And ev'ry choicest blossom crops From all the blooming virtues' tops; Around him throws a purple light While o'er his social board she shakes her flow'rs: Her festal hymns for ever sound. Give, give the Lyre-warm o'er my soul The swelling thoughts begin to roll! This hand shall wake a Dorian strain Striking aloud to Pisa's plain, And Pherenicus, fleetest steed, that scours Near silver Alpheus o'er the shouting ground, The whip he scorns, in wreaths his Lord's glad brows he bound. E. 1. With joy the Syracusian monarch glows Exulting in his haughty steed; Glory crown'd his matchless speed; Beaming from Hiero's brows She brightens all the land, of yore Where his fam'd sceptre Pelops bore V. 19. And ev'ry.] The elegance of West's translation of this passage it is vain to hope any other can equal. "Plucks every blooming virtue's fairest flow'r." V. 29. For Pisa and other names see Index. V. 30. Pherenicus, the name of the victorious steed. With his brave Lydian colony retir'd: Him Neptune saw, the god admir'd, When Clotho's pow'r his sever'd limbs replac'd, From glitt'ring cauldron ris'n, with ivory shoulder grac❜d. Thus wondrous fictions blind, By fancy drest, the human mind; 40 V. 39. With his.] For he came from Lydia. 55 V. 41. When Clotho's.] She was one of the Fates. The common story, which Pindar rejects, was, "that he was served up at table and his shoulder eaten the Gods restored him to life, and Clothe gave him an ivory shoulder." My Muse shall wake truth's genuine strain At Sipylus; the God, who holds the splendid mace, All search! He never more shall bless her sight!" V. 61. The father's.] Pindar allows thus much of the story to be true, that Tantalus, the father of Pelops, having been before feasted by the gods, in turn invited them at Sipylus, in Lydia. But the unnatural story of killing his son and boiling his limbs for the feast, he rejects. V. 62. The God.] Neptune. V. 68. Fair Ganymede.] I conceive Pindar had a very particular reason for this mention of Ganymede, who, for his beauty, was taken into heaven. See note on v. 160. 75 60 Hence, from the cauldron that his limbs were brought The honours of heav'n's golden plain, The bliss divine, unable to digest, With arrogance and pride the mortal swells his breast. His awful brow Jove bends In wrath and o'er his head suspends Tremendous mass of ever-threat'ning rock; He, shrinking still, still shudders from the whelming shock. He lives in torture unreliev'd, For ever groaning, ever griev'd, The fourth of that unhappy train Who wail in everlasting pain: 8. 3. V. 95. The fourth.] Ixion, Sisyphus, Tityus, and himself, are the four. The cup, whose sweets immortalize His humbler nature, from the skies He stole, which none but heav'nly banquets know, And lo! on mortal friends bestow'd, Bold, impious man! immortal food. Who daring would deceive the eyes Of those blest pow'rs which rule the skies, That rash soul errs. The Sire's offence To dwell once more with short-liv'd men below. Pelops in youth's full bloom to earth return'd, And for the bride proclaim'd his pensive wishes burn'd. To Pisa's mighty king he came : A. 3. His daughter of illustrious fame, 100 105 110 V. 108. And for.] Take away the comma after yapov, and it will be έTOIμOV Tapa. warpos, nuptias a patre paratas, i. e. certis legibus durisque. Pindar mentions two other instances where the father prepared or proclaimed his daughter's nuptials on certain conditions. See Pyth. 9. V. 109. To Pisa's king.] Enomaus, King of Pisa, having been informed by an oracle that he would be slain by his son in law; when the beauty of his daughter Hippodameia attracted many admirers, proposed a chariot-race to each young man on these conditions, that if himself were conquered he would give him his daughter; but, if he proved victorious, the lover must submit to be transfixed with his spear. Thirteen, so swift were the king's horses, had already lost their lives, when Pelops conceived a hope that, by divine assistance, he might obtain the prize. Observe here, as in a thousand instances beside, how Pindar delights to ascribe all events to some god. D |