My Sirmio, thou the very gem and eye
Of islands and peninsulas, that lie
In that two-fold dominion Neptune takes
Of the salt sea and sweet translucent lakes!
Oh! with what joy I visit thee again,
Scarce yet believing, how, left far behind,
The tedious Thynian and Bithynian plain,
I see thee, Sirmio, with this peaceful mind.
Oh, what a blessed thing is the sweet quiet,
When the tired heart lays down its load of care,
And after foreign toil and sickening riot,
Weary and worn, to feel at last we are
At our own home--and our own floor to tread,
And lie in peace on the long-wish'd-for bed!
This, this alone, repays all labours past.
Hail to thee, lovely Sirmio! gladly take
Thine own, own master home to thee at last:
And all ye sportive waters of my lake,
Laugh out your welcome to my cheerful voice,
And all that laughs at home, with me rejoice.
GRATIAN.--I well remember this singularly sweet, kind, affectionate
address. It is the best version of "Home is home, be it ever so homely,"
I know. You have needlessly repeated _own_. Why not say, loved master?
CURATE.--Don't you think the _acquiescimus lecto_ would be better
rendered "sink to rest?" I fancy the Latin expresses the sinking down of
the wearied limbs, or rather, whole person, into the soft and deep
feather bed.
AQUILIUS.--I Set it down so, but altered it, thinking the "lie in peace"
was in reality more quiescent than any thing expressing an act--as
sinking is a process _in transitu_--the result, lying in peace. It has
often been translated, among others, by Leigh Hunt, and that prince of
translators, Elton--though I think I was not satisfied with his
translation of the Sirmio--of the others I do not remember a word.
CURATE.--Leigh Hunt overdid his work--there is more labour than ease in
the line
"The loosened limbs o'er all the wished-for bed."
Not simple enough for Catullus; neither is this--a rather affected
line--
"Laughs every dimple in the cheek of home."
GRATIAN.--No, that won't do--it is a conceit. One would imagine it
borrowed or translated from some Italian poet.
AQUILIUS.--The "loosened limbs o'er all the wished-for bed," strikes me
as rather of the ludicrous, and not unlike the description of himself by
Berni in his fanciful palace, where he ordered a bed, adjoining that of
the French cook's, which was to be large enough to swim in--"Come si fa
nel mare."
GRATIAN.--Now then, Mr Curate, let us have your version.