Page:Catullus, Tibullus and Propertius.djvu/115

Rh toun, the most appreciative, and, on the whole, the most successful of Tibullus's translators. "His love of home and friends, his enjoyment of the country, of hills and dales, of shepherds and sheepfolds, of smiling meadows and murmuring rivulets, of purple vineyards and yellow corn-fields, and of the innocence and simplicity of earlier days, combined with that tender melancholy which ever, cloud-like, threw a shadow o'er his brow, gives him an almost romantic interest in the eyes of modern readers; and will always secure for him, with lovers of rural scenes, one of the most enviable positions among the sons of ancient song."