Book 3

Sea first beaten by the oars of Jason, and you, land, that lack neither fierce foe nor snow, will there be a time when I, Naso, shall leave you, bidden to be far off in a less hostile place? Or must I live forever in that barbarism, and be buried in the Tomitan soil? By your leave, if any leave is yours, Pontic land, which the neighbouring foe wears down on his swift horse, by your leave I would say it: you are the worst part of my hard exile, you weigh down my ills. You feel no spring girt with a flowering garland, you see no naked bodies of harvesters, nor does autumn hold out to you the vine-clad grapes: but an immoderate cold holds all the seasons, you keep the straits bound with ice, and in the sea the fish, shut in, has often swum beneath a roof of water. Nor have you springs, save almost of brackish water, which when drunk leaves it doubtful whether it stays or feeds the thirst, rare, and not fruitful, in the open fields stands out a tree, and on the land there is another form of the sea. No bird sings, unless one, far off in the woods, drinks the sea waters with hoarse throat, gloomy wormwood bristles over the empty plains, a bitter harvest suited to its own place. Add fears, and that the wall is battered by the foe, and the arrow drips, dipped in deadly poison, that this region is far off and out of the way of every road, and no one goes safe by foot or by ship. It is no wonder, then, if I seek an end of these things, and another soil is ever begged for me. It is more a wonder that you do not overcome this, my wife, and can hold back tears amid my ills. You ask what you should do? You should ask this very thing, of course, you will find it, if you truly wish to find out. To wish is too little: you must desire, that you may gain the end, and let this care make your sleeps short, I think many wish it: for who is so unjust to me as to wish my exile to lack peace? It befits you to lean with your whole breast and all your sinews and to strive for me by night and by day. And though others help, you ought to surpass my friends, wife, and come first to your own part. A great character has been laid on you by my little books: you are said to be the example of a good wife. Take care you do not fall away from it, that my heralding may be true; see that you guard the work of your fame. Though I myself complain of nothing, fame, silent, will complain of me, unless the care of me, which it owes, has been yours. Fortune has exposed me to be seen by the people, and has given more notice of me than there was before. Capaneus has been made better known by the lightning's stroke, Amphiaraus is known by his horses sunk in the earth, had he wandered less, Ulysses would be less known: great is the fame of Philoctetes by his own wound. If there is any place for the small among names so great, my ruin too makes me conspicuous, nor does my page suffer you to be unknown, by which you have a name no lower than Coan Bittis, whatever you do, then, you will be watched on a great stage, and you will be a dutiful wife before not a few witnesses. Believe me, as often as you are praised in my song, he who reads these praises asks whether you deserve them, and as I think more men favour those virtues, so not a few women will wish to carp at your deeds. See that you give them no chance that envy can say 'she is slow in seeking the safety of her wretched husband.' And since I fail, and cannot draw the chariot, make that you alone sustain the feeble yoke. Sick, I look to the physician with failing veins: while the last part of my soul remains to me, be present; and what I would render, if I myself were the stronger, that render to me, since you yourself are the more vigorous. Wedded love and the marriage compact demand this: by your own character, wife, you yourself demand it. This you owe to the house by which you are reckoned, that you may honour it no more by services than by probity, though you do all things, unless you are a praiseworthy wife, Marcia cannot be believed to be honoured by you. Nor am I unworthy: nor, if you wish to confess the truth, is no gratitude owed to my deserts. That is repaid me indeed with great interest, nor has rumour, even if it wished, the power to harm you, but yet add this one thing to your former deeds, that you be eager on behalf of my ills. Labour that I may lie in a less hostile region, and let no part of your duty be lame. I ask great things, but not such as bring envy on the asker: and though you do not gain them, your repulse is safe. Nor be angry with me if so often, in my song, I beg you to do what you do, and to imitate yourself. The trumpeter is wont to spur on the brave, and the leader with his own voice urges on men who fight well. Your probity is known and witnessed for all time; let your valour too be not less than your probity. You need not take up the Amazon's axe for me, nor bear the cut-out shield in a light hand. A deity must be worshipped, not that he be made friendly to me, but that he be less angry than he was before. If there is no favour, your tears will become your favour. By this part you can move the gods, or by none. That these may not fail you is well provided for by my ills: my husband's lot gives you a rich abundance of weeping; and as my affairs are, you will weep, I think, at every time. This wealth my fortune ministers to you. If my death had to be redeemed by yours, which I abhor, the wife of Admetus, whom you would follow, was there. You would become a rival of Penelope, if, chaste by craft, as a bride you wished to deceive the pressing suitors. If as companion you would follow the shade of your dead husband, Laodamia would be the leader of your deed. The daughter of Iphis would have to be set before your eyes, if you wished by chance to cast your body upon the kindled pyres. There is no need of death, none of the daughter of Icarius's web. Caesar's wife must be entreated by your mouth, who excels by her virtue, lest ancient antiquity press our age with the praise of chastity: who, having the beauty of Venus, the character of Juno, alone has been found worthy of a heavenly bed. Why do you tremble and fear to approach? Not impious Procne nor the daughter of Aeëtes is to be moved by your voice, nor the daughter-in-law of Egypt, nor Agamemnon's savage wife, nor Scylla, who terrifies the Sicilian waters with her loins, nor the parent of Telegonus, born to change shapes, nor Medusa, her knotted locks entwined with snakes, but the first of women, in whom Fortune proves that she can see, and has borne the false charges of being blind: than whom the world has nothing brighter on earth, from the sun's rising to its setting, Caesar excepted, choose a time often watched for, of asking, that your ship may not go out on an adverse tide. Not always do the oracles render the sacred lots, and the shrines themselves do not lie open at every time, when the state of the city is such as I now augur it to be, and no grief of the people contracts faces, when the house of Augustus, to be honoured as the Capitol, is glad, as it is and may it be, and full of peace, then may the gods grant you a chance of approaching, then think your words will accomplish something. If she is doing anything greater, defer your beginnings and beware of dashing my hope by haste. Nor again do I bid you wait until she is most at leisure: she scarcely has leisure for the care of her own body. . . . through the throng of affairs you too must go. When it has fallen to you to approach the face of Juno, see that you are mindful of the character you maintain. And do not defend my deed; a bad cause must be kept silent. Let your words be nothing but anxious prayers, then there must be no delay in tears, and, prostrate on the ground, stretch your arms toward those not mortal feet. Then seek nothing else but that I withdraw from the savage foe; let it be enough that Fortune is my foe. Many things indeed come to mind, but, confused by fear, even these you will scarcely be able to speak with trembling voice. I suspect this will be no loss to you. She will perceive that you greatly dreaded her majesty. Nor, if your words are broken by weeping, will it harm: sometimes tears have the weight of a voice, see too that a good day attend such beginnings and a fitting hour and a favouring omen. But first, fire laid on the holy altars, bring incense and pure wine to the great gods. Of these, before all, worship the Augustan deity and the dutiful offspring and the partner of his bed. Would that they may be mild to you in their accustomed way, and look upon your tears with no harsh faces.

The greeting which you read sent to you from me, Cotta, I pray it may be sent as truly as it has arrived. For, safe, you take much from my torments, and you make a good part to be safe in me. And while some falter and leave the tossed sails, you alone remain the anchor of my shattered craft. Welcome, then, is your piety; I forgive those who, when Fortune did, turned their backs in flight, when the thunderbolts strike one, they terrify not one, and the throng beside the smitten man is wont to be afraid: and when a wall has given signs of coming ruin, that place is left empty by anxious fear. Who, of the timid, does not shun the sick man's contagion, fearing lest the neighbouring ill draw harm from there? Me too some of my friends abandoned out of excessive terror and fear, not out of hatred. They lacked not piety, not the will to do their duty: they dreaded the gods who were against me. And as they can seem more cautious and timid, so they did not deserve to be called bad. Or my candour so excuses my dear friends, that, that they may have no charges against me, it favours them: let these be content with pardon, and let them boast that their deed is cleared, with even me as witness. You are the better, the few, who in hard straits thought it shameful to bring me no help. Then, therefore, the gratitude for your service will die, when I have become ash, my body consumed. I am wrong, and it will outlast the times of my life, if only I am read by a mindful posterity. Bloodless bodies are owed to mournful tombs: name and honour escape the built-up pyres. Both Theseus died and he who accompanied Orestes: but yet each lives on in his own praises. You too late grandsons will often praise, and your glory will be bright in my writings. Here too the Sarmatians and the Getae now know you, and the barbarian throng approves such hearts, and when I lately told of your probity (for I have learned to speak Getic and Sarmatian), by chance a certain old man, as he stood in that gathering, gave such words in answer to my sounds: 'We too, good guest, know the name of friendship, we whom the Pontus and the Hister hold far from you. There is a place in Scythia, the men of old called it Tauris, which is not so very far from the Getic soil. In this land (and I am not ashamed of my country) I was born: that nation worships the goddess who shares with Phoebus. The temples remain today, leaning on vast columns, and one goes up to them by forty steps, fame reports that there was a heavenly image there; and, that you may doubt it less, the base stands bereft of its goddess; and the altar, which had been by nature white of stone, discoloured, is red, stained with poured blood. A woman performs the rites, not known to the wedding torch, who surpasses the Scythian women in nobility, the kind of sacrifice is this, so the fathers ordained, that a stranger fall slain by a virgin's sword. Thoas held the realm, famous on the Maeotic shore, nor was any other better known on the Euxine waters. With him holding the sceptre, they say that one Iphigenia made a journey through the clear air. Whom, borne by light winds beneath a cloud through the sky, Phoebe is believed to have set down in these places. She had ruled over the temple duly for many years, performing the grim rites with unwilling hand: when two young men came on a sail-bearing ship and pressed our shores with their feet. Equal was their age and their love, of whom one was Orestes, the other was Pylades: fame holds the names. At once they are led to the cruel altar of Trivia, their two hands bound behind their backs, the Greek priestess sprinkles the captives with lustral water, that the long fillet may wreathe their tawny locks. And while she prepares the rite, while she veils her temples with bands, while she herself invents reasons for the slow delay, "I am not cruel, young men (forgive me)," she said, "I perform rites more barbarous than my own land. This is the custom of the nation. Yet from what city do you come? Or on what journey have you sought, with an ill-omened ship?" She spoke, and the dutiful maiden, hearing the name of her homeland, learned that they were sharers of her own city. "Let one of you," she said, "fall as victim to the rites, let the other go as messenger to his father's seat." Pylades, ready to perish, bids dear Orestes go; he refuses, and each in turn contends to die. This one thing arose, in which they did not agree: in all else they were a harmonious pair, and without strife. While the fair young men carry on the contest of love, she scratches written marks to her brother. She gave charges to her brother, and he to whom they were given (behold the chances of men!) was her brother. Without delay, they snatch the images of Diana from the temple, and secretly are borne by ship over the vast waters. Wondrous the love of the young men. Though so many years have passed, in Scythia even now they have a great name.' After this common tale was told by him, all praised the deeds and the dutiful faith, no doubt on this shore too, than which none is fiercer, the name of friendship moves barbarian hearts, what ought you, born in the Ausonian city, to do, when such deeds touch the harsh Getae? Add that your mind is always mild, and your character holds the token of high nobility, which Volesus, founder of your father's name, would acknowledge, which Numa on your mother's side would not deny to be his own. And the added Cottae prove it for your inherited names, a house that would perish if you were not. Worthy man of this lineage, think that to succour a fallen friend befits that character of yours.

If you have leisure to give a little time to a fugitive friend, O star of the Fabian race, Maximus, be present, while I tell you what I saw, whether it was the shade of a body or the likeness of the true thing or that sleep. It was night, and the moon was entering the double-leaved windows, shining as bright as it is wont about the month's middle. Sleep, the common rest of cares, held me, and my languid limbs were spread over the whole couch, when suddenly the air, stirred by wings, shuddered, and the window, moved, groaned with a small sound. Terrified, I raise my limbs onto my left elbow, and sleep, driven off, departs from my fearful breast. Love stood there, not with the face he used to have before, sad, holding the bedpost of maple with his left hand, having no collar on his neck, no clasp in his hair, nor his locks well-arranged, adorned as before, his soft hair hung over his rough face, and his wing seemed rough to my eyes, such as is wont to be on the back of the airy dove, which, handled, many hands have touched. As soon as I knew him, for no other is better known to me, my tongue, set free, addressed him in such sounds: 'O boy, cause of exile to your deceived master, whom it would have been more useful for me not to have taught, have you come here too, where there is peace at no time, and the barbarous Hister meets with bound waters? What was your reason for the road, unless to see my ills? Which, if you know it not, are hateful to you. You first dictated to me my youthful songs: under your guidance I added five feet to six, and you did not allow me to rise to Maeonian song nor to tell the deeds of great leaders, perhaps your bow and your fires have lessened the slight, yet some, powers of my talent. For while I sang your kingdom and your parent's, my mind had no leisure for any great work, nor had this been enough: I made, with foolish song too, that you could be no novice in my Arts. For which exile has been rendered me, wretched, as reward, and that too in the farthest, peaceless places. But Eumolpus, son of Chione, was not such toward Orpheus, nor was Olympus such toward the Phrygian Satyr, nor did Chiron take such rewards from Achilles, and they say Numa did no harm to Pythagoras. And not to recount names gathered through long ages, I alone have perished by my very pupil. While I gave you arms, while I taught you, wanton one, this is the gift the master has from his pupil, yet you know, and could swear to say it plainly, that I did not stir up unlawful beds. I wrote these things for those whom neither the fillet touches on their chaste hair nor the long robe upon their feet, tell me, I pray, did you ever learn to deceive wives, and to make the line uncertain by my commands? Or is every woman strictly kept off from these little books whom the law forbids to have stolen lovers? Yet what does this profit, if, forbidden by a severe law, I am believed to have composed the notes of adultery? But you, so may you have arrows that smite all things, so may your torches never lack their swift fire, so may Caesar rule the empire and restrain all lands, who is yours through your brother Aeneas, bring it about that the anger be not implacable toward me, and that he be willing to punish me in a more agreeable place. This I seemed to have said to the winged boy, these sounds he seemed to me to have given: 'By my weapons, my torches, and by my weapons, my arrows, by my mother and by Caesar's head I swear, that you have learned nothing unpermitted from me, your master, and that no crime is in your Arts. And would that I could defend the rest as I defend this! You know there is something else, greater, that has harmed you, whatever it is (for the grief itself need not be recounted, nor can you say it is far from your fault) though you shadow the crime under the image of error, the judge's anger was not heavier than your desert. Yet, that I might see and console you as you lay, my wing glided over the immense roads. These places I then first saw, when, at my mother's asking, the Phasian maiden was pierced by my weapons. Why I now revisit them again after long ages, you make me do, O soldier friendly to my camp. Lay aside your fears, then: Caesar's anger will grow mild, and a softer hour will come to your prayers. And do not fear delay, the time we seek is at hand, and the triumph holds all things full of gladness, while his house and his sons, while his mother Livia rejoices, while you rejoice, great father of your country and of its leader, while the people congratulate themselves, and through the whole city every altar is warm with fragrant fires, while the venerable temple offers easy access, it must be hoped that our prayers can avail,' he spoke, and either he melted into the thin air, or my senses began to wake. If I doubted that you favour these words, O Maximus, I should think the swans were of Memnon's colour, but neither is the milky fluid changed to black pitch, nor does what was white become turpentine-wood from ivory. A nature suited to mine is yours, for you have a noble heart and the simplicity of Hercules, envy, a sluggish vice, does not climb to lofty characters, but, lurking, creeps like a viper on the lowest ground. Your mind, sublime, towers even above your race itself, nor have you a name grander than your talent. Therefore let others harm the wretched and wish to be feared, and carry darts dipped in biting gall: but your house is accustomed to aiding suppliants, in whose number, I pray, you would wish me to be.'

These words, bearing no empty greeting to you, your Naso sends from the Tomitan city, and he bids you favour his Triumph, Rufinus, if, however, it has come into your hands. It is a slight work, unequal to your preparations: yet such as it is, I ask you to protect it. Strong things are sound of themselves, and seek no Machaon. The doubtful sick man flees to the physician's aid. Great poets have no need of a kindly reader: they hold him, however unwilling and hard. We, whose talent long toils have lessened, or perhaps there never was any before, weak in strength, are strong by your candour: which, if you take from me, I should think all things snatched away. And though all my works lean on your favourable goodwill, that book has a special claim to pardon. Other bards have written of the triumph they beheld; it is something to mark with mindful hand what was seen. We have written these things scarce caught from the common rumour by an eager ear, and report was my eyes. No doubt like feelings, or the same impulse, comes from things heard as from things beheld! Nor do I complain of the gleam of silver and gold which you saw, which I lacked, nor of that purple: but the places, the nations shaped in a thousand figures and the battles themselves would have nourished my song, and the faces of kings, the surest pledges of the mind, would perhaps have aided that work somewhat. From the very applause of the people and their glad favour any talent can have grown warm: and I should have taken vigour at such a shout, as the raw soldier does at the trumpet heard for arms. Though my breast be colder than the snows and ice and colder than this place which I endure, that face of the leader standing in the ivory chariot would shake off all cold from my senses. Lacking these things and using doubtful authorities, I come by right of your favour to your aid. Neither the names of the leaders nor the names of the places were known to me, my hands had no material. What small fraction of so great affairs was there which fame could report or anyone could write to me? The more, O reader, you ought to pardon, if anything has been erred there or passed over by me. Add that my lyre, constantly practised in its master's complaints, was scarce turned to a glad song. Scarcely, after so long, did good words come to me as I sought them, and to rejoice in anything seemed a strange thing to me. And as the eyes shrink from the unaccustomed sun, so my mind was sluggish toward gladness. The newness of all things, too, is most dear, and the favour for a service which delay slows down is absent. The rest, vying, written about the great triumph, I suspect were long ago read by the people's mouth. That the thirsty reader drank, my cups when he was full: that was drunk fresh, my water will be lukewarm. I did not delay, nor did sloth make me late! The farthest shore of the vast strait holds me. While rumour comes here and the hurried verses are made and, once made, go to you, a year can pass. And it makes no small difference whether you pluck untouched rose-beds first, or, late, those almost left behind by another's hand. What wonder, the garden drained of its plucked flowers, if a garland worthy of your leader has not been made? I deprecate this: let no one think a bard's words spoken against his own songs! My Muse has spoken for herself. I have sacred rites in common with you, poets, if the wretched may be in your choir, and a great part of my soul, you have lived with me, friends: in this part I honour you, absent, even now. Let my songs, then, be commended to your favour, on whose behalf I cannot myself speak, writings please mostly after death, because envy is wont to harm the living and carp at them with unjust tooth. If to live ill is a kind of death, the earth delays me, and only the tomb is lacking to my fate. In short, though my work of care be blamed on every side, there will be no one who reproves my devotion. Though strength be lacking, yet the will must be praised: with this I augur the gods are content. This makes the poor man too come welcome to the altars, and a lamb please no less than a slaughtered ox. The matter too was so great that to halt at its height would have been a great burden to the bard of the Aeneadae. Even the soft elegies could not bear so vast a weight of triumph on their unequal wheels, what foot I should now use is a doubtful question with me: for a second triumph over you, Rhine, is at hand, the forebodings of stirred bards are not in vain. A laurel must be given to Jove, while the former one is still green. Nor do you read my words, who am removed to the Hister, its rivers ill-drunk by the unpacified Getae: that is a god's voice, a god is in my breast, these things I foretell and prophesy with a god as guide. Why do you delay, Livia, to prepare the chariot and pageant for the triumphs? The wars now give you no delays. Treacherous Germany throws down her condemned spears. Now you will say my weighty word has its omen. Believe it, and in a short time proof will be at hand: your son will double the honour, and will go, as before, with yoked horses. Bring out the purple to cast on the victorious shoulders: the crown itself can know the accustomed head: but let shields and helmets shine with gems and gold, and let trophies, lopped, stand over the bound men: let ivory towns be girt with turreted walls, and the feigned thing be thought to be done in the true manner. Let squalid Rhine, his hair loosened beneath broken reeds, carry his waters stained with blood, already the captive kings demand their barbarian insignia and the woven robes richer than their fortune, and what besides the unconquered valour of your kin, often prepared for you, often to be prepared, performs, O gods, at whose prompting I have spoken what shall come to pass, approve, I pray, my words with swift fulfilment.

You ask whence the letter you read is sent to you? From here, where the Hister is joined with the dark-blue waters, as the region is named, the author too ought to come to mind, Naso the poet, harmed by his own talent. He sends you, from the shaggy Getae, the greeting which, present, he would rather bring, Maximus Cotta. I have read, O youth not unworthy of your father's voice, the eloquent words spoken by you in the full Forum. Which, although they were read by me with hurrying tongue through enough many hours, I complain were too few. But I made them more by reading them often, nor were they ever not more welcome to me than at the first, and since, read so often, they lose nothing of their sweetness, they please by their own powers, not by novelty. Happy those to whom it fell to know these in the very act and to enjoy so eloquent a mouth! For, although the savour is sweet in water brought to one, the waters are more pleasingly drunk from the spring itself. And it pleases more to pluck the fruit from the drawn-down branch than to take it from an engraved dish. But had I not sinned, had not my Muse driven me into flight, your voice would have shown me the work which I read, and, as I was wont, I should perhaps have sat as one judge of the hundred men upon your words, and a greater pleasure would have filled my heart, when I was drawn on by your words and assented to them. But since fate has preferred that I, my country and you left behind, should be among the inhuman Getae, what is allowed, that I may seem to be more with you, send me often, I pray, the pledges of your study to be read, and follow my example, unless you scorn that very thing, which you yourself could more rightly give to me, for I, who have long since perished, Maximus, to you, strive by my talent not to have perished. Repay me in turn, and let my hands receive the not infrequent records of your labour, welcome to be, yet tell me, O youth full of my studies, whether you are reminded of me by these very things. Whether, when you either recite a poem just made to your friends, or, as you often do, require them to recite, I am missed, so that sometimes your mind, forgetting what is absent, surely feels that something of its own is gone, and as you were wont to speak much of me when I was present, is the name of Naso now too on your lips? For myself indeed, may I perish, violated by the Getic bow (and you see how near is the penalty of perjury), unless, absent, I see you at almost every moment. Thanks that the mind is free to go wherever it will. When I have come here unseen by any into the city, I often talk with you, often enjoy you speaking. Then it is hard for me to say how well it is, and how bright that hour is in my judgment. Then, if there is any faith, received into a heavenly seat, I suspect I am with the fortunate gods. Again, when I have returned here, I leave heaven and the gods above, and the Pontic soil is not far from the Styx, whence, if I strive to return, fate forbidding, take from me, Maximus, hope without profit.

Naso sends to his comrade (how nearly he set the name!) this brief song from the Euxine waters, but if too incautious a hand had written who you were, perhaps a complaint would have been born of the kindness. Yet why, when others think this safe, do you alone ask that my songs not name you? How great is Caesar's clemency in the midst of his anger, if you know it not, you can be more certain from me. From this punishment which I suffer I could take nothing away, if I were forced to be the judge of my own desert. He does not forbid anyone to remember his comrade, nor does he forbid me to write to you and you to me. Nor would you commit a crime, if you console a friend and with soft words lighten his harsh fate. Why, while you fear safe things, do you make such reverence become invidious toward the Augustan gods? We have seen men struck by the bolts of lightning sometimes live and recover, Jove not forbidding. Nor, because Neptune had wrecked Ulysses's ship, did Leucothea refuse to bring help to the swimmer. Believe me, the heavenly deities spare the wretched, nor always press the wounded, and without end. Nor is any god more moderate than our prince: Justice tempers his strength. Lately Caesar set her in a temple made of marble, having long since set her in the temple of his own mind. Jupiter hurls rash bolts at many who have not deserved by guilt to suffer punishment. The god of the sea overwhelms how many with his savage waves, what small fraction of them was worthy to be sunk? Since the bravest perish in the battle-line, even with Mars himself as judge, his choice will be unjust. But if by chance you wish to inquire into us, there is no one who would deny that he has deserved what he suffers. Add that the dead, whether by water or by Mars or by fire, no day can ever restore again. Caesar has restored many, or lightened them of part of their punishment: and among the many, I pray, may he wish me to be, But you, since we are a people under such a prince, do you believe there is danger in addressing a fugitive? Perhaps you might justly fear these things under Busiris as master, or him who was wont to burn men shut in the brazen bull, cease to defame a mild spirit with empty fear, why do you dread savage rocks in calm waters? For myself, that I wrote to you at first without a name, I scarcely seem able to be excused, but fear, in my stunned state, had taken away the use of reason, all counsel had given way before the strange ills, and, fearing my fortune, not the avenger's, I myself was terrified by the title of my own name. So far admonished, grant a mindful poet leave to set dear names in his pages. It will be shameful for us both, if you, nearest to me by long acquaintance, are read in no part of my book. Yet, lest that fear be able to break your sleep, I shall be no more dutiful than you wish, and I shall hide who you are, except when you yourself permit: no one shall be forced to have my gift. You only, whom you could safely love even openly, if that thing is doubtful, love in secret.

Words fail me, asking so often for the same things, and now I am ashamed that my empty prayers lack an end. I think a weariness comes over you from a song so alike, and that you have all learned by heart what I ask. And you know now what my letter carries, although the wax has not been loosened from its bonds. Therefore let the burden of my writing be changed, that I may not so often go against the way the river hurries. Forgive me, friends, that I hoped well of you: there will now be an end for me of sinning so. Nor let me be called a burden to my wife: who indeed toward me is as upright as she is timid, and too little persevering. This too, Naso, you shall bear: for you have borne worse things. Now no burden can be felt by you. The bull, led from the herd, refuses the plough, and the young heifer draws back her neck from the hard yoke: we, whom fate has been wont to use cruelly, are long since no novices in any ills, we have come to the Getic bounds: let us die in them, and let my Fate go to the end by the path it began. It pleases to embrace hope—which, vain, never pleases— and to think those things to come, if you desire any to happen: the next step after this is to despair of safety with good cause, and to know once, with true faith, that one has perished. We see some wounds become greater by being treated, which it had been better not to have touched. He perishes more gently who is sunk by a sudden wave, than he who wearies his arms in the swelling waters. Why did I conceive that I could be without the Scythian bounds and enjoy a more prosperous land? Why did I ever hope anything gentler for myself? Was my fortune known to me thus? Behold, I am tortured more grievously, and the look of these places, sought again, renews my sad exile and makes it fresh. Yet it is more useful that the zeal of my friends should cease, than that the prayers they brought should have availed nothing, a great thing indeed it is that you do not dare, friends: but if anyone sought it, there was one who would wish to give. Provided Caesar's anger does not deny us this, bravely shall we die in the Euxine waters.

The gifts I was seeking, to send you, attesting my mindful care, the Tomitan field could provide. You are worthy of silver, and worthier too of tawny gold, but when you give, those things are wont to please you. Yet these places are precious for no metal: the foe scarcely lets the farmer dig them. Gleaming purple often borders your garments, but it is not dyed in the Sarmatian sea. The flocks bear hard fleeces, and to use the art of Pallas the Tomitan women have not learned, a woman, instead of wool, grinds the gifts of Ceres, and carries heavy water on her head beneath the load. Here the elm is not clothed with vine-clad tendrils, no fruits weigh down the boughs with their own weight. The misshapen fields bear gloomy wormwood, and the land teaches by its fruit how bitter it is. Nothing, then, in the whole region of the left Pontus was there which my diligence could send. Yet I have sent you Scythian weapons enclosed in a quiver: may they, I pray, become bloody with your foe. These are the reeds, these the little books this shore has, this is the Muse, Maximus, that thrives in our regions! Which, although I am ashamed to have sent, because they seem small, yet take these things sent, I pray, in good part.

That in these little books there is the same theme, Brutus, you report that someone carps at my songs: that I ask nothing but to enjoy a nearer land, and speak of how I am hemmed in by a dense foe. Oh, how out of many faults one is reproved! If my Muse sins in this alone, it is well. I myself see the faults of my own books, though each man approves his own songs more than is just, the author praises his work: so perhaps Agrius once said that Thersites was of fair appearance. Yet this error does not deceive my judgment, nor do I straightway love whatever I have begotten. Why then, if I see myself failing, do I sin, and suffer the fault to be in my writing, you ask? It is not the same thing to feel and to remove diseases; the feeling is in all, the ill is taken away by art, often, wishing to change some word, I have let it stand, and my powers fail my judgment. Often it irks me (for why should I hesitate to confess the truth to you) to correct and to bear the burden of long labour. The labour itself delights the writer and lessens the labour, and the work, growing, glows with its own breast. To correct is a thing as much more arduous as great Homer was greater than Aristarchus, so it harms the mind with the slow cold of cares and holds back the reins of the eager, running horse. And so may the mild gods lessen Caesar's anger toward me, and may my bones be covered in a peaceful soil, as the bitter look of my fortune sometimes hinders me, trying to bend my cares, and I scarcely seem to myself sane, who make songs, and try to correct them among the wild Getae. Yet nothing in my writings is more excusable than that one theme is in almost all of them. Glad, I have mostly sung glad things; sad, I sing sad. Each time is suited to its own work. What should I write of but the fault of the bitter region, and pray that I may die in a more agreeable place? But though I say the same things so often, I am scarcely heard by anyone, and my words, ignored, lack any profit. And yet, though these are the same things, I have not written to the same persons, and my one voice tries through many to gain help. Or, lest the reader find the same thought twice, was one of my friends, Brutus, to be entreated? This was not worth so much: forgive me confessing it, learned man: the fame of my work is cheaper than my safety. In short, the material which each man has drawn for himself, the poet varies much at his own discretion. My Muse is the witness, too true even, of my ills, and has the weight of an uncorrupted witness. Nor was it my purpose and care that a book be made, but that to each his own letter be given. Afterward I joined them, gathered as best I could, without order: do not think, by chance, this work was chosen by me. Grant pardon to my writings, of which glory was not my cause, but usefulness and duty.