Ode V
What slim lad holds dalliance with thee now, O Pyrrha. He will rue the day that first he tempted the bright and fickle sea. I have long since hung up my dank and dripping weeds to Neptune.Milton's version is well known. Imitation by Cowley, Johnson 5 Poets, 7. 73, and by La Fontaine.
multa . . . in rosa: probably on many a rose, i.e. a bed of roses. Cf. Marlowe, Passionate Shepherd, 'There will I make thee beds of roses.' But potare in rosa and esse in rosa may refer to garlands.—gracilis: slender.
perfusus: Epode 13. 9.—urget: woos.
sub: under (the covert of) = in. Cf. 2. 1. 39; 3. 29. 14; Epod. 9. 3.
cui: for whom? Cf. Tibull. 4. 6. 3, Tibi se laetissima compsit; Anth. Pal. 5. 228, εἰπὲ τίνι πλέξεις ἔτι βόστρυχον;—flavam: golden. Pyrrha (the name is fictitious) means flava, the fashionable color. Cf. 2. 4. 14; 3. 9. 19; 4. 4. 4.—religas: bind back; 2. 11. 24; 4. 11. 5.
simplex munditus: 'plain in thy neatness' (Milton). Cf. Pliny, N. H. 2. 4, Nam quem κόσμον Graeci nomine ornamenti appellavere, eum et nos a perfecta absolutaque elegantia mundum; Cic. de Off. 1. 36, Adhibenda est munditia non odiosa neque exquisita.—heu: cf. 1. 15. 19. n.; 3. 2 .9.—fidem: thy faithlessness. Cf. 1. 18. 16; 3. 24. 59; Ovid's de fide queri. Or supply mutatam. Cf. 3. 5. 7. n.
aspera: cf. horrida, 3. 24. 40; Verg. Aen. 3. 285, Et glacialis hiems Aquilonibus asperat undas. And for transfer to lady's temper, cf. 1. 33. 15.
nigris: effect as epithet of cause; it is the water that is made black by the wind. Cf. Epod. 10. 5; 3. 7. 1; candidi, 1. 7. 15; 2. 7. 21. n. For phenomenon, cf. Il. 7. 64, μελάνει δέ τε πόντος ὑπ¹ αὐτῆς; Tenn., 'Little breezes dusk and shiver.'
emirabitur: only here in classical Latin. The e- is intensive. Cf. 2. 14. 11, enaviganda.—insolens: unwonted to the sight. Cf. 2. 4. 2. n.; 2. 3. 3; 1. 16. 21.
credulus aurea: cf. 1. 6. 9. n. For vague use of aurea, all gold, i.e. excellent in every respect, cf. 4. 2. 23; 2. 10. 5; Theoc. 12. 16; Pindar passim; Shaks., 'Golden lads and girls all must | As chimney sweepers come to dust'; Barry Cornwall, 'Lucy is a golden girl.'
vacuam: fancy free, and so ready to entertain him.
aurae: cf. 2. 8. 24. n.; 3. 2. 20. n.
fallacis: shifting.
intentata: untried.—nites: perhaps keeping up the metaphor. Cf. Lucret. 2. 559, Subdola cum ridet placidi pellacia ponti. But cf. Glycerae nitor, 1. 19. 5; splendet, 3. 3. 25; Catull. 2. 5, desiderio meo nitenti.—tabulā . . . votivā: Sailors who had suffered shipwreck were accustomed to dedicate to Neptune or Isis some sort of tablet or picture commemorating the event, together with the clothes they had worn at the time. Cf. A. P. 20; Verg. Aen. 12. 768.
potenti: with maris.
