To tragic verse while thou Achilles train'st, And new sworn soldiers' maiden arms retain'st, We, Macer, sit in Venus' slothful shade, And tender love hath great things hateful made. Often at length, my wench depart I bid, She in my lap sits still as erst she did. I said, "It irks me:" half to weeping framed, "Ay me!" she cries, "to love why art ashamed?" Then wreathes about my neck her winding arms, And thousand kisses gives, that work my harms: 10 I yield, and back my wit from battles bring, Domestic acts, and mine own wars to sing. Yet tragedies, and sceptres fill'd my lines, But though I apt were for such high designs, Love laughËd at my cloak, and buskins painted, And rule, so soon with private hands acquainted. My mistress' deity also drew me fro it, And love triumpheth o'er his buskined poet. What lawful is, or we profess love's art: (Alas, my precepts turn myself to smart!) 20 We write, or what Penelope sends Ulysses, Or Phillis' tears that her Demophoon misses. What thankless Jason, Macareus, and Paris, Phedra, and Hippolyte may read, my care is. And what poor Dido, with her drawn sword sharp, Doth say, with her that loved the Aonian harp. As[328] soon as from strange lands Sabinus came, And writings did from divers places frame, White-cheeked Penelope knew Ulysses' sign, The step-dame read Hippolytus' lustless line. 30 ∆neas to Elisa answer gives, And Phillis hath to read, if now she lives. Jason's sad letter doth Hypsipyle greet; Sappho her vowed harp lays at Phoebus' feet. Nor of thee, Macer, that resound'st forth arms, Is golden love hid in Mars' mid alarms. There Paris is, and Helen's crimes record, With Laodamia, mate to her dead lord, Unless I err to these thou more incline, Than wars, and from thy tents wilt come to mine. 40 FOOTNOTES: [327] Not in Isham copy or ed. A. [328] The original has "Quam cito de toto rediit meus orbe Sabinus," &c. ELEGIA XIX.[329] Ad rivalem cui uxor curÊ non erat.