Those beauteous locks are gone; which Apollo might have longed for, _and_ which Bacchus might have wished to be on his own head. With them I might compare those, which naked Dione is painted [213] as once having held up with her dripping hand. Why are you complaining that hair so badly treated is gone? Why, silly girl, do you lay down the mirror [214] with disconsolate hand? You are not seen to advantage by yourself with eyes accustomed _to your former self._ For you to please, you ought to be forgetful of your _former_ self. No enchanted herbs of a rival [215] have done you this injury; no treacherous hag has been washing you with Itæmonian water. The effects, too, of no disease have injured you; (far away be all _bad_ omens; [216]) nor has an envious tongue thinned your abundant locks;'twas your own self who gave the prepared poison to your head. Now Germany will be sending [217] for you her captured locks; by the favour of a conquered race you will be adorned. Ah! how many a time will you have to blush, as any one admires your hair; and _then_ you will say, "Now I am receiving praise for a bought commodity! In place of myself, he is now bepraising some Sygambrian girl [218] unknown to me; still, I remember _the time_ when that glory was my own." Wretch that I am! with difficulty does she restrain her tears; and she covers her face with her hand, having her delicate cheeks suffused with blushes. She is venturing to look at her former locks, _placed_ in her bosom; a treasure, alas! not fitted for that spot. [219] Calm your feelings with your features; the loss may still be repaired. Before long, you will become beauteous with your natural hair. ELEGY XV. _He tells the envious that the fame of Poets is immortal, and that theirs is not a life devoted to idleness._ |Why, gnawing Envy, dost thou blame me for years of slothfulness; and _why_ dost thou call poesy the employment of an idle mind? _Thou sayest_ that I do not, after the manner of my ancestors, while vigorous years allow me, seek the prizes of warfare covered with dust; that I do not make myself acquainted with the prosy law, and that I have not let my tongue for hire [221] in the disagreeable courts of justice.