Page:Catullus, Tibullus and Propertius.djvu/103

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In conclusion, the personified and constellated lock, with a happy thought, claims a toll on all maids and matrons happy in their love and nuptials, of an onyx box of perfume on the attainment of each heart's desire; and this claim it extends, foremost and first, to its mistress. Yet even this is a poor compensation for the loss of its once far prouder position, to recover which, and play again on Berenice's queenly brow, it would be well content if all the stars in the firmament should clash in a blind and chaotic collision:—

After a survey of the larger poems in the foregoing chapter, and that next before it, it would be especially out of place to attempt the barest notice of all that remains—a few very scurrilous and indelicate epigrams, having for their object the violent attacking of Cæsar, Mamurra, Gellius, and other less notable names obnoxious to our poet. By far the most part of these are so coarse, that, from their very nature, they are best left in their native language; and in this opinion we suspect we are supported by the best translators of Catullus, who deal with them sparingly and gingerly. Here and there, as in Epigram or Poem 84, Catullus