in his ears, and with the facile maidens of his volatile amours draining the wine-cup at his elbow.
Wine is celebrated as the source of pleasure in social life, provocative of love, parent of poetry:[26]—