Page:The poems of Gaius Valerius Catullus - Francis Warre Cornish.djvu/125



The Lock of Berenice.

Conon, he who surveyed all the lights of the great heaven, who learnt the risings of the stars and their settings, how the flaming blaze of the swift sun is darkened, how the stars recede at set seasons, how sweet love calls Trivia from her airy circuit, banishing her secretly to the rocky cave of Latmus — that same Conon saw me shining brightly among the lights of heaven, me, the lock from the head of Berenice, me whom she vowed to many of the goddesses, stretching forth her smooth arms, at that season when the king, blest in his new marriage, had gone to waste the Assyrian borders.... Is Venus hated by new brides? and do they mock the joys of parents with false tears, which they shed plentifully within the bridal chamber? No, so may the gods help me, they lament not truly. This my queen taught me by all her laments, when her newly -wedded husband went forth to grim war. But your tears, forsooth, were not shed for the desertion of your widowed bed, but for the mournful parting from your dear brother, when sorrow gnawed the inmost marrow of your sad heart. At that time how from your whole breast did your anxious soul fail, bereft of sense! and yet truly I knew you to be stout-hearted from young girlhood. Have you forgotten the brave deed by which you gained a royal marriage, braver deed than which none other could ever dare? But then in your grief, when parting from your husband, what words did you utter! How often, O Juppitcr, did you brush 30