Epistulae

first love. If Cynthia, whose eye extends over all, should chance to fix it upon you, Phaon would be commanded to prolong his sleep. Venus would have borne you off in a chariot of ivory to the skies; but she foresaw that you would no less charm her beloved Mars. O scarcely a youth, and yet not a tender boy; useful age for lovers! O pride and glory of thy age, come to these arms; return, darling of my soul, to my soft embraces. I ask not your love, but that you will kindly receive mine. I write, and, as I write, the starting tears flow from my eyes: see what a number of blots stain this very place. If you were determined to abandon me, it might yet have been done in a kinder way. Was it too much to say, Farewell, my Lesbian maid? You saw none of my tears, you received no parting kisses; nor did I at all apprehend what a load of grief awaited me. You have left nothing with your Sappho but wrongs and woes; nor have carried any pledge with you to renew the memory of our loves. I gave you no charge; nor indeed had I any other charge to give, than that you would

be always mindful of me.

I swear to you by the God of love, by whom let me never be abandoned, and by the sacred nine, those deities whom I adore, that when first told (I hardly know by whom) that you and all my joys had fled, I had neither the power of speaking nor of weeping; my eyes did not grant me the relief of tears, and my tongue was deprived of all motion; a death-like coldness seized my boding heart: but when impetuous grief at last found a vent, I beat my breast, and rent my scattered locks, raving in all the wildness of furious despair; like a pious mother who bears to the funeral-pile the breathless body of her darling son. My brother Charaxus rejoices at the disaster, and barbarously triumphs in my griefs: his hated image is ever before my eyes; and, to reproach me with the shameful cause, he asks, Why all this sadness? Your daughter still lives. Love and shame are ever inconsistent. With garments torn, and my bosom bare, I proclaim to all the world my