Is it the hour when first to light of day

The fair-hair'd Bacchus sprang,

By Ceres throned, whose priests their homage pay
With cymbals' brazen clang?

Or think'st thou of the midnight hour

When veil'd within a golden shower

The chief of the celestial band

5

Deign'd at Amphitryo's doors to stand? 10 10

To aid, while sojourning on earth,
His spouse at the Herculean birth,
Or of Tiresias' counsels wise,
Or Iolaus, skilful charioteer,

Or earth-sown heroes, wielding as they rise
The indefatigable spear:

15

of Thebes are enumerated, apparently in illustration of the highly poetical exordium of this ode.

The early or heroic history of Thebes is particularly splendid; and neither Athens, Lacedæmon, Argos, nor Mycene, were so much celebrated as the capital of Boeotia for great events, for heroes, and for demi-gods. The names of Kadmos, Semele, Bacchus, Antiope, Zethes, Amphion, Amphitryon, Alcmena, Hercules, Laius, and his unfortunate race, furnish strong evidence of the early power and original lustre of this country. No part of Greece produced characters of more exalted fame than Hesiod, Pindar, Pelopidas, Epaminondas, Plutarch, and Sextus Charonensis. The dulness therefore which the rest of the Grecians ascribed to the Baotians, on account of the density of their atmosphere, was not always agreable to truth or consonant with experience. The conscious sublimity of Pindar repelled the imputation.' 15 This origin of the Thebans, who were fabled to spring from the sown teeth of the dragon, is frequently alluded to by the ancient poets. So Ovid (Amor. iii. 12.35):

Protea quid referam, Thebanaque semina, dentes? And Euripides (Herc. F. 4, 5):

- ενθ ̓ ὁ γηγενης

Σπαρτων σταχυς εβλαστεν.

See also Eur. Phon. 953; and Ovid Met. (iii. 110):
Crescitque seges clypeata virorum.

Virg. (Georg. ii. 140), &c.

Or when thou sent'st Adrastus far
From the rude shout and din of war,
Reft of his numerous friends, to roam
Back to equestrian Argos home:
Or when from distant Doris' land
Thou gav'st on foot erect to stand
The colony of Spartan line-

20

Thy sons besieged Amycle's wall,

Ægidæ, faithful to the call

25

Of the prophetic Pythian shrine. 22

But mighty deeds of old renown
Sleep unremember'd and unknown,
Save when enrich'd the record lie
In the sweet dews of poetry.

30

Then lead the pomp, the hymn's soft lays
Awake, Strepsiades to praise,

Who, victor in the Isthmian fray,
Bears the pancratium's palm away ;
Conspicuous in triumphant might,
And form pre-eminently bright; 32

35

This let the patriot warrior know,

Who drives the cloud of slaughter that impends
O'er his loved native soil, upon the foe.

His fame among the citizens shall bloom,
Growing through life and living in the tomb.
But thou, Diodotus' brave son,

And glories by Amphiaraus won;

Breath'dst forth in war's first ranks thy flower of life, Where the most brave sustain'd war's hopeless strife. 50

Then grief ineffable I bore;

But now the god, whose potent might
Girds the firm earth, day's splendor bright

Gives me for winter's gloom that lower'd before.
The victor's praise will I declare,

And fit the chaplet to his hair;

Nor let th' immortal train molest

With vengeful ire my tranquil breast,
Since to the destined term of age

Calm I approach life's closing stage,

And seize the fleeting pleasures of the day;
Though subject to unequal fate,

Death's common stroke we all await:

60

65

But he that would the scene beyond survey,
To him will never find it given

To tread the brazen soil of heaven. 63

70

And that which Pytho yields in contests all thine own! 70

THE EIGHTH ISTHMIAN ODE.

TO CLEANDER OF ÆGINA, VICTOR IN THE PANCRATIUM.

ARGUMENT.

THE poet in this ode exhorts the youths, liberated from the calamities of the Persian war, to apply their minds to the framing of hymns in honor of the victor-It becomes a Theban to sing the praises of an Æginetan, on account of their common origin-Thence he digresses to fables of the Æacidæ, and the nuptials of Peleus and Thetis; which leads him to panegyrise Achilles-Returns to the praise of the victor, and his uncle Nicocles, with which he concludes the ode.

To celebrate Cleander's praise,

O youths! the hymn of triumph raise,
That ever forms the glorious meed
To crown the blooming hero's deed.
To Telesarchus' splendid halls
Some friend his victor offspring calls
The pomp and revel to convey:
Potent upon the Isthmian plain,
The wreath of conquest to obtain,
And Nemea's guerdon bear away.
For him, though bitter grief control
The wonted ardor of my soul,
To me is given th' unequal task
The golden Muses' aid to ask. 12

Now from our mighty sorrows free,
No want of chaplets may we find,
Around the victor's head to bind,
Nor feed again our misery.
Pausing awhile, from fruitless woe
Let us direct the patriot mind
Some public blessing to bestow;

5

10

15

20

Since a kind god hath turn'd aside
Of threat'ning ills the direful shock
That hung like the Tantalean rock

O'er Græcia's land, unskill'd the storm to bide. 23 25

But now my fear has pass'd away,
And anxious Care relax'd her sway.
To seize each object as it lies
Before his foot becomes the wise.
O'er man impends deceitful age,
Revolving still life's onward stage.
Yet mortals e'en these ills may cure,
While liberty continues sure.

30

In calm contentment let them rest,
Of favorable hope possess'd.

35

Me too the happy task awaits,

(Nurtured where Thebes expands her seven-fold gates,)

With the bright Muses' wreath to grace

Ægina, nymph of kindred race.

Twin daughters of a common sire,

40

And youngest of Asopus' line,

Whose beauties could the soul incline

Of Jove himself to fond desire. 41

To her the heavenly lover gave
By Dirce's sweetly-flowing wave
O'er that fair city to preside,
Who joys the rapid car to guide.
Thee to Enopia's isle convey'd,
The thundering sire a parent made
Of Æacus, whose honor'd birth
Raised him above the sons of earth.
His godlike offspring's latest line
With might from him reflected shine,

24 See the note on Ol. i. 90.