Lines from Horace: Ode 8

"Lydia, dic per omnis. . ."

By all the gods, O Lydia,
Tell us why you make haste
That our Sybaris for his love
Should thus be left to waste?

Why hates he now the brightening plain,
Who never before did yield
To the chafing of the burning sun,
Or the heat of the battlefield?

As venom he shuns the wrestler's oil,
And fears the Tigris' tide;
No more he bridles the Gallic steed
Among his peers to ride.

No longer from the deeds of arms
Are his limbs with bruises dark,
That once with the cast of the javelin
Achieved the noblest mark.

He hides as sea-born Thetis' son,
When woman-like he turned
From slaughter of the Trojan bands,
In the days before Troy burned.

-Translation by Thomas Banks-