Page:Statius (Mozley 1928) v1.djvu/145
SILVAE, II. ii. 142—iii. 5
tinue thus, nor ever loose thy vessel, her voyage over, to face our storms. And thou, who in wisdom dost surpass the daughters of Latium and in mind art equal to thy lord, whose spirit no cares, whose brow no menace has dismayed, but who art ever bright and happy, while joy untroubled reigns in thy countenance:—for thee no churlish money-chest keeps tight grip of hoarded wealth, no waste of greedy usury tortures thy heart, but open to all are thy riches, and thou dost enjoy them in wise restraint. No union of souls is more blest, such are the minds that Concord has taught. Learn of her in untroubled peace, ye from whose hearts the blending fires are met in a long union, and whose hallowed love keeps fast the laws of chaste affection. Go onward through the years, and outdo the centuries of old and the title-roll of ancient fame.
III. THE TREE OF ATEDIUS MELIOR
Atedius Melior, another of Statius’s rich patrons, had a plane-tree in his grounds that grew beside a pool, with a trunk that bent over and down towards the water, and then straightening itself grew upwards again; Statius’s poem is a kind of Alexandrian αἴτιον, giving the cause of the phenomenon, and reminds one also of an Ovidian Metamorphosis. It was sent to Melior as a birthday gift.
Enfolding with its overshadowing boughs the clear waters of my elegant Melior’s lake there stands a tree, whose trunk, curving from its base, bends down toward the mere, and then shoots up aloft straight to its summit, as though it grew a second time from the midst of the waves, and dwelt with hidden roots in the glassy stream. Why ask so slight a tale of
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