"In all the world no spot there is, That wears for me a smile like this, The honey of whose thymy fields May vie with what Hymettus yields, Where berries clustering every slope May with Venafrum's greenest cope. "There Jove accords a lengthened spring, And winters wanting winter's sting, And sunny Aulon's[1] broad incline Such mettle puts into the vine, Its clusters need not envy those Which fiery Falernum grows. "Thyself and me that spot invites, Those pleasant fields, those sunny heights; And there, to life's last moments true, Wilt thou with some fond tears bedew-- The last sad tribute love can lend-- The ashes of thy poet-friend." [1] Galaesus (Galaso), a river; Aulon, a hill near Tarentum. Septimius was himself a poet, or thought himself one, who, "Holding vulgar ponds and runnels cheap, At Pindar's fount drank valiantly and deep," as Horace says of him in an Epistle (I. 3) to Julius Florus; adding, with a sly touch of humour, which throws more than a doubt on the poetic powers of their common friend,-- "Thinks he of me? And does he still aspire To marry Theban strains to Latium's lyre, Thanks to the favouring muse? Or haply rage And mouth in bombast for the tragic stage?" When this was written Septimius was in Armenia along with Florus, on the staff of Tiberius Claudius Nero, the future emperor. For this appointment he was probably indebted to Horace, who applied for it, at his request, in the following Epistle to Tiberius (I. 9), which Addison ('Spectator,' 493) cites as a fine specimen of what a letter of introduction should be. Horace was, on principle, wisely chary of giving such introductions. "Look round and round the man you recommend, For yours will be the shame if he offend," (C.) is his maxim on this subject (Epistles, I. 18, 76); and he was sure to be especially scrupulous in writing to Tiberius, who, even in his youth--and he was at this time about twenty-two--was so morose and unpleasant in his manners, to say nothing of his ample share of the hereditary pride of the Claudian family, that even Augustus felt under constraint in his company:--