Carmina

Catullus

Catullus, Gaius Valerius. The Carmina of Caius Valerius Catullus. Burton, Sir Richard Francis, translator. London, Printed for the Translators, 1894.

  1. You too by wedding-torch so happily, highly augmented,
  2. Peleus, Thessaly's ward, in whose favor Jupiter himself,
  3. The Father of the gods, resigned his passions.
  4. You Thetis, fairest of maids Nereian, vouchsafed to marry?
  5. You did Tethys empower to woo and wed with her grandchild;
  6. Nor less Oceanus, with water compassing th' Earth-globe?
  7. But when ended the term, and wisht-for light of the day-tide
  8. Uprose, flocks to the house in concourse mighty, convened,
  9. Thessaly all, with glad assembly the Palace fulfilling:
  10. Presents afore they bring, and joy in faces declare they.
  11. Cieros abides a desert: they quit Phthiotican Tempe,
  12. Homesteads of Crannon-town, eke bulwarkt walls Larissa;
  13. Meeting at Pharsalus, and roof Pharsalian seeking.
  14. None will the fields now till; soft wax all necks the oxen,
  15. Never the humble vine is purged by curve of the rake-tooth,
  16. Never a pruner's hook thins out the shade of the tree-tufts,
  17. Never a bull up-plows broad glebe with bend of the coulter,
  18. Over whose point unuse displays the squalor of rust-stain.
  19. But in the homestead's heart, where'er that opulent palace
  20. Hides a retreat, all shines with splendour of gold and of silver.
  21. Ivory blanches the seats, bright gleam the flagons a-table,
  22. All of the mansion joys in royal riches and grandeur.
  23. But for the Diva's use bestrewn is the genial bedstead,
  24. Hidden in midmost stead, and its polisht framework of Indian
  25. Tusk underlies its cloth empurpled by juice of the dye-shell.
  26. This be a figured cloth with forms of manhood primeval
  27. Showing by marvel-art the gifts and graces of heroes.
  28. Here upon Dia's strand wave-resonant, ever-regarding
  29. Theseus borne from sight outside by fleet of the fleetest,
  30. Stands Ariadne with heart full-filled with furies unbated,