THE LIFE OF ALBIUS TIBULLUS.
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with the offering of a lambkin, the substitution of which for the fatted calf of earlier days betrays the diminution of his fortunes. As Mr Cranstoun translates, the poet's admission runs thus:—
"Guards of a wealthy once, now poor, domain—
Ye Lares! still my gift your wardship cheers;
A fatted calf did then your altars stain,
To purify innumerable steers.
Ye Lares! still my gift your wardship cheers;
A fatted calf did then your altars stain,
To purify innumerable steers.
A lambkin now—a meagre offering—
From the few fields that still I reckon mine,
Shall fall for you while rustic voices sing:
'Oh grant the harvests, grant the generous wine!'"
—(C. i. l. 45, &c.)
From the few fields that still I reckon mine,
Shall fall for you while rustic voices sing:
'Oh grant the harvests, grant the generous wine!'"
—(C. i. l. 45, &c.)
The probable dates of his allusions to changed fortunes, in the first book of elegies, forbid the conjecture of some of his biographers that these arose from his lavish expenditure on his mistresses; and it is certainly not so much of a dilapidated roué as of one who lived simply and within his income and means, that the shrewd-judging Horace wrote in Epistle iv. (Book I.)—
"No brainless trunk is yours: a form to please,
Wealth, wit to use it, Heaven vouchsafes you these.
What could fond nurse wish more for her sweet pet,
Than friends, good looks, and health without a let,
A shrewd clear head, a tongue to speak his mind,
A seemly household, and a purse well lined?"
—Conington.
Wealth, wit to use it, Heaven vouchsafes you these.
What could fond nurse wish more for her sweet pet,
Than friends, good looks, and health without a let,
A shrewd clear head, a tongue to speak his mind,
A seemly household, and a purse well lined?"
—Conington.
Judging of him by his writings, and those of his friends, Tibullus, then, would strike us as a genial,
