About the same time that Maecenas recovered from this fever, Horace made a narrow escape from being killed by the fall of a tree, and, what to him was a great aggravation of the disaster, upon his own beloved farm (Odes, II. 13). He links the two events together as a marked coincidence in the following Ode (II. 17). His friend had obviously been a prey to one of his fits of low spirits, and vexing the kindly soul of the poet by gloomy anticipations of an early death. Suffering, as Maecenas did, from those terrible attacks of sleeplessness to which he was subject, and which he tried ineffectually to soothe by the plash of falling water and the sound of distant music, [Footnote: Had Horace this in his mind when he wrote _"Non avium citharoeque cantus somnum reducent_?"--(Odes, III. 1.) "Nor song of birds, nor music of the lyre, Shall his lost sleep restore."] such misgivings were only too natural. The case was too serious this time for Horace to think of rallying his friend into a brighter humour. He may have even seen good cause to share his fears; for his heart is obviously moved to its very depths, and his sympathy and affection well out in words, the pathos of which is still as fresh as the day they first came with comfort to the saddened spirits of Maecenas himself. "Why wilt thou kill me with thy boding fears? Why, oh Maecenas, why? Before thee lies a train of happy years: Yes, nor the gods nor I Could brook that thou shouldst first be laid in dust, Who art my stay, my glory, and my trust! "Ah, if untimely Fate should snatch thee hence, Thee, of my soul a part, Why should I linger on, with deadened sense, And ever-aching heart, A worthless fragment of a fallen shrine? No, no, one day shall see thy death and mine! "Think not that I have sworn a bootless oath; Yes, we shall go, shall go, Hand link'd in hand, whene'er thou leadest, both The last sad road below! Me neither the Chimaera's fiery breath, Nor Gyges, even could Gyges rise from death, "With all his hundred hands from thee shall sever; For in such sort it hath Pleased the dread Fates, and Justice potent ever, To interweave our path. [1] Beneath whatever aspect thou wert born, Libra, or Scorpion fierce, or Capricorn, "The blustering tyrant of the western deep, This well I know, my friend, Our stars in wondrous wise one orbit keep, And in one radiance blend. From thee were Saturn's baleful rays afar Averted by great Jove's refulgent star, "And His hand stayed Fate's downward-swooping wing, When thrice with glad acclaim The teeming theatre was heard to ring, And thine the honoured name: So had the falling timber laid me low, But Pan in mercy warded off the blow,