"_Epitaphium Lucretiæ_" (Vol. viii., p. 563.).--Allow me to send an
answer to the Query of BALLIOLENSIS, and to state that in that rather
scarce little book, _Epigrammata et Poematia Vetera_, he will find at
page 68. that "Epitaphium Lucretiæ" is ascribed to Modestus, perhaps the
same person who wrote a work _de re militari_. The version {113} there
given differs slightly from that of BALLIOLENSIS, and has two more
lines; it is as follows:
"Cum foderet ferro castum Lucretia pectus,
Sanguinis et torrens egereretur, ait:
Procedant testes me non favisse tyranno,
Ante virum sanguis, spiritus ante deos.
Quam recte hi testes pro me post fata loquentur,
Alter apud manes, alter apud superos."
Perhaps the following translation may not be unacceptable:
"When thro' her breast the steel Lucretia thrust,
She said, while forth th' ensanguin'd torrent gush'd;
'From me that no consent the tyrant knew,
To my spouse my blood, to heaven my soul shall show;
And thus in death these witnesses shall prove,
My innocence, to shades below, and Powers above.'"